Step for Bulgaria Foundation’s team consists of young and enthusiastic students and professionals who exchange organizational, educational and professional experience and work jointly on the management of youth projects. Young interns from Bulgarian universities and volunteers from high-schools often take part in our project teams. Our mission is to promote volunteerism in Bulgaria, which is why we insist that all trainers in our programs be volunteers who participate in our projects to pursue their individual development through the care for and help to others.
Every year over 40 Bulgarian and foreign volunteers – university and high-school students, representatives of commercial and public organizations, psychologists and educators, participate in the initiatives of the foundation.
Our executive team consists of:
Evgenia Peeva, co-founder, President of the Executive Board
Evgenia graduated from Harvard University in 2008 with a BA in Social Studies. She launched Summer Academy STEP Bulgaria 2007 with the support of other Bulgarian students at Harvard (the Harvard Buglarian Club) and family and friends in Buglaria. From the start, working with the team and youth of SBF is a source of lots of positive energy and unique new experience for Evgenia. Her belief in the importance of education for the economic and social development of a country is key in her motivation and work at the Foundation.
Veronika Elenkova, Program Manager 
Veronika became part of our team in 2008. She comes with prior experience as a coial worker and youth supervisor as well as with academic training in psychology and psychodrama. She is extremely dedicated to the work with our young students. For a bit more than a year, Veronika successfully established good working relationships with our partner children's homes, with our volunteer trainers and with our supporters. Veronika had a key role in the implementation of our new full-year educational program "Step in the Future!".
Elena Furnadjieva, Administrative Director, board member
Since 2007, Elena has supported our work's organization and logistics. She has an engineering background, with a diploma from the National Technical University in Sofia and additional qualification in the tourist sector. Elena is committed to building lasting reltaionships with our public and private partners and making sure that the Foundation's programs are well promoted and well celebrated.
Lyudmil Milanov, National Partnerships Coordinator, board member
Lyudmil was one of the first volunteers in Summer Academy STEP Bulgaria 2007. He studies economics at the Sofia University and is a member of the Sofia University Business Club. Lyudmil is extremely good at establishing close friendship with our young students because he knows how to speak their language.
Georgi Karaivanov, International Partnerships Coordinator, board member
Georgi also participated in STEP Bulgaria 2007. Since then he became a member of our Executive Board. His academic background is in economics with diplomas from Sofia University and Germany. Since graduation Georgi has been working in the finance sector and supporting the Foundationa's activity from abroad. He is very active in creating and managing our international parnterships.
Maya Apostolova, Education Methodology Expert, board member
Maya was selected as a member of the Exective Board in 2008. She has supported us, since the start, with her experience with teaching and social psychology.
Knut Olav Klokk, Head of Strategy
Knut Olav graduated from Harvard University with a Bachelor in Economics in 2005, and the following year completed an MSc in Management Research at Oxford University. After almost 3 years with McKinsey & Company, he resigned his job in January 2010 and moved to Sofia to work pro bono as an independent consultant for Step for Bulgaria. In close collaboration with the Executive Board, Knut will work on creating a strategic plan for the organization going forward.
Click here to read Knut's blog: http://knutsbulgarianadventures.blogspot.com/
Our current volunteers - trainers in the Step in the Future! program include:
Christiana
Elitsa
Kalin
Zdravko
Ivaylo
Gaby
Christo
