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Meet the GenNext Cabinet
The GenNext™ Cabinet is a group of volunteers who work with United Way Toronto to engage twenty- and thirty-something Torontonians with the community through giving and volunteering.
The Cabinet helps by planning fundraising events, volunteer activities and opportunities for GenNexters to meet and connect with each other. Cabinet members also provide guidance on how best to encourage young Torontonians to get involved in the community.
Our two GenNext Cabinet Co-Chairs also sit on the United Way Campaign Cabinet and provide guidance for United Way Toronto’s annual fundraising campaign.
You can meet the members of the GenNext Cabinet below. We would also like to invite you to come out to our events to meet them in person!
2011 GenNext Cabinet Members
- GenNext Cabinet Co-Chairs
Sarah Stallan and Tim Poon - Community & Agency Engagement Officers
Chrishyami Sivaraj and Kwame Daaku - Community & Agency Engagement Committee
Kejina Robinson and Sabrina Gollnow - National Liaison
Janessa Bishop - Leadership Program Officers
Marianne Tai and Farah Qasemi
- Ambassador Network Co-Chairs
Danielle Arnold and Adam Hagarty - Ambassador Network Committee
Ehsan Sarrafian, Rebecca Cohen and Gary Kalaci - Rouge Liaison
Ashley Lewis - Member Agency Representative
Elaine Magil - GenNext Manager (United Way staff)
Rebecca Chesley
Sarah Stallan, Cabinet Co-Chair
Sarah Stallan is a Commercial Project Specialist at Chubb Insurance Company of Canada. She holds a Bachelor of Business Administration from Bishop’s University and is currently working toward her Project Management Professional (PMP) designation.
Sarah’s involvement with the United Way began in 2006, when she first joined the Rouge planning committee. She continued working on Rouge for three years, culminating as the event’s Co-Chair in 2009. This is her third year on the GenNext Cabinet and she is looking forward to her expanded role as Co-Chair of the 2011 Cabinet, responsible for managing the Ambassador Network and the GenNext signature event Rouge.
Tim Poon, Cabinet Co-Chair
Tim Poon is on the technology planning team at TELUS Communications. In this role, he coordinates TELUS’ national program for new wireless installations.
Tim’s career has led him to opportunities on national and international projects, having worked on activities in Australia, France, and the United Kingdom. Tim has also completed studies at the University of Alberta and the University of Cambridge.
Tim first joined United Way Toronto’s GenNext in 2008, volunteering with the organizing committee for United Way’s Great Neighbourhood Race. He joined the GenNext Cabinet in 2010, focusing on community and agency engagement, and linking our energetic GenNext cohort with the vast array of United Way agencies.
Chrishyami Sivaraj, Community & Agency Engagement Officer
Chrishyami Sivaraj is a bilingual Human Resources Technical Consultant working for a Federal government agency in Toronto. Her role consists of providing expert technical advice to Staffing Advisors and clients on a variety of regional staffing issues, and providing input on regional strategies and national policies.
She became actively involved with United Way Toronto in 2007 as a Rouge volunteer, and was a committee member with United Way’s Great Neighbourhood Race in 2008. She is returning to the GenNext cabinet for a second year as Community & Agency Engagement Officer and is looking forward to helping engage young professionals in community activities.
Chrishyami holds an Honours Bachelor of Business Administration degree from Wilfrid Laurier University and a Certified Human Resources Professional Designation.
Kwame Daaku, Community & Agency Engagement Officer
Kwame currently works at Scotia Capital in Foreign Exchange, where he is an Associate Director. Kwame has experience in various areas of banking and credit, including government and municipal finance, non bank financial institutions and foreign exchange. He also worked in corporate and commercial banking in West Africa.
He has volunteered with various charities including the Stephen Lewis Foundation and Sick Kids Foundation, and has been part of GenNext since 2007, where he volunteered as a Cabinet member for the Scotiabank GenNext team until 2009.
