Adult Staff
Nadia Moritz, YWP Executive Director, has led the organization since 1994 as its founding director, growing the organization from a budget of $20,000 to $500,000 and designing and implementing programs that have launched thousands of teen women leaders and moved key social justice initiatives in foster care, reproductive health, sexual harassment, and other issues. Nadia’s current work focuses on organizational development and management, staff building, curricula development, fundraising, and policy development and implementation focused on reproductive health and foster care. During her tenure, Nadia has led several key initiatives including designing and developing curricula and program infrastructure for YWP’s award-winning after school programming designing curricula in youth-led project development, leadership development, reproductive health, foster care advocacy, and other issues; leading an adult-teen partnership to reform foster care group homes and older youth services.
In past lives, Nadia served as Project Coordinator and Development Associate at theInstitute for Women's Policy Research where she developed and implemented a leadership development-community action program for young women include focused on peer-led training, information, and regional organizing. She was the American Family Magazine at the Youth Policy Institute; and worked as a nonprofit consultant, organizing public relations campaigns, conducting research, editing newsletters, and coordinating events. Nadia has served on Boards and Committees, including the Board of Directors the National Committee, DC Alliance for Youth Advocates, and the Empower Program. Advisory Board for older youth programming at DC Child and Family Services Agency, Nadia graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of Pittsburgh with a BA in Writing and Women's Studies.
Christina Maria Ramos, Manager of Youth Development, Training and Reproductive Justice, comes to The Young Women’s Project with a background in training, youth development and empowerment, reproductive health, fundraising and education. She has worked the front-lines at Delta Health Care in California as a Health Educator at mainstream and alternative education schools and Teen Time Counselor at two adolescent centered clinics that combat the lack of contraception and proper sex education that girls receive, an area that she is most passionate about. She received an award from W.R.I.C.H.E (Western Region Institute for Community Health Educators) for her outstanding contribution to the field of health education. After graduating from Humboldt State University with a B.A. in Sociology and Ethnic Studies, her career path started with a year of service in the AmeriCorps program as a literacy coordinator in Portland, Oregon in which she recruited and trained volunteers for the SMART Program, Start Making a Reader Today. This solidified her dedication to giving back to her community.
She also attended California State University-Sacramento working towards a master's and teaching credential in bilingual-multicultural education and taught for many years before her segue into foundation and fundraising work for The Community College Foundation as the Northern California Area Manager of two education programs, the eBus and the 1-2-1 program. Within this role, she helped to create technology initiatives for Latina women in California so that they may secure competitive jobs in this technologically advanced world and partnered up with Habit for Humanity and the Girl Scouts of America to teach financial literacy and business development to women and young women. Her passion is reproductive justice and giving a voice to the women that historically have been ignored.
Nashwa Elgadi, Program Coordinator for the Foster Care Campaign, graduated from Temple University with a B.A. in Political Science. Beginning in her sophomore year, Nashwa tutored and mentored foster care youth at the Achieving Independence Center in Philadelphia. After college, she joined the Match Corps Program (a fellowship in urban education) at the Match Charter Public High School in Boston. MATCH is a nationally recognized, open-admissions charter school focused on preparing traditionally underserved students to succeed in college through a combination of intensive support and high rigor. Over the course of her two years there, Nashwa served in a number of different roles that directly impacted Match’s ability to fulfill that mission. In the summer of 2010, Nashwa joined the staff of the Young Women's Project as an intern for the Foster Care Campaign. In October she assumed the role of Program Coordinator for FCC policy, organizing and education initiatives. Nashwa has also been active in the Sudanese American Young Adults Project (SAYAP), an organization she helped found in January 2007. SAYAP convenes youth of the Sudanese diaspora to discuss and act upon issues of concern in present-day Sudan. Over the past three years, SAYAP has organized several educational, cultural, and fundraising events aimed at giving voice to the perspectives of Sudanese youth.”
Alexandra Dongala, Peer Health and Sexuality Intern, is a graduate of the University of Maryland, College Park. She graduated in 2009 with a BS in Biology. She is very passionate about women’s rights and has the intention of pursuing a master’s in public health, with emphasis on women’s health in the near future. One of her goal is to gain a PhD degree as well. Through her work at the Young Women’s Project, Alexandra hopes to gain valuable experience in the realm of reproductive rights legislation and the surrounding issues affecting women in both the nation and the District. In ten years from now, Alexandra hopes to lead an internationally known organization geared toward the reproductive rights of African women. On her spare time, she loves to read and bake.
More staff biographies coming soon!
