The people of Panta Rhea

STAFF

Connie Archbold Robinson

Chief Executive Officer

Connie joined Panta Rhea in 2019. She serves as an officer of the board providing organizational oversight and cultivating strategic global partnerships. 

Prior to joining Panta Rhea, Connie served as grantmaking portfolio director on The James Irvine Foundation’s executive team. Connie has also played staff leadership and board governance roles at philanthropic and community-based organizations across California, the Caribbean, and Americas.

Connie serves on the founding board of Raizal Diaspora Foundation, supporting the Caribbean islands of San Andres, Providence, and Santa Catalina, Colombia. She was also a commissioner and chair of California’s inaugural, award-winning Citizens Redistricting Commission from 2010-2020, and trustee for the SoCal Grantmakers & Funders Committee for Civic Participation.

Connie holds a Master of City and Regional Planning degree from the University of California at Berkeley, and a BA in Communications and Spanish from La Sierra University.

Connie loves travel, exploring nature, and cultures all around the world.

Amalia Brindis Delgado

Chief Strategy Officer

As Panta Rhea’s first chief strategy officer, Amalia oversees the foundation’s strategy and programs, collaborating closely with community and philanthropic partners across the Caribbean and the Americas. 

Amalia has more than 20 years of leadership experience in global and US-based social entrepreneurship, philanthropy, and nonprofit organizational development. Before coming to Panta Rhea, Amalia worked for five years at Hispanics in Philanthropy as vice president of strategy and impact, where she spearheaded the development of new program strategies and oversaw migration, climate, power building, and justice initiatives. 

Earlier in her career as a Fulbright Scholar in Turkey, and through her work at Jesuit Refugee Services, the ACLU, Amnesty International, and other organizations, Amalia launched several initiatives that continue to transform systems and build power for grassroot communities. Amalia co-founded Asylum Access, an international refugee advocacy organization in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, where she served as a board member and a staff member for a total of 12 years. She currently serves on the board of directors of United Philanthropy Forum and Grantmakers Concerned with Immigrants and Refugees. 

Amalia is a licensed lawyer in California and received her Juris Doctor degree at Washington College of Law. Born in Venezuela and raised in the U.S. Virgin Islands, Amalia currently lives near Washington, D.C. surrounded by family, nature, music, and art.

Gerlie Collado

Grants & Administration Lead

As the grants and administration lead, Gerlie provides programmatic support and serves as the central hub for Panta Rhea’s grantmaking and administrative activities.

Gerlie brings a diverse skillset to Panta Rhea, developed over nearly 20 years in the nonprofit sector. Prior to Panta Rhea, she helped award up to $20 million in grants annually to California-based arts organizations with The James Irvine Foundation. Before that, she served on the communications team for the California Community Foundation, and curated and designed arts engagement programs at The Music Center, the Performing Arts Center of Los Angeles County, and The Pasadena Playhouse.

Passionate about civic and community engagement, Gerlie currently serves as a regional planning commissioner for the City of Los Angeles and as a board member of Visual Communications, the nation’s premier Asian American media arts organization.

Gerlie earned a Master of Arts Management from Claremont Graduate University and a Bachelor of Business Administration from the University of San Francisco.

Itziar Mondragón

Executive Assistant to the President & Co-chair

Based in Mexico City, Itziar joined Panta Rhea in 2024. She serves as the primary administrative support for President and Co-Chair Lisl Schoepflin. In addition to managing Lisl’s agenda, Itziar helps coordinate events and board meetings.

Before joining the team, Itziar worked as an editor, event planner, team manager, and educator on several cultural projects. Alongside these roles, she has kept her own art practice—gestural, abstract mixed-media paintings on unstretched cotton canvas.

She has a Master of Arts in Art History from the Academy of Art University and a Bachelor of Arts in Communications from Universidad Iberoamericana.

BOARD

Lisl Schoepflin

President & Co-Chair

Lisl is a mother, historian, and author. She joined the Panta Rhea Foundation board in 2008 and became chair and president in 2017. She also serves as deputy chair of the Schöpflin Foundation based in Lörrach, Germany; trustee for Casa Gallina in Mexico City, Mexico; and trustee for the Spore Initiative in Berlin, Germany. She served in the Solidaire Network as trustee and co-facilitator of family philanthropy solidarity circles from 2018-2023.