Kwame is a GenNext Cabinet member responsible for community engagement for the second year. He is an alumni of the Richard Ivey School of Business at the University of Western Ontario.
Kejina Robinson, Community & Agency Engagement Committee
Kejina is an Account Manager with ExperiencePoint. In this role, she works with executive education providers to develop training programs that incorporate ExperiencePoint learning tools.
As a member of the Community & Agency Engagement committee, Kejina hopes to help create meaningful opportunities for GenNexters to engage with specific United Way agencies.
Kejina holds an Honours Bachelors in Communication from McMaster University and is working towards a Certificate in International Development from the University of British Columbia.
In addition to being a part of the GenNext Cabinet, she also volunteers with various United Way agencies and Rethink Breast Cancer.
Sabrina Gollnow, Community & Agency Engagement Committee
Sabrina Gollnow is an experienced health promotion and fundraising professional. As a Corporate Development Officer at SickKids Foundation she works to help achieve the hospital’s fundraising goals by developing strategic partnerships and initiatives with corporations in Canada.
Sabrina worked previously as a Corporate Account Manager at the Heart and Stroke Foundation and as a Health Promotion Consultant at the Irish Heart Foundation. Earlier in her career she also worked as an elementary teacher where she created a cultural integration program to foster better collaboration among the teachers, parents and students of a remote Australian aboriginal community.
Sabrina has an Masters Degree in International Health Promotion from the National University of Ireland, as well as a Bachelors Degree/Bachelor of Physical and Health Education and a Bachelors in Education, both from Queen’s University. Sabrina swims competitively on a team and is the Chair of Board of Directors for Culture Link—a United Way funded agency.
Janessa Bishop, National Liaison
Janessa Bishop is a Senior Consultant in the consumer practice at Environics Communications. In this role, she specializes in media relations and leads public relations campaigns for various consumer clients.
Janessa has a combined Honours Degree in Journalism and English from Carleton University and is fluently bilingual.
Before joining Toronto’s GenNext Cabinet, Janessa was a member of United Way Ottawa’s NextGen Cabinet, and also helped organize the first Ottawa Timeraiser.
Marianne Tai, Leadership Program Officer
Marianne Tai is a Client Operations Manager in Eagle Investment Systems, a subsidiary company of the Bank of New York Mellon. Having obtained a Bachelor of Commerce at the University of Toronto, she is also fluent in Malay and three dialects of Chinese.
Her involvement with United Way began with being a super volunteer during CIBC Mellon’s annual United Way fundraising campaign, followed by being a Sponsored Employee with United Way Toronto in 2009, during which time she presented well over 50 speeches. Since then she has become a Leadership Level Donor, a GenNext Leadership Speaker for United Way Toronto, and a volunteer with Pathways to Education and Big Brothers and Big Sisters of Toronto.
Farah Qasemi, Leadership Program Officer
Farah currently works as a Manager and Account Driver in the banking and capital markets practice at PwC Canada. Her professional background is primarily in sales and marketing strategy, and the industries she knows well are financial services, non-profit, oil and gas, and the mid market. She is a McGill University alumni.
Farah is new to the GenNext Cabinet, but in no way new to United Way; she hails from Montreal, Quebec, where she was involved in multiple Centraide initiatives. Farah became a Leadership donor directly as a result of attending the GenNext One + 1 event last year. This year, she hopes to bring a ‘fresh pair of eyes’ to the Cabinet as a Co-Chair for the Leadership Programme, and is a firm supporter of staying involved in the community-building process beyond the giving stage. Farah speaks three languages and is looking forward to getting to know as many GenNexters as possible!
Danielle Arnold, Ambassador Network Co-Chair
Before joining Toronto’s GenNext Cabinet in 2010, Danielle was involved with several programs at the United Way of Winnipeg, including the Youth Connections Council, Community Investment Committee, and was a founding member of several youth initiatives. Danielle is also currently in her second year as a Panel Allocation Volunteer with United Way of Toronto.
