Staff
Founder & Executive Director
TAZ TAGORE is a designer, social entrepreneur, author and management consultant. Her design experience spans the fashion, product, theater and museum sectors. She was a strategy consultant at The Boston Consulting Group, an investment banker on Wall Street and led the Sales/Marketing team at Edwin Schlossberg’s design firm (ESI Design). She currently consults to leading corporations such as Mattel, ConocoPhillips and Atom-Shockwave. Tagore has spent over 15 years volunteering at youth shelters and working with homeless youth in the U.S., Canada and in India. She has been featured on ABC-News and in publications such as the New York Times, Daily News, Metropolis, Yoga Journal, Breathe, Fit Yoga, the Globe & Mail and the New York Post. She graduated from Queen’s University with a degree in Biology and Chemistry and earned an MBA from the Harvard Business School. She was named a Dean’s Fellow by the Harvard Business School in 2001.
Founder & Managing Director
ADAM BUCKO is a trained sociologist, lecturer, social services sector consultant and a veteran homeless youth program coordinator. Throughout his career, he has performed extensive research on new models for the youth shelter system and has worked directly with homeless children and youth for nearly ten years. He has collaborated with Covenant House, Coalition for the Homeless, and Stand Up for Kids on program development and also shaped programming at an experimental “community of the poor” in India. He holds undergraduate and graduate degrees in Theology, Philosophy and Social Science and taught sociology and gender issues at Adelphi University.
LGBTQ Services Coordinator
RJ SUPA has been involved in social services for more than 10 years. With a lengthy history of direct service among various homeless and at-risk populations RJ is interested in continuing his work by eventually moving into a policy and advocacy-related position. He currently works for the Ali Forney Center as the Vocational and Educational Services Coordinator and at The Reciprocity Foundation.
Director of PR & Marketing
ANDREE DESMARAIS moved to New York City two years ago from Cape Town, South Africa. She worked in the south African magazine industry for 5 years on Shape, Men’s Health and Real Simple, and most recently as Art Director of award winning Seventeen South Africa. She art directed and designed a cookbook, has consulted on magazine launches and trend forecasts for a South African retail group.
Design & Marketing Manager
DAVID GONZALEZ is a fashion designer and stylist. He graduated from the Reciprocity Foundation’s Proof of Concept program in 2006 and will be designing new products for the line and leading the sales/ marketing efforts to grow Appreciate Design. He is a former youth employee of FIERCE!