Our Team

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Dr. Cliona Hannon

Dr. Cliona Hannon is the Chief Executive Officer of the Katharine Howard Foundation and a Chen Yidan Visiting Global Fellow in Harvard University 2021-2022.

Cliona was formerly Director of the Trinity Access Programmes (1999-2021), Trinity College Dublin and a Visiting Fellow and Course Director in Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford University (2016-21). She has developed a range of innovative courses to diversify admissions into selective universities and to prepare teachers in socio-economically challenged communities to lead change in their classroom, school and communities. She is an expert on the development of educational outreach and admissions routes for students from under-represented socio-economic groups, which has transformed admissions in Trinity College Dublin, the University of Oxford  and the University of Cambridge in the UK.

Cliona has a BA (History and Sociology), MA (Development Studies), MBA and a PhD (Sociology of Education). She has published a book on use of the capability approach as an evaluative lens for student development in less advantaged communities. She has also published on the financing of higher education, international admissions policies and leadership in higher education.

She took up the role of Chief Executive Officer of KHF in January 2022.

Cliona@khf.ie

Gina Allen

Gina joined KHF in 2014 to manage operational administration and programme support for the Foundation. She is an honours graduate of UCD with a degree in French and Spanish, and after completing college, she joined the Department of An Taoiseach for 3 years, working in the Information Society Commission. Following a period of travel, she returned to Ireland in 2000, joining Accenture European Service Centre, before moving to The Coca-Cola Company in 2004 where she got involved in the company’s corporate citizenship programme. Gina returned to Australia in 2007 but a desire to work in the not-for-profit area in Ireland brought her back to Dublin in 2010 where she started volunteering initially, before joining the team at Suas Educational Development fulltime from 2010-2014.

gina@khf.ie

Jane Treacy

Jane is the Finance Manager for the Katharine Howard Foundation, having joined KHF in 2016.  She is an honours graduate in Computer Science from SETU and holds qualifications in Project Management from DCU and Business Management from the NCI.  Jane’s background is in IT, and she worked with Irish software consultancy Prose (now part of Version 1) for twenty years. Her role as Software Development Manager involved working on a variety of financial and bespoke projects in government departments, RTE, the IAA, and other organisations. Jane joined the not-for-profit sector in 2007 working with Irish Charities Tax Research Ltd, managing their membership and financial systems. In 2012, she moved to the Insurance Institute of Ireland, a not-for-profit educational body, to work as a Systems Development Specialist on their student/member interface.

jane@khf.ie

Francis Chance

Francis works with KHF in a consultancy capacity, in particular supporting the Community Mothers Programme Development Project. From 2015 to March 2020 Francis worked with KHF as Programme Manager of The Nurture Programme – Infant Health and Wellbeing. Francis is a Professionally Qualified Social Worker with almost 40 years’ experience of working with children in Ireland in both the statutory and voluntary sectors including in Children and Family Services within the Eastern Health Board and, latterly, the Northern Area Health Board and as Assistant Director of Children’s Services in Barnardos. Francis has considerable experience in working strategically on committees and working groups at national, regional and local levels including the HSE Expert Group on Children (2006-2009), the Tallaght West Childhood Development Initiative, the South Dublin Children’s Services Committee and the National Steering Group for Children’s Services Committees.