Danielle Arnold is a Planning Manager at Indigo Books & Music in Toronto, working primarily with the print business. In this role, she works with procurement teams in order to maximize their sales and profits, and provides accurate weekly budgets and forecasts.
Adam Hagarty, Ambassador Network Co-Chair
Adam is a Director within Canadian Banking Operations at RBC, where he runs a services centre supporting both business and personal banking groups with major premises strategy, technology and workplace innovation, and policy and procedure-writing needs. He holds an Masters, Business Administration from the Schulich School of Business, a Professional Engineering License and Lean Six Sigma Black Belt certification, as well as management experience from General Electric and General Motors.
Prior to joining Toronto’s GenNext Cabinet in 2011, Adam was also one of the originators of RBC’s GenNext workplace program, which began in June of 2010 and is currently Co-Chairing the RBC GenNext Cabinet in 2011.
Ehsan Sarrafian, Ambassador Network Committee
Ehsan is currently finishing his Masters, Business Administration at Schulich School of Business, specializing in Marketing and Finance, and is a recipient of the Schulich Marketing Case Competition Award.
Previously, Ehsan worked as a Manager at Bell Canada, during which time he maintained a commitment to community involvement: he was an active contributor to the United Way, as well as a Bell Walk for Kids Champion. Ehsan also worked for Research In Motion (RIM), in both Marketing and Systems Engineering, and while employed at RIM he volunteered as a Campus Ambassador at the University of Waterloo. He also holds an Honours Bachelor of Computer Science from the University of Waterloo.
As a member of the GenNext Cabinet, Ehsan is excited to lead positive change in order to improve the lives of people.
Rebecca Marissa Cohen, Ambassador Network Committee
Rebecca Marissa Cohen works in public relations.
Rebecca graduated from the University of Western Ontario in 2008 with a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Political Science and Psychology. In 2010, Rebecca obtained a certificate in Public Relations from Ryerson University.
Rebecca has volunteered for a wide variety of charities, and has been volunteering with Big Brothers and Big Sisters since 2007. Rebecca is also currently involved with United Way Toronto’s Speakers Bureau.
Gary Kalaci, Ambassador Network Committee
Gary Kalaci is the CEO and founder of Alexa Translations, a translations company that provides services in over 100 languages. Gary is also a lawyer at McTavish Yen LLP where he practises corporate law. He graduated from the University of Windsor with a combined Law and Masters, Business Administration degree after having previously completed a Bachelor of Science in Biochemistry.
Gary is highly involved in the community and has previously sat on the Board of Directors of United Way Windsor and was the Chair of the GenNext Committee of United Way Windsor. He was also the Vice President of the Board of Directors of the AIDS Committee of Windsor, a past board member of University of Windsor Board of Governors and is currently the President of the Golden Future South Africa Project Board of Advisors. In 2009, Gary became the first-ever recipient of the Thérèse Casgrain Volunteer Award in the youth category presented by the federal government for outstanding contributions to his community.
Ashley Lewis, Rouge Liaison
Ashley Lewis is a marketing manager at KPMG International, part of the Global Energy, Natural Resources & Chemicals practice.
Ashley has a Bachelor of Arts from Wilfrid Laurier University and a Masters of Arts from the University of Westminster. She speaks French and Spanish.
Ashley is currently part of the GenNext Ambassador cabinet at her workplace and in 2009 was part of the planning committee for the United Way GenNext event Rouge.
Elaine Magil, Member Agency Representative
Elaine Magil has over six years of experience in social services and nonprofit management. Most recently, she has worked for the Homeward Bound program at WoodGreen Community Services, a United Way member agency. Elaine currently oversees Financial Literacy programming across WoodGreen. Previously, Elaine managed an affordable homeownership program at a United Way member agency in Seattle, Washington. She has provided client service in English, Spanish, and Mandarin Chinese. Elaine brings to the GenNext Cabinet her enthusiasm for the United Way, informed by having experienced firsthand its tremendous impact on an agency’s ability to provide a wide range of crucial frontline services.
