About

Team and board

Forty-one people across two centres. Almost half came through our programmes as students or clients.

Eleni Markatou

Co-founder and Executive Director

Eleni began her career as a Greek-language teacher in the public school system of Kypseli, where she taught for nine years before starting the foundation. She holds a degree in Modern Greek Philology from the University of Athens and a postgraduate certificate in adult education from the Hellenic Open University. She runs the pedagogical curriculum and chairs the executive committee. On Saturdays she still teaches one A1 class herself, a habit she refuses to give up.

Dr. Hossein Karimi

Co-founder and Director of Programmes

Hossein trained as a paediatrician in Tehran (Tehran University of Medical Sciences, MD 2003) and practised for eleven years before he and his family arrived in Greece in 2015. He directs the six programme tracks and the caseworker model. He sits on the board of GIVE Greece and advises the Hellenic Red Cross on integration policy. He speaks Farsi, English, Greek, and basic Arabic.

Maria-Christina Voulgari

Director of Legal Services

Maria-Christina is a registered solicitor with the Athens Bar (no. 38420), specialising in asylum and family-reunification law. She joined as a founding board member and moved into a salaried role in 2019. She holds an LLM in International Refugee Law from SOAS, University of London. She runs the Legal Navigation Clinic and the volunteer-lawyer rota of fourteen practising solicitors.

Kweku Asante-Owusu

Director of Vocational Bridge

Kweku grew up in Accra and worked in regional logistics for fifteen years before he and his wife resettled in Athens in 2014. He joined the founding board and now leads the employment-placement programme. He has personal relationships with all 38 employer partners and reviews every placement at month three and month twelve. He holds a BSc in Business Administration from the University of Ghana.

Sofia Petraki

Coordinator, Children’s Learning Hub

Sofia is a primary-school teacher with twelve years of classroom experience in Athens public schools. She designed and runs the after-school programme at Spaton 38, including the holiday camps and the school-enrolment support service. She holds a postgraduate diploma in Trauma-Informed Pedagogy from Goldsmiths, University of London. She speaks Greek, English, and conversational Arabic.

Bilal Hamdan

Senior Caseworker, Vocational Bridge

Bilal arrived in Greece in 2017 from Aleppo. He completed the Vocational Bridge programme himself in 2018 and worked at a partner hotel for two years before joining the staff in 2020. He is one of three senior caseworkers and manages the hospitality and healthcare-auxiliary placement streams. He speaks Arabic, English, Greek, and French.

Niovi Apostolaki

Director of Finance and Compliance

Niovi is a chartered accountant (Hellenic Institute of Certified Public Accountants no. 14802) with a previous career at Grant Thornton Greece, where she led the civil-society audit practice. She joined HopeFoundation in 2021 and is responsible for the financial statements, donor reporting, GDPR compliance, and safeguarding administration.

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