Team

Feel free to get in touch!

If you want to contact the Community Health team about any ideas or concerns you have, please fill out this form (with the option to remain anonymous) so we can ensure your message reaches the relevant team member.

If you want to speak about anything else but aren't sure who to contact, please fill out this form; we'll direct you to the right person.


Executive Team

Ben West

Interim Managing Director

Ben is responsible for overseeing CEA’s work during the transition to new permanent leadership. He was previously Head of the Online team. Before joining CEA, he was the founder/CTO of Health eFilings (acquired by Alpha II) and founder/CEO of Statistok (acquired by Rei Exitus, MB). He was also the software architect of an analytics platform used by almost every major healthcare organization in the US, and has served on numerous government committees related to health care and interoperability.


Max Dalton

Interim Advisor

Max was until recently CEA's Executive Director, overseeing CEA’s work and setting our overall direction. He has recently transitioned to an advisory role. Before becoming Executive Director, Max led the redesign of the EA Forum, ran the first round of EA Grants (now part of EA Funds), and did research into the cost-effectiveness of medical research. Before joining CEA, Max received an MSc in economics from the University of York, and studied philosophy, politics, and economics at the University of Oxford.


Oscar Howie

Chief of Staff

Oscar supports the work of CEA's executive team. Before joining CEA, Oscar was Chief of Staff to a member of the UK House of Lords. He studied philosophy, politics and economics at the University of Oxford.


Angelina Li

Data Analyst

Angelina works on data analytics and data operations for the executive office. Previously, she worked on content for the EA Global conference series and, before CEA, as an economic consultant at Analysis Group. Angelina founded the EA group at Wellesley College, where she studied economics and computer science, and has been interested in EA since 2014.

Events Team

Amy Willey Labenz

Head of Events

Amy manages a team of nine people to put on a wide variety of highly-impactful events, ranging from large conferences to small, specialized retreats. Her role includes managing our three program leads, budgeting and fundraising, and stakeholder management. Previously, Amy was Chief Operating Officer of the Machine Intelligence Research Institute, where she was also Executive Producer of The Singularity Summit. Amy earned a Juris Doctor degree from New York University after graduating summa cum laude from Alma College with a BA in foreign service.


Sophie Thomson

Partner Events Program Lead

Sophie leads the Partner Events team, a new program within the CEA Events team which collaborates with subject matter experts to run high-impact events. Prior to joining the Centre for Effective Altruism, she was a Business Analyst for a specialist risk advisory firm and Head of Operations at Longview Philanthropy. She has a first-class degree in Liberal Arts with a major in Philosophy from King’s College London.


Ollie Base

Community Events Manager

Ollie supports EAGx conference organisers and investigates opportunities to expand CEA's events portfolio. Previously, he worked as a Research Analyst at Longview Philanthropy, a nonprofit which advises major philanthropists focused on safeguarding the long-term future. Before Longview, Ollie was an EA group organiser at the University of Warwick and in Cologne, Germany. He holds a first-class degree in philosophy with psychology from the University of Warwick.


Eli Nathan

EA Global Project Manager

Eli works on the EA Global conference series and joined CEA in April 2022. Previously, he worked as an Operations Assistant at Open Philanthropy, where he worked on events, office management, and as a personal assistant to the Co-CEO. Eli came across EA in 2016 while studying Chemistry at the University of Oxford, and was involved in various EA group organizing projects thereafter.


Ivan Burduk

Senior Events Associate

Ivan works on the systems and communications for the EA Global conference series. Before joining CEA, Ivan was a community builder for Effective Altruism Australia and New Zealand. He has a BE(Hons) in Chemical Engineering & Materials Science, and a BSc in Physics and Chemistry from the University of Auckland - where he co-founded the EA group in 2015.


Elinor Camlin

Events Production Specialist

Elinor is a global operations, projects, and events manager with over 10 years experience in the arts and live events. She supports the Partner Events program which facilitates world-class events for people working on solving important problems. She holds a BMus in Piano Performance from the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire.


Michel Justen

Events Associate

Michel works to identify and run impactful events. Before joining CEA, he founded the University of Wisconsin–Madison's EA student group, ran workshops on existential risk reduction with Global Challenges Project, and built the EA Opportunity Board . Michel holds degrees in Neurobiology and Psychology.


