Kirsten M. Berry
ADVISED GRANTS FUNDS ASSOCIATE

Reporting to the grants administration officer, Kirsten’s primary responsibilities include client service, data entry, grant research and processing.  She is responsible for processing grant recommendations submitted by the community foundation’s fundholders.

Kirsten’s road to Silicon Valley Community Foundation was a circuitous one.  After eight years as a professional driver, she was fortunate enough to qualify for a program at Opportunities Industrialization Center-West, which had received a federal grant to assist displaced transportation workers post-9/11.  Upon completion of her training there, she spent the next two years temping with Office Team, where she discovered a love for work in the nonprofit sector. During this time, she worked on Second Harvest Food Bank’s successful 2006 Holiday Food & Fund Drive. She accepted an assignment at Silicon Valley Community Foundation in February 2007, and was hired on permanently two months later.

A life-long resident of the Bay Area, Kirsten was part of the San Francisco Chronicle’s “Faces of Burning Man” photo-essay in 2005.  A true passion in her life, 2007 marks her fifth year volunteering for the event, and she was recently named to the advisory council for her department.  She also volunteers locally for a number of science fiction conventions.

Kirsten lives in the Almaden Valley with Douglas, her husband of 16 years, who is a construction delivery driver and freelance game designer with several titles to his credit.