Allison Lynch is currently Chief Operating Officer at the Brooklyn Cooperative Federal Credit Union, a community development credit union providing micro-enterprise lending, savings, homeownership, and other asset building programs in low-income communities in Brooklyn. She is also founded and directs the Incubator Program of New York Women Social Entrepreneurs. Her professional experience spans fifteen years in international and domestic economic development, including banking sector reform and small business development in the former Soviet Union and public-private partnership for statewide development with the Massachusetts Alliance for Economic Development. She has also been instrumental in launching and developing several non-profit organizations, both in the US and abroad. Allison understands the social determinants and impacts of poverty and marginalization from managing programs that introduce new models of health and social services in Russia and Ukraine. She received her masters in International Affairs with a concentration in International Finance and Business from Columbia University.