Isobel Phillips

EA Global Project Manager

Isobel is responsible for programming content for EA Globals. Previously she has worked in charity evaluation, as an analyst in the Civil Service, and done direct work in NGOs. She studied Economics and Management at the University of Oxford.


Frances Lorenz

Junior Events Associate

Frances works on communications, administration, and volunteer coordination for EA Global. Previously, she worked on community building in the AI Safety space. She holds a degree in Integrated Science with a concentration in Math and Stats from McMaster University, located in Canada.

Groups Team

Jessica McCurdy

Head of Groups

Jessica leads Groups Team at CEA managing subteams focused on: university EA groups, EA virtual programs, and city and national EA Groups. We support over 300 groups across all populated continents and have funneled several thousand people through our virtual programs in the past few years. Before joining CEA, she studied Cognitive Science at Yale University. There, she led Yale EA, helped seed new EA groups, and created trainings and workshops for group organizers.


Joris Pijpers

University Groups Lead

Joris creates scalable systems and programs to help support effective altruism university groups around the world. Before joining CEA, Joris organized EAGxRotterdam, and co-founded and chaired the Positive Impact Society Erasmus. He holds a BSc degree in Liberal Arts & Sciences from Erasmus University College in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, where he majored in Philosophy, Politics & Economics.


Jake McKinnon

University Groups Associate

Jake works on supporting university and other effective altruism groups, particularly focused on mentorship, group strategy, and connections to the broader effective altruism landscape. He previously led the EA group at Stanford University, where he received a BS in Theoretical Computer Science & MS in Computer Systems.


Amarins Veringa

Groups Associate

Amarins provides support to city and national groups around the world. Before joining CEA, she was the co-director of EA Netherlands, a summer research fellow at the Happier Lives Institute and a co-founder of PISE. She holds degrees in Economics (BSc), Psychology (BSc) and Methodology (MSc).


Naomi Nederlof

CBG Manager

Naomi leads grant evaluations and provides support for the community building grants program. Alongside working for CEA, she is the executive director of the Swiss Existential Risk Initiative. Prior to CEA, Naomi was the director of EA Switzerland and EA Geneva and worked for various non-profits. She holds a BSc in Psychology and an MSc in Culture, Organisation, and Management.


Cian Mullarkey

Virtual Programs Associate

Cian works on strategy and operations for the Virtual Programs team. Previously, he ran the Effective Altruism groups at Trinity College Dublin and New York University, where he studied Mathematics and Economics. He also worked as a program manager for BERI.

People Operations

Caitlin Elizondo

Head of People Operations

Caitlin works to improve staff well-being and productivity, and manages CEA's recruiting and onboarding. She has a background in operations work from her time with the Frameworks Institute in DC and working in academic administration during her time as a graduate student at Georgetown. She has a BA in linguistics from Haverford College and an MS in sociolinguistics from Georgetown University.


Hillary Grills

Project Manager, People Operations

Hillary supports the People Operations team in transforming their systems to increase efficiency and usability. Before joining CEA, she worked on corporate sporting events in North America for clients such as Major League Baseball (MLB) and the National Hockey League (NHL), as well as Chinese lantern festivals in Europe. She also helps run the EA Ottawa group and holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Theatre Production from Toronto Metropolitan University.

Online Team

JP Addison

Interim Head of Online

JP is managing the Online team during Ben West’s tenure as Interim Managing Director. JP previously worked on the team as an engineer and Engineering Manager. He joined CEA from an aerospace startup where he wrote data processing code. He also cofounded the South Bay Effective Altruism meetup group. Before that, he was a research assistant writing code for simulations of quantum computers. He holds a BS in physics from Georgia Tech.


Sarah Cheng

Senior Software Engineer

Sarah graduated from MIT with a BS in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science and a minor in Philosophy. She worked at Care.com and then at BetterLesson, supporting educators across the United States.


Lizka Vaintrob

Content Specialist

Lizka runs the EA Newsletter and the non-engineering side of the EA Forum, and helps with a wide range of other content projects. Before starting at CEA, she worked in math education and was a visiting research fellow at Rethink Priorities. Lizka holds a BA from Columbia University with a double major in mathematics and comparative literature.


