Our team is an incredible mosaic of women from all over the world and a hundred different professions but we all share one thing: a curiosity for the world of science.
Curious too? Hover over each team member's photo to learn more about what they love!
Founder and Chairman
Brussels, Belgium
Melissa Rancourt, Chairman & Founder. Melissa is an engineer herself and loves the Big Bang TV show. So much so that she does a workshop based on it which has proved to be one of the favourites of the girls. Melissa is a true science geek and doesn't mind who knows this!
Our Board of Directors
Africa & Event Activities Chair
Kinshasa. DRC
Asia & Gender Equity Chair
Bangalore, India
Sarah is the ultimate teacher. She looks forward to our future work with teachers to bring fun new ideas into the classroom. It isn't the surprising to know that Sarah loves to dive into the fun detail of the science experiments. Her work with g4g in the US here!
Americas & Education Chair
Bridgewater, MA, USA
Headquarter team
International Project Manager
Brussels, Belgium
When she is not posting/youtubing/instagraming or hashtaging, Marie is usually in front of her sewing machine. Or learning how to do aerial hoop. Or taking a webinar on cyber security! She visited 20 countries in the world so far and doesn't plan to stop before she saw them all. An ecofriendly advocate she firmly believes that the children will be the ones to save our planet and she can't wait to see them succeed.
Communication & Event Coordinator Brussels, Belgium
Having grown up wanting to be Indiana Jones, Alexaundra loves to find new ways to combine her passions for science, history, languages and world travel. She has a Master's degree in European Studies, co-taught an after school science program at ISB, and currently loves being a member of the g4g headquarter team!
Operations Manager
Brussels, Belgium
Déborah is a Master student in Communications at the VUB. She loves to travel and explore new cultures. She’s passionate about music, especially singing. There are so many things she still wants to learn in her life, from learning a few more languages, to learning to play a few more instruments, to learning to code. Luckily at G4g, she is learning lots of new things.
Project Coordinator
Brussels, Belgium
Lucy Reynaud is an Aussie expat married to a fabulous Frenchman and has 3 young children who were each born in different countries. She’s an all or nothing girl, therefore most likely to be found either out training for a half marathon… or lazing around reading her third book this week. She is a Gemmologist and Diamond Grader by profession, a total nerd, and likes to think of herself as a semi-professional dumpling & massage tester too.
HQ Coordinator Brussels, Belgium
Combinin her love of technology, design and science, Nikki helps lead our g4g Makerspace in Brussels. Having two daughters of her own, Nikki is passionate about inspiring the next generation to look for innovative solutions to today’s most pressing problems. When not at the g4g Atelier, Nikki can be found teaching at the International School of Brussels, tinkering with her family at home or off-the-grid in her cabin in Canada.
Makerspace Instructor, Brussels, Belgium
Global partners
I have been working in SBD for 6,5 years. In the past year, I have been in the role of Talent Management Director - beside of overall strategic talent management, learning & development and talent acquisition, also in the lead of coordinating the strategic approach for GTS EANZ (Europe Australia & New Zealand) in the fields of Corporate Social Responsibility, Diversity & Inclusion and Health & Wellbeing. I am officially certified as Coach, Internal Trainer and Internal Mentor – actively involved in developing and supporting our diverse talents and running programs related to among other things D&I. I am also actively involved in the corporate partnership with g4g and PWI and a strong supporter of empowering makers (our first CSR pillar) by engaging partnerships with educational institutions and organizations, like universities and g4g.
Global Stanley Black & Decker Contact Brussels, Belgium
Global Cisco Contact, Project Manager
Brussels, Belgium
In her work life, Rachel Owen is passionate about communicating the cool science behind a multinational company and how this translates into getting more girls inspired by STEM subjects. In her private life, she is an expert in juggling (metaphorically speaking!) two ‘lively’ young kids, a cheese and gin habit and a penchant for bad karaoke … usually on her own.
Covestro Head of Communications
Frankfort, Germany
I am truly passionate about our wonderful partnership with Greenlight for Girls and I love developing new fun events together!
AIG Corporate Citizenship and Events Manager
London, UK
Country representatives
Country Manager
Ouro Branco, Brazil
Maria took the lead initiating the global SBD partnership with greenlight for girls, as well as the advisory board. She is a D&I Champion, inspiring and connecting with the Women’s network and budget owners across the globe. She has almost 20 years of service at SBD covering several leadership roles, has been a key note speaker at Brussels Day in 2017 and Global Point of contact for 2 years. Through her leadership, our our collaboration has grown and continues to develop!
Project Manager, Brussels, Belgium
Doom is a graduate of Chemistry and is currently working on pursuing a Masters in Medicinal Chemistry. Her passion for Science has led her to take up different volunteer jobs in teaching students Basic Science, especially those in less privileged communities.
She currently works as the Senior Programme Officer for the Women’s Right to Education Programme (WREP), a Non-Governmental, non-profit organization that works to promote Girl-Child Education and Women Empowerment in Nigeria.
Doom believes in empowering Girls to become global leaders and she thinks one of the ways to achieve this is through Science and innovation.
