Razom unites various Ukrainian activists throughout the U.S. and maintains a global network of over 2,000 people of diverse background – doctors, engineers, educators, as well as legal and financial professionals.
OUR BOARD
Dora Chomiak
President
Dora Chomiak, a native New Yorker, has been active in the Ukrainian-American community in the United States since the 1980s. Dora has been traveling to Ukraine for 25 years and worked for the independent Soros foundation in Kyiv from 1991 to 1992 when she co-founded a media incubator that launched non-governmental news organizations in newly independent Ukraine. She then led a $7 million grant from USAID until 1994 with Internews. Dora has grown businesses through marketing at brands such as McGraw-Hill, Thomson Reuters, and Baby Jogger. Dora holds an A.B from Princeton University and an M.B.A. from Columbia University. She speaks English, Ukrainian and Russian. Dora has been involved in the numerous Razom projects, and is also responsible for the Razom Partnership with Hromadske Radio.
Maria Genkin
Born and raised in Lviv, Maria has started her education in Lviv where she attended Lvivska Polytechnica. While being a student there, she co-founded a local chapter of AIESEC, an international student organization. In the summer of 1994, Maria received a scholarship from Ukrainian Professionals and Businesspeople Association to attend the summer school at HURI (Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute). The following summer, Maria came back to the United States on a scholarship from Cornell University. Maria started her professional career at Goldman Sachs. After her son, Aaron, was born in 2004, she left Goldman Sachs and since pursued a variety of projects in education and culture. Maria has been deeply involved with Razom since 2017 and has been an enthusiastic supporter since 2014 when she attended a concert by Taras Chubai in New York. It is Maria who co-founded and is now managing the Razom Book Club. It’s Maria who initiated and built the partnership with the Serhiy Zhadan Charitable Foundation in Ukraine. In her tenure on Razom Board Maria hopes to contribute to unlocking the potential of Ukraine.
Anastasia Rab
Nastia Rab was born and raised in Lviv, Ukraine and currently resides in Wisconsin, not far from the Chicago area Ukrainian-American community where she grew up as a teen and a proud Plastunka. Nastia gained a degree in Political Science and French from Barnard College in New York City and started her career in tech at PowerToFly, a mission-driven startup in the diversity, equity and inclusion space. Earlier, Nastia gained valuable experience working at the Council of Europe in France, the Global Women’s Leadership Initiative in Romania, and the Athena Leadership Center at Barnard College.
Nastia got hooked on Razom through the Razom IT project, inspired by the incredible ideas and change-makers coming out of Ukraine that the project exposed her to. She went on to help host the Razom IT Trip in 2016 and Razom IT Speaker Series aimed at amplifying the voices of people from Ukraine in conversations in the US, and to build a community of people in New York who are interested in the intersection of tech and Ukraine. Nastia helped organize and manage many events throughout the years and later served as Secretary to the board for three years.
Olya Yarychkivska
Olya has been with Razom since the very beginning and is one of the co-founders of the organization. Olya has been very active for years and was a Board member for a while, until she had to put her activism on a pause while finishing her PhD in Molecular Biology from Columbia University. Since receiving the degree, Olya got herself fully submerged in the campaign to save little Dmytryk from Odesa, who was diagnosed with a rare genetic disease SMA. Being one of the most active leaders for the campaign #ДітиМиВстигнемо (#ChildrenWeWillMakeItOnTime), after the required $2million was raised for the life-saving medication, Olya continued with the initiative starting the Save SMA Children project within Razom. The project raises public awareness of the harsh situation of Ukrainian children with rare genetic disease and aims to improve healthcare delivery and access to newly available treatments for Ukrainian children suffering from spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) through official changes in medical support legislation.
OUR LEADERSHIP TEAM
Oksana Falenchuk
Treasurer
Oksana’s passion for supporting the young generation of Ukrainians brought her to Razom in 2016. She has been managing the Razom Partners program and is involved in several projects focusing on leadership, education, and culture. Oksana spent five years in London as a management consultant and over a decade on Wall Street as an equity analyst researching and investing in the consumer sectors. A native of Ternopil, Oksana is fluent in Ukrainian and travels frequently to her home country. She has a BA in Economics from Kyiv Mohyla Academy and MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.