Will Howard

Software Engineer

Will is a software engineer on the EA Forum. Before joining CEA he previously worked as a developer for a supply chain logistics start-up. He holds a BA in Physics from the University of Oxford.


Ollie Etherington

Software Engineer

Ollie works as a software engineer for the EA forum. He previously worked as an engineer for a popular chess website, and before that as a musician and music teacher. He holds a BSc in mathematics and physics from The Open University.


Agnes Stenlund

Product Designer

Agnes designs the EA Forum and other digital products at CEA. She previously worked as a product designer at Intercom and Basecamp. Before she started designing software she worked as a photographer.


Toby Tremlett

Content Manager

Toby works with Lizka, running the EA Newsletter and the non-engineering side of the EA Forum, as well as facilitating a range of other content projects. Before starting at CEA, he worked as the research assistant for Richard Fisher's book The Long View, and (amongst other things) as a writer for organizations such as CAIS and Non-Trivial. Toby holds a BA in Philosophy from the University of Warwick, where he was Vice President of the Effective Altruism society.

Community Health Team

Nicole Ross

Head of Community Health and Special Projects, Trustee (EV US)

Nicole leads the Community Health team, conducts analysis on broad community health questions, and provides internal consultation to other teams within CEA. Nicole has also coordinated with other EA organizations and projects across a broad range of areas, such as communications and politics. Before joining CEA, Nicole worked at the Open Philanthropy Project, GiveWell, and the Center for Healthcare Ethics at Cedars-Sinai.

You can contact Nicole via this form (you'll be anonymous by default).


Chana Messinger

Deputy Head of Community Health and Special Projects

Chana supports high school outreach efforts and investigates areas of improvement for community epistemics (how we form beliefs about the world). Before joining CEA, Chana was a high school math teacher in Pittsburgh, New York, and London. She has also contracted for the Machine Intelligence Research Institute. She holds a BA from the University of Chicago and an MA from Columbia University.

You can contact Chana via this form (with the option of being anonymous).


Julia Wise

Community Liaison

Julia oversees community wellbeing. Her work includes projects such as improving community members’ access to mental health services and conveying feedback from more junior to more senior community members. She is also a go-to person for specific cases where community members find themselves in challenging situations. She serves on the board of GiveWell and writes about effective altruism, parenting, and other topics at Otherwise. She was president of Giving What We Can from 2017-2020. Before joining CEA, Julia was a social worker, and studied sociology at Bryn Mawr College.

You can contact Julia via this form (you'll be anonymous by default).


Catherine Low

Community Liaison

Catherine is the main contact for community health support for groups, and also works on assessing and mitigating risks to the EA community. Alongside Julia, she is a go-to person for specific cases where community members find themselves in challenging situations. Before joining CEA, Catherine managed the Students for High-Impact Charity program and taught science, physics, and ethics at the high school level. She was also heavily involved in EA community building in New Zealand and Australia. Catherine holds a PhD in physics from the University of Melbourne.

You can contact Catherine via this form (you'll be anonymous by default).


Charlotte Darnell

Community Liaison

Charlotte is one of the people community members can contact about challenges or bad experiences they have in the community. Before joining the Community Health team, Charlotte worked on the Events team and has also worked on various community building projects outside of CEA, such as EAGxOxford 2022, UK high school outreach, and university group events. She studied History and Modern Languages at the University of Exeter.


Eve McCormick

Community Health Project Manager and Senior Assistant

Eve supports the work of Nicole and other members of the team and is responsible for the team's internal systems. Before joining CEA, she was the co-director of EA Cambridge. Eve holds a degree in Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic from the University of Cambridge.

Communications

Shakeel Hashim

Head of Communications

Shakeel helps the effective altruism movement handle communications. Previously, he was a news editor at The Economist, where he also wrote about science and technology. He previously worked at Protocol, Finimize and News UK, and studied philosophy, politics and economics at the University of Oxford.

shakeel.hashim@centreforeffectivealtruism.org


Emma Richter

Communications Associate

Emma supports communications efforts across EA cause areas and the community. Before joining CEA, Emma worked in nonprofit communications and academic operations. She holds an MA in the social sciences and a BA in English and History.


Trustees and Structure

CEA is an Effective Ventures project. Effective Ventures Foundation (UK) and Effective Ventures Foundation USA Inc. are separate charities that collaborate closely under the “Effective Ventures” name.