Rwanda Team
Our team team is characterized by the cohesion that grows from a shared vision, a deep commitment to service and the satisfaction of effectively designing and implementing high impact education and income generation projects. A well-designed plan, a dedicated team with strong skills, good management, open communication, and financial transparency have always been at the heart of our success.
Program Manager
Zuena Umurararungu - Zuena Umurararungu is a passionate community development leader with 5+ years of experience in social impact initiatives with a proven ability to manage programs, foster partnerships, and empower beneficiaries.
Prior to joining Hands of Mothers, Zuena was a key player in socio-economic development projects that involved capacity building as well as empowerment of local rural communities. As the Associate Field Manager at GiveDirectly, Zuena was responsible for overseeing strategic initiatives aimed at promoting the use of unconditional cash transfers for households living in extreme poverty. In her previous role as the Project Manager with the Rwanda Youth in Agribusiness (RYAF), Zuena supported the design and implementation of capacity building projects for young farmers and farmer cooperatives.
Program Assistants
Immaculee Icyizanye - Immaculée is a highly motivated and creative assistant who has been working with Hands of Mothers since 2014. Immaculée’ is the primary point of contact with the families in our Education and Economic Development Initiatives. In addition to working for Hands of Mothers, Immaculée is attending college and pursuing a degree in accounting. Immaculée has given us permission to share her story.
Elisha Kwizera - One of the things that interests me most about the Hands of Mothers is the experience I had with this organization since 2018, when they started to pay my school fees to study software development in high school. After I finished high school, Hands of Mothers helped me to study photography. I have personally experienced how the Hands of Mothers initiatives impact young people’s lives. Hands of Mothers provides children with the lifetime opportunity to attend school, which is changing their lives. Hands of Mothers also supports mothers through financial and literacy training and business loans. I am honored to have the opportunity to give back to my community by working for Hands of Mothers and to share my story.
U.S. Founding Team
Susan Moinester - Managing Director
Susan’s career has traversed the sectors of women’s health advocacy, occupational health, and business. Susan has an extensive background in entrepreneurship and corporate marketing. From 1991 to 2009 Susan managed a personal accessories import start-up, CONNECT USA. Prior to launching CONNECT USA, she was Director of Marketing and New Product Development with the Dr. Scholl’s division of Schering Plough.
Susan lives in Memphis, TN where she is actively engaged in her local community on issues of social justice, education and food insecurity. She serves on the board of her synagogue and is the long-term Chair of the community engagement committee (“Tikkun Olam”). Susan is also a board member of KAVOD, an organization dedicated to providing support for the emergency needs of Holocaust Survivors in the US. Susan volunteers as a reading tutor with the Shelby County Team Read Program and as a mentor with the innovative Tennessee Promise/tnAchieves program college program. Susan holds a Master’s Degree in Social Work and Social Policy from the University of Pennsylvania and a B.A. from Brooklyn College in Psychology.
Arielle Moinester - Advisor
Arielle is the Program Director for Women’s Earth Alliance (WEA). She is committed to collaboratively building just food systems that work for people and the planet by centering the solutions of women around the world. Before moving to the Bay Area, Arielle lived in Africa and Asia designing and managing large-scale agricultural development projects and saw how women’s work in food systems was routinely sidelined to the detriment of communities, ecosystems, and the climate. Now with WEA, Arielle works with women environmental leaders and with mission-driven companies to accelerate, resource, and connect the women-led solutions we need to survive on this planet.
Arielle previously worked and lived internationally with Catholic Relief Services (CRS) managing national agricultural and livelihoods portfolios and then served as Regional Technical Advisor for Europe, Middle East, and Central Asia. Prior to CRS, Arielle co- founded Hands of Mothers, an NGO building women’s micro-enterprises globally, and co-founded the raw juice company Earthjuice. Arielle is a founding Advisory Board Member of Ag Innovation Development Group, a Development Impact Lab (DIL) Practitioner in Residence at UC Berkeley, and a 2014 Fellow of the Leadership Institute for Ecology and the Economy. Arielle earned her M.S. in Agricultural and Resource Economics and an M.S. in International Agricultural Development from the University of California, Davis.
Dr. Margot Moinester - Co-Founder and Advisor
Margot is a co-founder of Hands of Mothers and currently serves as an Advisor. She first became involved with the organization in 2007 when she worked with INEZA, an income generation project connected with Women’s Equity in Access to Care and Treatment (WE-ACTx) in Kigali, Rwanda. She subsequently returned to Rwanda as a Davis Projects for Peace recipient and worked to transition INEZA into an independent cooperative. Margot is now an Assistant Professor of Sociology at Washington University. She holds a PhD in Sociology from Harvard University.
