Executive Director Melissa Picciola is an experienced nonprofit professional and attorney with over 15 years of experience in the legal and nonprofit sectors. Most recently, she served as the Director of Pro Bono & Community Partnerships at Legal Aid Chicago. At Legal Aid Chicago, Melissa oversaw all volunteer and pro bono projects, including internships, in-house volunteers, community legal clinics, and all law firm and corporate partnerships. She created volunteer-focused projects at Legal Aid Chicago serving clients in advance directives, eviction defense, and record expungement. She joined Legal Aid Chicago in 2018 after a career dedicated to legal aid. She has practice experience in family law and domestic violence, eviction defense, and representing people with disabilities on individual and systemic matters. Melissa received both her undergraduate and law degrees from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Board President Sara Ghadiri serves as Chapman and Cutler LLP’s Pro Bono Counsel, where she supervises and administers the firm’s pro bono programming, services, and partnerships across all offices. Sara coordinates Chapman’s pro bono projects and partnerships firmwide as well as collaboration initiatives with clients. She serves as a mentor and supervises lawyers on pro bono matters in various areas of public interest law and maintains a substantive pro bono case load, much of which focuses on immigration, small business advice, pro se advice, wills and advance directives, orders of protection, and civil litigation in both federal and state court.

In her role, Sara seeks out new partnerships and strengthens existing ones, both with legal service partners and with business clients, to identify strategies for growth in pro bono work and launch new pro bono initiatives. She works closely with Chapman's financial institution clients to create pro bono partnerships with a focus on identifying relevant, succinct, and rewarding opportunities, many of which involve clinics with legal aid organization partners. Sara received her undergraduate degree from Illinois Wesleyan University and her law degree from the University of Iowa College of Law.

Board Vice President Kristen Sonday is the Co-Founder and COO of Paladin, whose mission is to increase access to justice by helping legal teams run more efficient pro bono programs. In her role, she works with law firms and Fortune 500s to staff, manage, and track their pro bono programs, focusing on the organization's impact. In addition, Kristen currently serves as the Co-Chair of the Legal Services Corporation’s Emerging Leaders Council, working to highlight the value of legal aid in the United States.

Prior to Paladin, Kristen worked on international criminal matters for the U.S. Department of Justice and served on the founding team of a New York City-based tech start-up. As a result of her work to close the justice gap, she has been named a 2017 ABA Woman in Legal Tech to Watch, ABA Journal Legal Rebel, and FastCase50 honoree. Kristen also served as a Code2040 Entrepreneur-in-Residence, supporting black and Latinx founders, and co-hosts the Latinx Founders Collective to increase diversity in tech.

Board Secretary Camilo Mitchum brings over a decade of leadership experience in healthcare and technology, with a strong focus on product development, data analytics, and customer engagement. Currently, Camilo is serving as a Senior Consultant in Data & Analytics at Slalom, where they lead and partner with senior leadership teams, information technology, operations, finance, and business partners to conceptualize new client programs and products for various Fortune 50 organizations. Their work has entailed partnering with health care plans and organizations to leverage analysis of Social Determinants of Health to create programs and interventions to target and support vulnerable patient populations in marginalized communities with challenging health conditions, focused on Oncology, Chronic Inflammatory Diseases, and complex patient management. They have worked to build programs that utilize corporate resources to provide support for local non-profit organizations and fund need-based programs for patients that are struggling to afford prescription copayments at a national-scale pharmacy organization.

Board Treasurer Sara Disney Haufe is a Vice President and Director of Traffic Engineering in the City Solutions sector of TYLin, a global engineering and advisory firm. For 20 years, Sara has supported clients in the public, private, and institutional sectors by delivering innovative, data-driven solutions that connect and elevate communities. Her work has included comprehensive transportation planning and engineering for transformative real estate investments throughout the City of Chicago and the surrounding region, as well as thoughtful visioning and design for urban corridors. Sara incorporates progressive, equity-minded principles into each project to promote safe streets for all and foster strong, resilient neighborhoods.

Sara received her undergraduate degree in Civil & Environmental Engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She is licensed as a Professional Engineer in the states of Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin, and New York and is a certified Professional Traffic Operations Engineer. As an active member of the Urban Land Institute (ULI), Sara serves on the national Transit-Oriented Development Council and on ULI Chicago’s Public Policy Committee. She was recognized by ULI Chicago in 2019 as Young Visionary of the Year and by the Illinois Real Estate Journal in 2023 as Emerging Leader of the Year.

Board Member Alyse Sagalchik is a partner in the Capital Markets Group at Katten. She primarily represents both private and public companies in a variety of capital markets and other securities transactions, including initial and follow-on public offerings, placements of equity and debt securities, and going-private transactions, as well as mergers and acquisitions and other corporate matters. In addition, Alyse regularly represents investment banks and Canadian and other non-United States issuers in connection with cross-border capital raising transactions, as well as US registration and stock exchange listing matters. She also counsels entrepreneurs, high-growth companies and investors who invest in such companies, and maintains an active pro bono practice, representing victims of domestic violence and asylum seekers, among others. Alyse is a graduate of Vanderbilt University (summa cum laude with honors) and the University of Illinois College of Law (summa cum laude).

Board Member Lauren Worsek is the Director of Pro Bono Initiatives at Lawyers for Good Government (L4GG), where she oversees the strategic direction and operations of L4GG’s national pro bono programs, mobilizing thousands of volunteers to respond to urgent legal issues nationwide. She previously served as the Director of the Pro Bono & Community Service Initiative and Assistant Director of Public Interest Law at DePaul University College of Law in Chicago, where she oversaw public interest employment and developed pro bono and community service opportunities for law students, faculty, and staff. Prior to that, she was a Portfolio Manager at Equal Justice Works in Washington, DC, where she collaborated on pro bono opportunities for Fellows and developed, launched, and managed programs providing critical immigration services nationwide. Lauren also spent years as an employee benefits associate at Seyfarth Shaw in Washington, DC, where she maintained an extensive pro bono caseload and received the firm’s Pro Bono Associate of the Year distinction. In 2024, Lauren was honored with the Tanya Neiman Pro Bono Professional of the Year Award from the National Association of Pro Bono Professionals for her work at L4GG. Lauren has a B.A. from the University of Michigan and a J.D. from Washington University in St. Louis. She also holds a Certificate in Nonprofit Management from Duke University.