At her free time, she likes to watch movies, read, play games and hang out with friends.
Project Manager Abuja, Nigeria
Project Manager
Dresden, Germany
Project Manager
New York City, USA
Project Manager
Athens, Greece
Michelle is our Project Leader in launching the first ever g4g event in Canberra, Australia! She has been a Software Engineer for the past 19 years, and a Girl Guide Leader with Girl Guides NSW & ACT for over 15 years. On the side, she has been involved in online businesses and system innovations, loves the adventurous outdoors and has a passion for STEM and for promoting skills and leadership in girls.
Project Manager Canberra, Australia
Project Leader
Goa, India and San Francisco
Loredana is our Venezuelan numbers geek who is able to learn first someone’s phone number or date of birth than the actual name. She is also an avid traveller who loves to meet people from all around the globe because of her interest on how people could do simple daily life so different from one place to another…specially eating given her Italian family background! She was living in Brussels when g4g was getting started and always stayed around the organization to help in any possible way ( even just to cheer-up for the great success stories it has had). Even though her personal /career path did not guided her straight into Engineering or science studies as she would loved to, she has followed numbers and STEM path through Finance and Project Management within several multinationals in the Technology, Telecom and Engineering industries. Being a witness during her work life of the need for diversity initiatives including more girls into STEM subjects, and now mother of a little girl, she is currently supporting g4g her knowledge and passion for global projects and exposure to amazing people/girls from around the world.
Project Manager Barcelona, Spain
Project Manager Tangiers, Morocco
Priscila is a Brazilian recent graduate in Mechatronics Engineering. She helped organize the very first g4g event in Brazil in 2012 and since then, she's just been more and more engaged with the goal of getting girls in STEM. Now, love has brought her to Luxembourg and the passion to inspire girls & the g4g experience has just become greater. Beginning of 2018, she will be leading the planning to launch the first ever g4g day event in Luxembourg!
Project Manager Luxembourg City, Luxembourg
Around the world
Emma is a French and English law student at Leicester University who loves to advocate for women’s rights. She hopes to one day be at the head of the UN. When she isn’t reading textbooks, she loves to watch horror movies and eat Nutella, mostly at the same time!
Project Leader Leicester, UK
Maite is a Networking Engineer w/ Cisco focused on different Security Technologies for the last 9 years. She enjoys sharing her knowledge and working with people. She believes education is the key for a better future. In her free time she loves travelling, learning and specially spending time with family and friends.
Point of Contact
Barcelona, Spain
Ewa works as Network Consulting Engineer. She loves math, networking and working with people. In her free time she travels with a photo camera, and enjoys a good game of volleyball!
Project Coordinator
Krakow, Poland
Ana is an Agrobiologist and shows our greenlight girls and her university students about the importance of Chemistry and Biology of the plant and harvesting world!
Project Coordinator
Brazil
Anna joined Cisco in October 2013 as a BI Analyst in GBS BI team and loves creating stories based on the numbers provided :). She likes challenges, process improvements and project management. In her free time, she loves cooking, travelling and meeting with people.
Project Coordinator
Krakow, Poland
Jackie is one of our first official Ambassadors since fall of 2014 at Brussels HQ. At just 12 years old, she developed her first educational app called J's Flashcards. Jackie has lived and studied in the US, China, and Europe and speaks four languages fluently, including Mandarin Chinese! She is passionate about girls' education in STEM and in her spare time takes coding, physics and math courses.
Project Coordinator
Barcelona, Spain
Project Coordinator
Goa, India
Melissa Cieto attends Bridgewater State University where she is pursuing her bachelor’s degree in Elementary Education. She loves meeting future scientists everyday as she encourages her students to explore the STEM fields.
Project Coordinator Bridgewater, MA, USA
Gosia is part of the Krakow g4g team as Project Coordinator. She works at Cisco as a Security Customer Support Engineer. She plays computer games, always smiles, and loves ice cream.
Project Coordinator
Krakow, Poland
Elisangela is the person we go to for learning about Physics. She brings her knowledge of how physics is a part of our everyday life right into her university classroom.
Project Coordinator
Brazil
Project Coordinator
Barcelona, Spain
She is a computer engineer and now a Senior engineer at Estarta-Cisco TAC. She loves being around young people, and enjoy volunteer work, especially discovering the strength in young people. She enjoys working in the networking field, considering network issues a puzzle needing to be solved.
Project Coordinator
Amman, Jordan
Project Coordinator
Krakow, Poland
Karolina has joined Cisco in 2014 as a Data Specialist in payroll team, now working as a combination of Continuous Improvement specialist and Business Analyst. She has maths background so naturally she likes numbers and analytics. Personally a mum of a girl and an equal rights believer. Plays flute and sings in Cisco choir.
Project Coordinator
Krakow, Poland
Elena is Italian and lives in Munich. She teaches science there in the European school. She's known about us since g4g Day@Brussels 2013 and she's been a fan since day 1! She 's going to look into getting g4g to come to Germany!
Project Manager
Dresden, Germany
