Our Team
Jennifer Rasmussen, Chair, Board of Directors
Jennifer brings 20+ years of senior leadership and experience in international development and advocacy to her role as Chair of Networks. Throughout her career, she has worked to promote human rights and the rule of law by advancing the application of international law. She joined The Center for Justice & Accountability in 2016 and currently leads their transitional justice work as Deputy Executive Director. For 8 years prior, she was Director for Asia & the Pacific and Coordinator for Access to Justice and Human Rights at the American Bar Association, where she developed programs in 14 countries in the region.Prior to joining the ABA, Jennifer was Director of program design at Global Rights, a Washington, DC-based human rights organization, where she worked for 12 years. As the creator and director of Global Rights’ Access to Justice Initiative, she worked to develop human rights programs involving public interest litigation, legal reform and advocacy in various regions of the world. Throughout her career, she has focused on building local partners’ capacity to increase legal protections for vulnerable and marginalized populations and strengthening protections available under relevant human rights frameworks.Jennifer is a graduate of American University’s Washington College of Law, where she specialized in international law. She has published on human rights and public interest law and has served as an adjunct professor for the Human Rights Institute at American University’s School of International Service. In her spare time, Jennifer can be found pursuing her equestrian and marine biology avocations.
Mark Bromley, Board of Directors
Mark is Chair and co-founder of the Council for Global Equality, an organization working to encourage a stronger American voice on international lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender human rights concerns. Previously, Mark worked for more than 11 years at Global Rights, where he served in various leadership positions, growing their acclaimed human rights and access to justice programs with emphasis in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Burundi, Morocco, Nigeria and India. In 2005, he launched an organization-wide Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Intersex Initiative.Mark regularly monitored developments within the UN human rights system. He conducted research on sexual violence in support of the International Criminal Tribunals for Rwanda and for the former Yugoslavia, and reviewed international law standards in amicus curiae briefs filed by Global Rights in human rights cases before US and international courts.In 2001-2002, Mark served as a Foreign Policy Fellow in the office of US Senator Russ Feingold, where he staffed the Senator's work on the Foreign Relations Committee, including Senator Feingold's Chairmanship of the Africa Subcommittee.Mark has published on human rights and international law issues and served as an adjunct professor for the human rights clinic at the University of Virginia School of Law and Nova Southeastern University, Shepard Broad Law Center. He lives in Washington with his husband David Salie and their daughter Tallulah and son Justice.
Duncan Furey, Board of Directors and COO
Duncan co-founded Networks of Change based on his interest to join together quality media content with savvy communications technology to help grassroots groups enhance their work. As Chief Operating Officer at Networks, Duncan oversees the creation and delivery of programs, while ensuring quality results and impact.Formerly, Duncan was Director of the MENA region programs at the Institute for War & Peace Reporting. Throughout his career, he has developed programs in more than 20 countries in conflict or transition. Working on-the-ground in some of the most challenging environments, he has designed and directed journalists' training projects in Syria, Tunisia and Libya, Afghanistan and Iraq. In Africa, Duncan developed media development programs in Uganda, Sudan, Zimbabwe and DRC. He is an expert in conducting needs assessment studies and evaluations.Between his posts at IWPR, Duncan served as program specialist for the Freedom Forum, European Center, and as the first Executive Director at the Frontline Club Charitable Trust in London, a charity dedicated to promoting free press and advancing the education of journalists globally. Duncan is known internationally for his astute needs assessment ability on-the-ground, leading to entrepreneurial media projects with strong local management. He holds a master’s degree from the University of Canterbury in International Relations and European Studies and an MBA from Warwick Business School at the University of Warwick in the UK.When not traveling, Duncan lives with his wife Lara and two children in the countryside outside of London where he tries to hone his farming skills by raising chickens.
Ria Burghardt, Co-founder & Executive Director
Ria brings a 30-year career managing nonprofit organizations in the US and internationally to Networks. When she co-founded Networks of Change in 2012, she set out to challenge the way international organizations operate. Dedicated to enriching and inspiring excellence in nonprofits, her philosophy embraces the belief that international NGOs do not need a mammoth infrastructure to successfully impact social change.For 5 years prior, she directed the US affiliate of the Institute of War & Peace Reporting, an internationally recognized media development organization. At IWPR-US she supervised programs in 24 countries and led the global fundraising team.Her experience also includes creating the inaugural development department at NetAid, a New York-based organization dedicated to fighting global poverty and at Global Rights, (formerly International Human Rights Law Group), in Washington, where she spent 8 years fundraising, designing programs and setting up operations for human rights programs in Africa, Latin America, Southeast Asia and Eastern Europe.The early 1990s found her in San Francisco as in-house counsel at SeniorNet, a startup Internet technology nonprofit, and on the adjunct faculty at the University of San Francisco, teaching Financial Management of Nonprofit Organizations to directors of domestic and international organizations. She holds a JD from Franklin Pierce Law Center.Ria lives on the banks of the Susquehanna River in Maryland with her husband George and two very goofy cats.