Staff

Molly Abbruzzese

Senior Program Officer, Gates Foundation

Molly is a global health professional who has spent most of her career working in immunization and health systems strengthening in sub-Saharan Africa. Most recently, she served as a Senior Program Officer at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation where she led initiatives focused on increasing equity and demand for vaccines.  She started her career as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Ecuador and has worked in water and sanitation, HIV prevention, and SafeMotherhood.

Molly holds a joint Master of International Affairs and Master of Public Health from Columbia University, and a BA from Lewis & Clark College in Portland, Oregon.

She is a strong believer in youth leadership and has been involved with AMIGOS as a volunteer in the Dominican Republic and Mexico, as the president of the Seattle Chapter, and as the proud parent of a 2017 volunteer.

Ambassador Arnold Chacon

Career Foreign Service Officer

Ambassador Chacon is a career member of the United States Foreign Service currently serving as the Senior Vice President at the National Defense University. He has held senior leadership positions at the State Department, including Chief of Mission in Guatemala and Chief Human Capital Officer. He is widely recognized for his expertise in Latin American and European affairs, talent management, communication strategies and building a diverse workforce.

Prior to his service in Guatemala, he served as Deputy Chief of Mission in Spain. His other diplomatic assignments include postings to U.S. Missions in Honduras, Mexico, Chile, Italy, Peru, Ecuador, and the United Nations. Ambassador Chacon joined the AMIGOS Board of Directors in 2019. From 1974-1979, he served with AMIGOS in Nicaragua, Honduras, Ecuador, and Mexico as a volunteer, route leader and member of the AMIGOS international staff. A life member of the Council on Foreign Relations, Ambassador Chacon is a Boettcher Foundation Scholar and graduate of the University of Colorado. His wife Alida Chacon is retired from the Foreign Service and they have three children.

Adolfo Jimenez

Partner, Holland & Knight LLP

As an AMIGOS alumnus and parent, Adolfo hopes to give back to AMIGOS however he can. His four years as a volunteer and staff-member were valuable. His work in the 1990s with the Miami Chapter and his daughter’s summer experience several years ago allowed him to witness the organization’s historical development. The strength and well-being of AMIGOS is important to him. Adolfo’s personal and professional life has always had a strong Latin American component. He has handled disputes and matters for clients from throughout the region. Adolfo hopes to collaborate with other board members to raise the profile of AMIGOS, connect with alumni, and further develop a sustainable long-term fundraising strategy.

Philip C. Johnson, MD

Professor and Vice-Chair, Department of Internal Medicine, McGovern Medical School

Philip Johnson, M.D., is a board certified physician and division director, Professor and Vice-Chair for the Department of Internal Medicine at McGovern Medical School at UTHealth.

He is actively involved in clinical patient care, teaching and research. Dr. Johnson served as the associate program director of the University Clinical Research Center at Memorial Hermann Hospital for 15 years, with interest in the research areas of gastrointestinal and fungal infections and HIV/AIDS. His research awards include, but are not limited to, grants from NASA and leading pharmaceutical companies.

Dr. Johnson was listed in Texas Super Doctors and the Best Doctors in America a total of four times and was voted as one of Houston’s Top Doctors in 2002.

Dr. Johnson is a diplomate of the American Board of Internal Medicine as well as a fellow in the American College of Physicians.

Lisa Pieper, MD, MBA

Founder & Managing Director, Pieper & Associates LLC

Lisa Pieper has over 20 years of healthcare experience and more than a decade of experience in the life sciences industry. She founded and manages Pieper & Associates, a life sciences consulting firm focused on organizational and leadership advisory services, including executive-level and board recruitment. Lisa was previously a consultant in the life sciences practices of global executive search firms. Earlier, she practiced medicine for a decade in a large multi-specialty group practice, where she served in a variety of leadership roles and founded the evidence-based medicine program.

Lisa serves on the President’s Council of the Gladstone Institutes, a non-profit biomedical research foundation based in San Francisco. She is also an alumna of Amigos de las Américas, a non-profit, Pan-American community services organization in which she held roles of increasing responsibility, culminating in Country Director, Ecuador.

Lisa’s educational background includes undergraduate degrees in International Affairs and Spanish, followed by graduate degrees that include an MD from the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), where she subsequently completed residency training, leading to board certification in her field, as well as an MBA from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), with contemporaneous involvement in a number of new ventures and advisory roles. Lisa is fluent in Spanish.

Toby Spoon

Executive Vice President, The TECMA Group

Toby’s first exposure to AMIGOS was at the age of 13 in Guatemala where his parents were missionaries and AMIGOS worked in San Miguel Chicaj, Guatemala. It was there he began to dream about becoming an Amigo while helping by serving as a guide for the volunteers. He went on to get a degree in Theology and was involved in ministry and missions from 1982 to 1990. In 1990 he switched careers and began to work for the Tecma Group, where today he is a partner and holds several titles with the company. Tecma works in manufacturing in Mexico. They have 72 clients, 9,000 employees, and 3.2 million square feet of space mostly along the border. Working with and developing people continues to be his passion.

Toby participates on several boards, and he and his wife LaDeena have been involved in projects in Rwanda as well as AMIGOS. He served as a volunteer, route leader, assistant country director, and project director in Nicaragua and Ecuador. Toby also worked for AMIGOS HQ as the Field Program Coordinator.