As a historian, Lisl’s research and publications focus on Indigenous and colonial history and social memory practices of the Americas, particularly the Andean region. Select awards and fellowships include the Foreign Language and Areas Studies fellowship to study Quechua in Cusco, Peru; the Fulbright-Hays Dissertation fellowship to conduct archival research in Peru; Getty Research Institute’s Scholar Fellowship in Los Angeles; and UCLA History’s 2023 Best Dissertation award. In 2024-2025 she held a postdoctoral position at the Instituto de Investigaciones Estéticas in the Universidad Autonomía Nacional de México.

Lisl completed her BA in Anthropology and Theater Arts at the University of Pennsylvania, and MA and PhD in Latin American History at UCLA. She completed her BA in Anthropology and Theater Arts at the University of Pennsylvania, and MA and PhD in Latin American History at UCLA.

Lisl currently lives in Mexico City with her family. She loves spending time in nature, traveling, skiing, camping, dancing, reading, trying her hand at guitar and piano, and—most of all—being with her two sons and husband.

Holly Roberson

Co-Chair

Holly joined the Panta Rhea board in 2015 and became co-chair of the board in 2020. She brings 25 years of experience as a cross-sector practitioner, entrepreneur, and organizer in food, philanthropy, social entrepreneurship, and the arts.

Holly has spent years mobilizing families, activists, artists, and broader networks in support of philanthropy, impact investing, movement building, and social enterprise. In her home state of Missouri, Holly established and grew three interrelated social enterprises: Terra Bella Farm, a 200-acre organic farm that partners with a farm-to-table brewery; Ragtag Cinema, an independent film house and home to the True/False Film Fest; and Uprise Bakery, an organic bakery, bar, and community space.

Holly enjoys various board and advisory roles in philanthropy, organizing, and the arts, including her most recent role as a project advisor for Transmission Quilts.
Holly holds a BA from Bryn Mawr College and has enjoyed artist residencies in the U.S. and globally.

Holly is a potter who works primarily out of her home studio in Northern California, where she lives with her partner and two creative, energetic teenage boys. Her current practice involves the use of wild clay and explores themes of place, grief, and repose. She is a member of the Berkeley Potters’ Studio.

Cedric Brown

Board Member

Cedric has served on the Panta Rhea board since 2022. As a trustee, he especially cherishes the opportunity to advise and help shape Panta Rhea’s philanthropic strategies and impact.

An award-winning social impact leader, Cedric has spent decades working to increase opportunities for people of color through leadership development, tech inclusion, college readiness, cultural representation, voter education, and philanthropy.

He managed global leadership programs for the Obama Foundation, where he designed and launched two programs in direct consultation with the eponymous president, and co-led the Kapor Foundation and Center for over a decade. He has also held roles or collaborated with ABFE, Georgetown University’s Center for Public and Nonprofit Leadership, the Museum of the African Diaspora, the Oakland Museum of California, and the San Francisco Foundation.

Cedric is currently a Senior Atlantic Fellow, board chair of the Atlantic Fellows for Racial Equity, and founder of the boutique consultancy Blue Skies Advising.

Cedric holds academic degrees from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Stanford University, as well as executive certificate credentials from Georgetown University and the London School of Economics and Political Science.

He is an everyday poet and an occasional artist who also enjoys reading, running, writing, and alliteration.

Adelaide "Daidie" Donnelly

Board Member

Adelaide is a psychotherapist and life coach with decades of experience in community mental health, criminal justice, and secondary education.

She also has a particular interest in sustainable agriculture—which grew out of her 40-year involvement with the Chez Panisse restaurant—and 50 years of experience in the arts, including photography, film, theater, and creative writing.

She currently helps individuals with life transitions, and is involved with several nonprofits in Northern California.

She is working on a novel, and gets great joy from her four grandchildren and the natural surroundings in which she lives.

Solomé Lemma

Board Member

Solomé is the president and CEO of Thousand Currents, an organization that supports grassroots groups and movements from the global south that are working toward food, climate, and economic justice. She joined Panta Rhea as a board member in 2021.

Previously, Solomé worked with Africans in the Diaspora, Global Fund for Children, and Human Rights Watch in New York City, among other organizations.

She received a Master’s in Public Policy from the Harvard Kennedy School and a Bachelor’s in International Relations from Stanford University.

Solomé spends her free time parenting her delightful and inquisitive kid, and taking long walks to unwind.