The executive leadership team

  • Vicki Condon AM - Founder & CEO

    We are in the midst of a youth mental health crisis.  As Founder and CEO of Raise Foundation, Vicki is committed to making a significant positive impact on youth wellbeing in Australia through early intervention youth mentoring programs. Vicki has built Raise into a national charity from the ground up, by strategically attracting and leading a skilled and inspiring team of counsellors, volunteers, Board Directors, and Advisors.  Previously, Vicki had a corporate career in Human Resources and taught in Outreach at TAFE. She founded and now sits on the Board of the Together 4 Youth collective. Raise and Vicki have been recognised with various awards, and Vicki is a Member of the Order of Australia.

  • Lucy Snowball - Data & Youth Insights Director

    A data and evaluation expert, Lucy is passionate about using evidence to improve outcomes. Lucy joined Raise Foundation as the Data and Youth Insights Director in June 2021. Leading program evaluation, Lucy also ensures the youth voice is embedded across the organisation. 

    Prior to Raise, Lucy held a range of evaluation, policy and research leadership roles, most recently Lucy was the Director, Evaluation and Effectiveness at the NSW Department of Education.

     


  • Adelaide Thompson - Marketing and Fundraising Director

    A strategic fundraising and marketing expert, Adelaide brings over 10+ years’ experience in the ‘for purpose’ sector across a breadth of revenue streams from individual giving to campaigns to philanthropy.

    Prior to joining the NFP industry Adelaide worked on some of the most sophisticated loyalty schemes in the UK at leading marketing agencies such as M&C Saatchi resulting in a passion for data driven marketing.

    As Marketing and Fundraising Director, Adelaide’s role is to create a diversified fundraising portfolio to enable Raise to grow sustainably. This will assist Raise in achieving its ambition of being in every public high school in Australia so we can ensure Australia is showing up for our young people.

  • Kathleen Vella - Strategic Project Director

    Kathleen is one of Australia’s leading authorities on youth mentoring having founded the Australian Youth Mentoring Network, Australia’s first peak body for the youth mentoring sector.

    Kathleen developed the minimum operational standards that all mentoring programs in Australia are encouraged to meet. Passionate and driven to deliver programs that enable the best possible outcomes for young people, she continues to consult privately in the sector.

    As the Strategic Project Director at Raise, Kathleen is responsible for the implementation and successful delivery of new and exciting social enterprise initiative.

  • Tamara Salamacha - Program Director

    Tamara leads our Programs Team nationally delivering hundreds of programs for thousands of young people across the country.  She joined Raise in 2020 as our NSW State Manager leading our team to deliver over 100 programs across metro and regional NSW and ACT.

    Tamara's previous experience includes Programs Director with the AIEF for 6 years.  Prior to that she was the General Manager of The Shack Youth Service, Residential Program Manager for Impact Youth Services, and Program Coordinator for Life Without Barriers.  She brings a wealth of program delivery and people management expertise to the Raise village. 


Patron, Chair and Board of Directors

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