Kevin Ninomiya, Chief Administrative Officer

Kevin has a passion for promoting and fostering an entrepreneurial spirit, especially among K-12 youths and university students. Kevin is the original creator of SENDforC's "QDII" curriculum, which continues to be the backbone of SENDforC's educational programs.

While volunteering for SENDforC in multiple positions since its unincorporated founding in 2012, Kevin has since then worked as a Systems Analyst Intern at Sandia National Laboratories and as a Magnetic Compressor Development Engineer for the world's No.1 HVAC company group, Daikin, where his team also received the group's "President's Excellent Product Award." He is now a Business Development Engineer for Daikin's Open Innovation Lab in Silicon Valley, finding synergies between IoT and HVAC technologies. He is also a part-time law student at Santa Clara Law in hopes to practice law in areas such as M&A and patents in the future. Kevin received his B.S. and M.S. in Mechanical Engineering from UC Berkeley.

CV: https://www.linkedin.com/in/knino25/

Email: kninomiya@sendforc.org

Natalie Kim, Chief Financial Officer

Natalie is passionate about the power of STEM and impactful mentorships. She used her time at college to support her pursuit to destruct institutional inequities and create opportunities for young students. Previously, she was the Global Forum Fellow for the namesake program series, worked in two labs, and supported multiple campaigns. Natalie holds a B.S. in Public Health, with a Minor in Bioethics, from the University of California, San Diego.

Abbas Idris, Educational Coordinator

Abbas became passionate about STEM and STEM education through various research experiences he has had. He have been involved in several REU programs and began research as a junior in high school where he saw that student success highly correlates with quality mentorship. He wants to help younger students overcome most of the hurdles they will inevitably face by providing guidance on research projects and helping them enhance their abilities to learn as researchers. He want students to know that the work they do at EVERY level matters and help reinforcing good learning habits. He holds a degree in Bioengineering and supporting knowledge on a wide range of biology and engineering concepts. He also have many fun learning projects which he hopes SENDforC can utilize to enhance student and mentor learning experience.

Jigyasaa Alemu Sood, Educational Coordinator

Jigyasaa is passionate about teaching Computer Science and mobile application development for students across the United States.

Since joining SENDforC in Fall 2015, she has served as a Mentor and Computer Science Track Lead for SENDforC San Diego. She has designed lesson plans for our mentors to teach at Crawford High School and Clairemont Boys & Girls club.

Jigyasaa also serves as an advisor to SENDforC San Diego and SENDforC Berkeley.

In particular, she is interested in creating multimedia and creative programming workshops to introduce nontechnical people to the field of software development.

Julie Yu, Financial Director

Julie is passionate about bridging the gap between minorities and majorities in STEM. She is a 4th year immunology major and has done research in academic labs for 5 years beginning in high school, resulting in one published manuscript and another in the pipeline. In addition to academic labs, she has worked in a biotech startup on campus and a small drug discovery company in Berkeley. These experiences sparked a strong interest in entrepreneurship/business and she hopes to get an MBA in the future in preparation for starting her own company/non-profit. She has accepted an associate position at ZS Associates (a top life sciences management consulting firm) starting summer 2019 and hopes to continue working with SENDforC throughout her career.

Ethan Zhu, UC San Diego

Ethan's passion for STEM, experience in tutoring, desire to innovate, and skills in leadership found opportunity to synthesize as University Director of SENDforC San Diego. From helping classmates in high school to co-founding a chapter of Future Business Leaders of America at his high school, he has practiced a diverse set of skills that are universally applicable to SENDforC's wide-ranging and holistic curriculum, providing valuable insight into STEM curriculum, mentorship, and entrepreneurship. As we seek to grow the San Diego branch, Ethan looks to set a strong foundation by structuring a capable officer team, recruit a diverse team of mentors, and establish long-term, permanent placement relationships with undeserved San Diego County K-12 communities. Ethan is currently a second year student at U.C. San Diego studying Biochemistry and Cell Biology thinking of pursuing a career in medicine and research. He is from Los Angeles and has hobbies in autos, piano, technology, and basketball.

Willy Ju, UC Berkeley

Willy is currently a 4th year at UC Berkeley studying Molecular and Cell Biology with an emphasis in Immunology and Willy is passionate in bridging gaps within educational and health care systems. As a Health Leads Advocate and Lead Resource Coordinator, Willy has been active in the Bay Area community serving low-income patients at the West County Health Center by connecting families and individuals to basic resources that they need in order to be healthy. With experience participating in Google Science Fair, creating a community garden for his eagle project, and organizing a benefits concert for Hep B research/awareness, he hopes to empower students to pursue projects that bring positive change to their community and world. As the program director Willy is responsible for ensuring UC Berkeley chapter operations are running smoothly and for promoting transparency between parent organization and chapter members. Furthermore, he act as a mentor at the partner Summit K2 High School and is the primary point of contact between the partnership school and the collegiate UC Berkeley chapter.