Leonie hails from the cross-border region of Germany, the Netherlands, and Belgium. She has a master degree in European public policy and administration from Maastricht University and in International and European law from the Vrije Universiteit Brussel. She has also lived in Budapest, Berlin and the Washington D.C. area.

Leonie has been active in JEF since the end of 2010, when JEF Netherlands was re-initiated. She was one of the co-founders of JEF Maastricht, has been active in many board positions in JEF Netherlands, ensuring that the organization would become a member section, and she stimulated inter-regional ties as one of the coordinators of the JEF Cross-Border Network. With her passion for communicating European politics and stimulating the political debate, Leonie has been active as Senior Vice-President for two mandates (2015 – 2019) and is full-time President since January 2020.

Alejandra Oriola Almarcha was born in Spain. She obtained her degree in Law at the University of Alicante, where she did her final thesis on international and European migration law. She also holds a master’s degree in Human Rights and Democratisation from the Global Campus of Human Rights in Venice, Italy. As part of her programme she went to Strasbourg, France, to research on the European Citizens’ Initiative as a push for a democratic reform within the European Union.

In addition to being a Schuman trainee in the Human Rights Action Unit of the European Parliament, she has interned at the NATO Defense College in Rome and the Permanent Representation of Spain to the Council of Europe.

Karoliina comes from Finland where she obtained her MSc. in Economics and Business Administration from the Turku School of Economics. As a part of her degree, she carried out specialisation studies on Russia and Eastern Europe at the Aleksanteri Institute. Karoliina has lived in nine different countries and accumulated experience from international organisations, state administration, security research and the humanitarian sector. She is a long-term active with JEF Finland and launched the section’s Tähdistö webzine back in 2017.

Karoliina coordinates the strategic development of communications at JEF Europe, runs the daily communication activities of the organisation, and supports a number of ongoing projects.

Michał was born in Poland and joined JEF Europe’s Secretariat after interning at the European Parliament and NATO as well as promoting human rights and youth civic engagement with several NGOs. Holding Master’s degrees in International Relations and Peace & Conflict Studies, he considers European integration the most successful peacebuilding process in history and is committed to taking it to the next level.

After coordinating the I Choose Europe campaign before and after the European Elections 2019, he is now responsible for collecting, testing and promoting ideas for more effective and youth-friendly EU as part of the project Y-FED: Europe is what we make of it.

Théo Lecarpentier was born in France. He obtained two bachelor’s degrees related to sport sciences, during which he spent one year in Norway. He also holds a master’s degree in European Project Management. As part of his programme he interned the UNESCO WWAP Office in Perugia, Italy in which he worked on gender equality and water resources. He considers European Federalism as the most efficient way to tackle the biggest challenge of the humanity: climate change.
He is responsible of the 2020 Work Plan of Europe at School Programme: New Directives and works on the Youth SDGs project.

Alexandra was born in Munich, Germany, she studied in Germany and Spain and holds a Bachelor degree in Political Sciences & Sociology and a Master degree in Intercultural Studies. Having been involved in the Youth Peace Ambassador’s campaign of the Council of Europe and working for the educational agency of the European Commission made her passionate for European youth politics and active citizenship. Alexandra is working on the administration of JEF and involved in the support of other projects.

Elitsa Hadzhieva comes from Ravda (Bulgaria) and holds a degree in Political Science. She is still finishing her Masters in European Integration and Diplomacy in the EU where she has a focus on Youth policy-making in the EU for her master thesis. During her studies, she completed several internships in local and national governmental institutions like the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Bulgaria and the Municipality of Nessebar. Elitsa has been involved in volunteering from the age of 16 and she has been a member of AEGEE for 5 years where she has worked intensively on the European elections campaign of the organisation (Y Vote project) and in raising awareness on the topics of Gender Equality and Mental health (Europe on Track project). She was also employed as a project officer for the project “My Europe. My Say.”

Elitsa has joined the European Secretariat of JEF Europe this February and she is working on the reporting of the “I Choose Europe” project and the implementation of “Y-FED” as projects assistant.