Staff and Trustees

Staff

London Project Co-ordinator

Alice Griffey manages our project with young refugees and asylum seekers in the borough of Barnet, North London. Alice has extensive experience of working with young refugees and asylum seekers and was a volunteer youth worker with the Oxford charity Asylum Welcome. She has just over three years experience teaching in an inner city London secondary school, which had a high proportion of ethnic minority and migrant pupils, where she worked as an RS teacher, Key Stage co-ordinator and Acting Head of Department. Alice was a trustee for Refugee Youth Project for several years and has acted as Education Project Coordinator and Secretary. She has a BA in Philosophy and Theology from the University of Oxford and a PGCE in Secondary education.

Trustees

Chair

Roz Evans studied for an MSc in Forced Migration at the University of Oxford’s Refugee Studies Centre in 2004-2005 and completed her doctorate in Development Studies at Oxford University in 2009. Her research explored the impact of child-focused participatory projects on Bhutanese refugee children living in camps and she spent a year conducting fieldwork in Nepal. Most recently, Roz has been doing project and youth work with young refugees in London. She has also worked with refugees as a legal adviser in Egypt, and as a English teacher and project worker with young refugees in Lebanon. She co-founded Refugee Youth Project.

Treasurer

Jon Mawby

Secretary

Grace Capel

Nepal Project Development Co-ordinator

Laura Kyrke-Smith works for a London-based international communications consultancy. She previously worked in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office having completed an MSc in International Relations at the London School of Economics. She has experience working with Chechen refugees in Russia and teaching English to refugees in Cambridge. She has twice visited Nepal to develop Refugee Youth Project's work with Bhutanese refugees.

Lebanon Project Development Co-ordinator

Catriona Pennell is currently a Lecturer in History at the University of Exeter, Cornwall Campus where she specialises in the history of the First World War and Modern Middle East. She has previous experience working and volunteering with young asylum seekers, refugees and immigrants particularly on educational support projects. She has also worked as a volunteer researcher for the Refugee Department at Amnesty Ireland. She has spent considerable time in the Middle East, in particular in Lebanon, and has been involved in Refugee Youth Project since 2005.

Legal Advisor Trustee

Jenny Barnes works as an employment lawyer in London representing charities, companies and individuals.  She has a degree in History from the University of Cambridge.  Jenny frequently undertakes pro bono legal work including delivering citizenship lessons on legal issues to school students and representing claimants from all walks of life in their employment tribunal claims through the Free Representation Unit.  Jenny has volunteered for Refugee Youth Project's London Project in the past and has visited the project in Lebanon. 

Volunteer Co-ordinator

Victoria Ing completed an MPhil in Migration Studies at the University of Oxford, with a particular research focus on unaccompanied asylum-seeking children, in 2006. Since then she has worked for 2 years in the legal aid sector as an immigration and asylum caseworker. She is now working as a Refugee Support Worker for a grass-roots community charity in South London. In the past Victoria has volunteered as a youth-worker and advice-worker for Asylum Welcome in Oxford. She also volunteered for many years as a home tutor with JACARI, an education charity working with ethnic minority children in Oxford.

Events and fundraising co-ordinator

Cara Delaney completed a BA in History from the University of Sussex. She has had extensive experience of working with young homeless people including asylum seekers in the UK; and she has also worked as a volunteer for Out of School Clubs with children aged 7–11. She has worked for a local authority for the last five years in a variety of different roles including projects funded by central government. She currently works as a business analyst.

Human Rights and Citizenship Education Adviser

Dan Jones has worked with the Education and Youth Team at Amnesty International UK for 19 years. He was previously a Youth and Community Worker in the East End of London for 18 years. He is also an artist, writer and campaigner.

Founding Trustee

Rachel Yarrow is a co-founder of Refugee Youth Project, which she started after teaching English as a volunteer in Lebanon in 2004. She is Second in the English Department at Abingdon School in Oxfordshire. She gained an MSc in Comparative and International Education at Oxford University in 2007, with a research focus on education for Palestinian refugees in Lebanon, and published work as a member of the Conflict and Education Research Group while studying for this. Before starting as a full time teacher in 2007, she had worked as a teacher and project worker with young refugees in Lebanon and the UK.

Trustee

Rosie Bayley works as a Refugee and Asylum Seeker Support Worker for a community charity in South London. She previously volunteered for Refugee Youth Project in Nepal developing activity projects for young Bhutanese refugees. She has also coordinated a youth project for young unaccompanied asylum seekers based in Brighton. Alongside this, she has extensive experience teaching English Language (ESOL) to refugees and asylum seekers. She is currently completing an MSc in Human Rights at the London School of Economics.