He considers AMIGOS the wonderful foundation for all that has come his way in life and he is grateful to be able to serve on the board.

Krisa Van Meurs

Rosemarie Hess Endowed Professor of Neonatal and Developmental Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine

Krisa Van Meurs is the Rosemarie Hess Endowed Professor in the Division of Neonatal and Developmental Medicine at Stanford University School of Medicine and an attending neonatologist at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford. Dr. Van Meurs has been actively involved in clinical care, clinical research, program administration, and mentoring during her medical career. Her specific areas of research interest are neonatal pulmonary disease and neonatal neurocritical care. Dr. Van Meurs is the medical director of the Neonatal ECMO program and the NeuroNICU, a specialized virtual unit focused on improving neurologic and developmental outcomes for critically ill neonates. She is the Stanford principal investigator for the Eunice Kennedy Shriver NICHD Neonatal Research Network and has held various administrative roles at Stanford including Associate Chair for Clinical Research for the Department of Pediatrics; Vice Chair, Appointments Promotions and Tenure Committee; Pediatric Mentoring Program Executive Committee member; Spectrum Child Health Executive Committee member; and interim Division Chief, Division of Neonatal and Developmental Medicine.

Krisa participated in AMIGOS for 5 years serving as a volunteer, route leader, assistant country director, and country director in Honduras, Colombia, and Ecuador. She had the honor of being the first female country director in Ecuador in 1974. Her daughter, Annalise, served as an AMIGOS volunteer in Mexico.

Jorge Ortega

Executive Vice President, Client Success Changemakers

Jorge Ortega is the Executive Vice President at ChangeMakers, a reputation management, marketing, and social impact advisory firm serving clients and leaders across sectors. With more than three decades of experience in strategic communications and leadership development, Jorge has held senior executive roles at two of the world’s leading firms—Edelman and Burson—where he led cross-border initiatives for corporate, nonprofit, and government clients. He helped them manage their reputations, navigate crises, and build trust with diverse stakeholders. He has also served as interim Chief Communications Officer at three publicly traded companies.

Jorge brings deep experience in working with nonprofit organizations. His work with St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital has focused on leadership development and professional coaching, helping to strengthen the organization’s internal talent and culture. He was also the creative lead for the Dallas Regional Chamber’s award-winning COVID-19 vaccination campaign, which mobilized public health action through a multisector coalition of business and civic leaders. He has provided marketing counsel to global humanitarian organizations such as Mercy Ships, helping them communicate their impact and increase their visibility.

Jorge serves on the Corporate Advisory Board of ALPFA (the Association of Latino Professionals for America), the nation’s leading nonprofit organization dedicated to empowering Latino students and professionals across the corporate, nonprofit, and public sectors. He is also a former board member of Camillus House, a nonprofit serving individuals and families experiencing homelessness in Miami-Dade County, providing housing, healthcare, and dignity to thousands each year.

Jorge is the co-founder and past board chair of the International Kids Fund, a program of the Jackson Memorial Foundation that raises funds and coordinates life-saving medical care for critically ill children from underserved regions across Latin America and the Caribbean.

A volunteer alum and former instructor for Amigos de las Américas, Jorge is fluent in Spanish and passionate about service, equity, and cross-cultural impact.

Born and raised in Miami, he holds a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration with a concentration in Marketing from American University in Washington, D.C.

Stacy Keaton Alexander, JD

Former Attorney, Mediator, and Adjunct Professor of Negotiations at St. Mary's School of Law

Stacy Keaton Alexander, J.D. is a former attorney, mediator, and adjunct professor of Negotiations at St. Mary’s University School of Law.

As an attorney, she specialized in civil appellate law for almost 30 years in Houston and Austin, Texas, handling numerous multi-party, multi-million-dollar appeals. As a credentialed mediator, she has mediated a variety of civil disputes. She also coaches basic mediation training and has volunteered as a mediator at the Austin Dispute Resolution Center. As an adjunct professor, she developed a lecture on Gender in Negotiation. She authored an article based on that lecture, “Gender in Negotiation,” which is a chapter published in the textbook: “Negotiation: Behavioral Observation and Manipulation.”

She is a graduate student at Pepperdine University in their psychology program. At FIRE, she is a clinical researcher and has co-designed a research project on gender bias in the legal profession.

She enjoys speaking, presenting, and continuing research to promote equality for women. Her most recent presentations include “Negotiating Salaries” for Women in the Profession Committee State Bar of Texas (click here to watch), and “Navigating Gender Bias in the Legal Profession” for Women Empowering Leadership in the Law (WELL).

Mrs. Keaton Alexander is also an author and illustrator of a bilingual (English and Français) children’s book: “How to Pet a Kitty.”

Brian Austin

Chief Operating Officer, Alliance Residential Company

Brian Austin is responsible for sourcing new investments and managing the development/acquisition process throughout the Eastern U.S. Mr. Austin brings 17 years of experience in development and project financing, and most recently served as Senior Managing Director for Mill Creek Residential Trust LLC (MCRT) in the Gulf Coast/Southwest Division. Mr. Austin is a past board member of the Houston Apartment Association and served as Chairman of the Houston Apartment Association Developer’s Committee. He is a founding member and treasurer of Houstonians for Responsible Growth, and a trustee for its related PAC. Mr. Austin received a BBA in Finance from Texas A&M University in 1995.

Brian is an AMIGOS alum (Brazil, 1990) and has been supporting the organization in recent years.