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Team

Our Team

David Coman-Hidy

David leads charitable grantmaking at The Navigation Fund, with a strong background in nonprofit advocacy and philanthropy. He previously grew a major farm animal advocacy organization and has a BS in Political Communication from Emerson College.

Kristen Diederich

Grants and Operations Director

Kristen leads our grantmaking processes at The Navigation Fund, having joined the team after spending ten years in nonprofit fundraising. She graduated with Honors from Penn State University with degrees in Biology and Psychology and earned her Master’s Degree in Primate Conservation from Oxford Brookes University.

Erin Keith, Esq.

Program Officer, Transforming Criminal Justice

Erin leads The Navigation Fund's efforts to transform the criminal legal system into one that is actually just, contributing her vast experience in legislative policy advocacy, indigent defense, legal services representation, and coalition building. She earned her B.A. in Political Science from Howard University and both her J.D. and LL.M. from Georgetown Law.

Katie Ly

Executive and Operations Assistant

Katie provides both critical support to the operations of The Navigation Fund and administrative support to the President. She has a BA from the University of California, Berkeley, and leverages her background in nonprofit operations to ensure our organization runs smoothly and efficiently.

Jesse Marks

Program Officer, Farm Animal Welfare

Jesse is the Farm Animal Welfare Program Officer at The Navigation Fund. He has more than two decades of experience running a broad range of programs and leading teams for global animal protection organizations.

Karthik Ram

Program Officer, Open Science

Karthik, a Program Officer in Open Science at The Navigation Fund, leverages his research experience to fund transformative projects. He has established key initiatives, holds a PhD from UC Davis, and is a fellow at the Berkeley Institute for Data Science.

Our Board

Seemay Chou

Chair of the Board

Seemay is a scientist, Pew Scholar, Board Member of Astera, and Co-Founder and CEO at Arcadia Science. Previously, she was an Assistant Professor in Biochemistry and Biophysics at UCSF, and she received a PhD in Molecular Cell Biology from UC Berkeley.

Jeff Gramm

Jeff manages Bandera Partners, a value-oriented hedge fund based in New York City, and teaches Shareholder Activism at Columbia Business School. He authored Dear Chairman: Boardroom Battles and the Rise of Shareholder Activism.

Jennifer Pahlka

Jennifer is a senior fellow at the Niskanen Center and the Federation of American Scientists. Previously, she served in federal government as US Deputy Chief Technology Officer and later a member of the Defense Innovation board, founded Code for America, and wrote Recoding America.

Interested in joining our team?

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