Board of Directors

In 2009, SAFER reorganized as an entirely volunteer collective. Our Board of Directors is responsible for all aspects of organizational functioning and programming, while also working full time or attending school. We value diversity, and strive to maintain a Board that represents the wide range of student experiences in order to better serve our college audience. For information on how to join SAFER's Board, please contact us. 

Who We Are

Christine Borges, M.P.H., currently works with domestic violence survivors at one of the nation’s first Family Justice Centers in Brooklyn and previously worked as a rape crisis counselor and educator for a community-based organization, also in Brooklyn. She has volunteered as an anti-violence advocate and activist since 2001 and has also worked on several NIH and CDC funded clinical trials in the area of HIV prevention. Christine recently received her M.P.H. from the Urban Public Health program at Hunter College and received her BA in Psychology from Boston University.

Erin Burrows, M.A., completed her Fifth Year MA in Women’s History at Sarah Lawrence in 2009. She was a leader in the successful campaign at Sarah Lawrence College to rewrite the Sexual Harassment and Sexual Assault Policy and improve sexual assault services on campus. Erin was heavily involved with feminist and queer organizing on campus, leading to numerous changes in programming and policy including mandatory anti-oppression training for student senators. Erin was awarded the Senior Appreciation Award for recognition of her undergraduate leadership in 2008. She has been working for SAFER since August, 2008 and joined the board in May, 2009.  She currently works as a Community Educator in the Domestic Violence Education and Prevention Program at My Sisters' Place, based in Yonkers, NY.

Renée Heininger graduated from New York University with her B.S. in Media, Culture and Communication in January 2010; she spent her senior year writing an honors thesis on the intersections of street harassment and new media.  She is currently enjoying time off from school while volunteering for V-Day 2010 in her hometown of Rochester, NY.  Renée has been running her own D.I.Y. punk record label, CrotchRot Records, since 2007.  Renée began working with SAFER as an intern in June 2009 and joined the Board in October 2009.

Jennifer Howard, M.A., is currently a Program Associate with the New Jersey Sexual Violence Initiative at the Vera Institute of Justice, providing technical assistance to NJ rape crisis centers as they work to implement primary prevention programming. Prior to this position, Jennifer coordinated service learning programs at the University of Notre Dame and worked as a research assistant to an author who writes on gender violence among youth. In graduate school, she interned with several nonprofits including the National Center for Victims of Crime, Girls Incorporated’s Public Policy office, the Washington Area Women’s Foundation, and the Institute for Women’s Policy Research. Jennifer holds a Bachelor’s degree from Vanderbilt University, a Master’s degree in Women’s Studies with a concentration in Gender and Violence from the George Washington University, and she is completing a Master’s in Nonprofit Administration from the Mendoza College of Business at the University of Notre Dame.

Jenise Jenkins, M.A., invested in the fight to end violence against women, joined SAFER's Board in October, 2009.  In 2008 Jenise received her MA in Forensic Psychology from John Jay College of Criminal Justice. She dedicated her studies to researching the effects of intimate partner violence on college students. Jenise completed an undergraduate degree in Psychology from Fisk University. While a student at Fisk University, she helped to organize and lead the Clothesline Project in collaboration with Vanderbilt University's Women's Center.  The Project successfully united college communities in Nashville to raise awareness of violence against women, in an effort to give a voice to survivors, victims, and victims loved ones. Currently, Jenise works as an advocate for victims of domestic violence at the NYC Family Justice Center in Brooklyn.

Ashley Lauren Kleinman joined the SAFER Board of Directors in October, 2009.  Ashley Graduated from Marymount Manhattan College in 2008, where she completed a B.A. in both Psychology & Theatre as well as a minor in Drama Therapy.  At Marymount Ashley served as the President of  The Feminist Majority Leadership Alliance for two years and has been a certified volunteer, Rape-Crisis Advocate at Bellevue Hospital Center since 2005. In 2004 Ashley joined V-Day: A Movement to End Violence Against Women and Girls and has been producing annual productions of The Vagina Monologues since then, donating 100% of the profits to the cause.  Ashley will continue her education in Drama Therapy, in hopes to fuse her passions of theatre, psychology & human service; to save the world, one step at a time.

Sarah Martino began volunteering for SAFER in June 2008 and officially joined the Board in May 2009. Sarah received her B.A. in Literature and Creative Writing in 2007 from Bard College, where she was also involved with student journalism and a literary magazine for incarcerated students. She currently works in communications at the William T.Grant Foundation and also volunteers with the New York City Writer's Coalition.

Jenny Ohrstrom, M.A., recently finished a Masters in Contemporary Indian studies at the University of Oxford and upon returning to the US, moved to the Big Apple and joined SAFER as an intern. During her undergraduate studies at Soka University of America she founded and led the only two women's rights groups on campus--a radical anti-rape demonstration group and a (still radical) consciousness-raising weekly discussion group.  The club's greatest achievements were the tightening of the university's sexual assault policy and the orchestration of the first ever Vagina Monologues at Soka University, from which the proceeds went to the Panzi Hospital for women and girls in the Congo.  She is dedicated to human rights activism, writing, piano, and her cat, bibim bop.

Kaja Tretjak, Esq. (Chair) is currently a doctoral candidate in the Department of Anthropology at the City University of New York, Graduate Center, focusing on social movements and law. She holds a J.D. from the University of California, Berkeley School of Law (Boalt Hall) and a B.A. from Columbia University. Kaja was a founding member of SAFER at its inception as a student group at Columbia University, helped constitute it as an independent non-profit organization, and has been involved ever since.

Davinia Troughton works within the Initiatives for Women and Girls at NoVo Foundation where previously, she was the Manager of Research and Grants. Prior to joining NoVo, she worked at the Rudolf Steiner Foundation’s east coast office in Manhattan. She is a rape crisis counselor through the St. Luke’s Roosevelt Hospital system in New York City, and she volunteers regularly at Sanctuary for Families within the Children’s Program. She received a degree in international trade and finance from Louisiana State University.

Dan Wald is a graduate from Ithaca College during his tenure he started a proactive student organization to end rape and rape culture. Dan also was a co-founder of the sexual assault workgroup which spearheaded many judicial policy changes that passed and made IC a more survivor friendly campus. He is currently pursuing a health policy career.

Wagatwe Wanjuki studied international relations at Tufts University with a concentration in social justice. As a peer educator in Prevention, Awareness and Consent at Tufts, she gained interest in gender issues and relationship violence. She was one of the spearheads in the campaign to create a sexual assault policy and change the the judicial process for sexual misconduct cases. She still fights for sexual assault policy reform at Tufts from home in New Jersey through writing for the Tufts University Survivors website.