Evelina Kurilets
Executive Director of Razom Dlia Ukrainy (Razom affiliate in Ukraine)
Evelina was born, grew up and lives in Ukraine. A graduate of MAUP and KNEU. She worked in the financial sector for a long time. She volunteered all her conscious life, but 5 years ago she completely switched to work on the implementation of charitable projects. At one time, she founded a support foundation for children with scoliosis. As a member of Razom, she volunteered at different times in various projects: Co-Pilot Project, Razom Toy Drive, Save SMA Children, and the Emergency Response. Evelina was elected as an Executive Director of the Ukrainian part of Razom called Razom Dlia Ukrainy (Разом Для України) in 2021, and started in this role in early 2022.
Maryna Prykhodko
Maryna Prykhodko was born and raised in Kharkiv, Ukraine and currently resides in New York City. Inspired by the irreversible spirit of Euromaidan, Maryna has volunteered with Razom since its beginning in 2014.
Maryna graduated in 2018 with her Master’s degree in International Relations from New York University’s Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. She also received her undergraduate degree in Politics, Rights, and Development from New York University. She has previously worked on gender policy and peacekeeping in the UN through various NGOs and during the annual UN Commission on the Status of Women. Before returning to working at the UN, Maryna did a two-year stint in the music business and entertainment industry.
Maryna frequently travels home to Kharkiv and is eager to share the magic of her hometown with everyone she meets.
Zoe Ripecky
Zoe Ripecky grew up in the Ukrainian-American community of Chicago. Zoe regularly visits the country of her grandparents and lived in Kyiv during a year-long Fulbright Fellowship focused on Ukraine’s energy sector. During that time she partnered with leading Kyiv-based NGO DiXi Group to develop a multilateral energy diplomacy strategy for Ukraine’s Ministry of Energy. Upon returning to the US, Zoe got her first gig volunteering with Razom: authoring a chapter on Ukraine’s energy sector in Razom’s first major congressional report. Since then, Zoe has worked as a project manager in the non-profit sector, consulted companies and investors on ESG and sustainability strategies, and most recently worked as an investment banker at Goldman Sachs. Zoe holds a BA from Vassar College and an MBA and MEM (Master of Environmental Management) from Duke University. She is excited about applying her diverse experiences in non-profits, business, and finance to unlocking the potential of Ukraine with Razom.
Mariya Soroka
In 2014 at the peak of protests in the Maidan, Mariya joined several fellow Ukrainians living in New York City to create Razom, a young, energetic, and progressive start-up which seeks to amplify the voice of Ukraine to an American audience. An active member of the board, she has been long responsible for organizing cultural events as well as cooperating with government representatives, activists, and various civic groups and human rights organizations in support of Ukraine’s quest for democracy. Currently, Mariya is the lead of the Co-Pilot Project, which aims to raise the bar of neurosurgical training in Ukraine.
Mariya is also heavily involved with fundraising for Razom’s projects via crowdsourcing, charity events, and online petitions. After graduating from Penn State University with a BA in Advertising and Public Relations and a dual minor in Entrepreneurship and International Studies, Mariya spent several years in Manhattan working within the content marketing industry. She believes in the enormous potential of dedicated volunteers around the world working to rebuild Ukraine one project at a time.
Former board members:
- Anna Shpook
- Viktor Berezyuk
- Makar Kobylinskyi
- Ivanna Bilych
- Bohdan Pechenyak
- Anastasiia Rybytska
- Bohdan Polovko
- Natalia Shyrba
- Tetyana Dzhula
- Daria Ozimko
- Yulia Paslavska
- Olya Yarychkivska
- Anya Sobolevska
- Iryna Mazur
- Oleksii Prokopenko
- Lyuba Shipovich
- Dmytro Kavun
- Mariya Soroka
- Oksana Falenchuk
- Maryna Prykhodko
