Tania Tzelnic, project director, is an expert in youth and workforce development. Drawing on her strong background in project design, project management, and user-experience/design thinking, she leads and advances initiatives to prepare youth for the rapidly changing digital economy. She specializes in linking private sector to youth programs through local labor market assessments, innovation and entrepreneurship challenges, and work-based learning. Tzelnic is an advocate for disability inclusion across youth workforce development programs.
Tzelnic led the USAID funded Umurimo Kuri Bose project in Rwanda, and provided technical assistance to the Mastercard Funded Building Resilience through e-Learning (BRITE) project, both in Rwanda. She also led the Bank of America funded Virtual First Jobs mentorship program in Indonesia, Thailand and the Philppines. In 2017, she led President Obama’s Young Southeast Asian Leader’s Initiative World of Food Innovation Challenge that invited youth across 10 countries in ASEAN to propose and develop solutions to address local challenges in aquaculture and agriculture.
Tzelnic holds an MA in International Relations, with a focus on International Finance, from Boston University.