The Best Effect Team

Elizabeth Kemler

Elizabeth Kemler is a training and coaching professional who, for twelve years has helped people discover how they can express themselves with confidence, clarity and conviction through both speech and writing. The founder of Best Effect, LLC., Elizabeth worked for seven years as the in-house presentation skills consultant and trainer for Information Builders, Inc., one of the countries largest privately held software companies. For the past ten years she has designed and facilitated workshops and developed training materials for the CONNECT communications program at the Cooper Union School of Engineering.

A graduate of Sarah Lawrence College and a Drisha Fellow, Elizabeth has an extensive background in communications and performance, founding a theater company in NYC, producing shows for public radio, and writing for educational and cultural organizations. Elizabeth is committed to helping people thrive - most particularly women, young adults, and those faced with socioeconomic and other significant life challenges. To that end, she has founded and worked with numerous non profit organizations, including the National People's Campaign, Community Access to the Arts, Greenworking, Visions and Dreams, Hawthorne Valley Farm School and most recently The Woodhull Institute. Her professional affiliations include New York Women Social Entrepreneurs, In Good Company, Net Impact, and Ladies Who Launch.

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Tim Boylan

Tim Boylan is a proven entrepreneur who co-founded and was Executive Vice President of Human-i-Tees Inc., an educational fundraising business focused on database marketing and call center activity. He was involved in all operational functions, including new product development, building strategic relationships and developing the call center. Tim is past President of Affinitybid, an auction service for nonprofit affinity groups, and was a board member of eFundraising.com, a leading web-based fundraising company in the educational sector. Tim is knowledgeable in all aspects of business operations, with special areas of concentration in strategic planning, operations, marketing and sales.

Since selling Human-i-Tees in 1999, Tim has assumed a variety of leadership positions. He was President of Statswizard, Inc., an internet enabling technology business that powers high-traffic sports web sites, including AOL, USA Today and Sporting News. He has served in the roles of investor, advisor and board member for a number of early-stage and mature companies. He received a BA in political science from Trinity College, Hartford, Connecticut.

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Brittany Gevanter, M.S.

Brittany Gevanter joins us after completing the Journalism Graduate program at Quinnipiac University, where she also received her Bachelor of Art's Degree in English and double minored in Journalism and Women's Studies.  Prior to graduating, Brittany interned at multiple companies in New York City, including MSNBC, Simon & Shuster, Inc., and The Hampton Sheet magazine. 

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Yael Silverman

Yael Silverman has worked with Best Effect, LLC. since its inception in 2008. She holds a BFA from New York University, Tisch School of the Arts. Her focus of study was drama and applied theater with an emphasis on group work and education. As a Dr.Martin Luther King, Jr. Scholar, Yael participated in international community service and empowerment projects.

Yael began her work in youth empowerment and community development with the Minnesota Organization on Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention and Parenting and with Central Touring Theater in St. Paul, Minnesota. Since moving to New York, she has worked with Theater 315, The Hemispheric EmergNYC Institute and The Centrifuge Theater Company. She has also worked in Israel with The Tel Aviv Stage Center and Birthright Israel. Yael continues to be involved in local and international organizations, working to give voice to underserved communities.

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Shawn Shafner

Shawn Shafner has been working as a teaching artist and curriculum developer in New York City schools since 2006, and has collaborated with the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum's Learning Through Art department, Periwinkle Theater for Youth, and Arts for All. Shawn received a 2005 Spielberg Fellowship to teach theatre at a summer camp in Wisconsin, and has now worked as an Artist-in-Residence at four other summer camps, in addition to leading professional development for The Foundation for Jewish Camping and New York City schools. As an actor, Shawn has collaborated on countless original productions in New York and regionally with Storahtelling, and his NYC credits include The Club at La Mama, Classic Stage Company and Joe's Pub, in addition to performing at Madison Square Garden and touring nationally as Pablo in Nickelodeon's The Backyardigans Live! Shawn holds a BFA from New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, and currently runs The People's Own Organic Power Project, an organization that uses art, performance and humor to raise awareness about current international and domestic sanitation challenges. More info at www.thePOOPproject.org

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Eliza Ladd

A performer, composer, writer, director, and teacher from New York City, Eliza Ladd holds an MFA in Theater: Contemporary Performance from Naropa University and a BA in Comparative Religion from Harvard University. She is a certified educator in Body Dynamics, a teacher of movement for the actor at Shakespeare & Company and, a Director of ensemble theater making.

Eliza has designed and taught Theater, Professional Development, and Creative Group Process workshops at Bank Street College, Young Audiences NY, The Cooper Union College of Arts and Sciences, Naropa University, and the California State Summer Arts Intensive. She has taught creative residencies and curriculum development workshops to special needs kindergarteners, gifted high school students, and public school teachers throughout the NYC public school system.

Currently in NYC Eliza is teaching at the T. Schreiber Studio, Marymount Manhattan College, and Kingsborough Community College and, throughout the country, with ThinkBuildLive Success. She is delighted to have received a Puffin Foundation Grant to develop her creative practice of Live Sound Action and to be bringing her contemporary musical, Elephants and Gold, to La Mama Theater, NYC in 2012.

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Michael Cohen

Michael Cohen is an actor, theatre creater and educator from Brooklyn, NY. He graduated from Sarah Lawrence College in 2009, with a dual focus thesis on Theatre and Social Psychology. He is a founding member of American Centaur: Classical/Experimental Theatre Company. He teaches theatre at the 14th St YMHA, is an acting member of Storahtelling-New Jewish Traditions, and proud 7 year member of Narcotics Anonymous.

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