Meet our new cohort of amazing Shapers 🚀

Wow! More than 50 amazing individuals applied to join our Copenhagen Global Shapers Hub this year! That’s humbling and we’re beyond excited to share the profiles of the 5 amazing individuals who we’ve selected to join us. ❤️

They’re researchers. Impact investment professionals. UN trailblazers. Sustainable development geeks. Non-profit heroes. And all committed to create social impact. Read more about each of them here:

Gitte Gram

Gitte is a sustainable development geek aged 27, who has spent the past three years working with sustainable development issues in several sectors and countries, including responsible taxation at Oxfam IBIS and climate and environment projects in Indonesia. She is now part of SDGlead, where she is part of the team that developed the investment fund ‘SDG Invest’. The fund invests in listed companies that proactively addresses the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in their business models, and who engage with companies to further pursue sustainable impact through active ownership.

Gitte had her sustainable ‘aha’ moment, when she was working on a waste2energy project in Indonesia, which took her to a landfill, where more than 200 families lived and worked. Seeing people living off a dumbing ground was an eye-opening experience, and since then she has been committed to working with impact solutions, on both a voluntary and professional level.

As part of the Global Shaper community, Gitte wish to engage in projects, that helps disadvantaged youth gaining access to their dream job and/or education, and to overall increase sustainability awareness and action among youth.

Nathan Rietzler

Nathan is doing his master and PhD in innovation at Copenhagen Business School. In his research, he is investigating how we can best use crowdsourcing to harness the wisdom of the crowd in finding solutions to some of the world’s toughest problems.

Joining the Shapers means for him to collaborate with other young people that have the goal to make a positive impact on the lives of other people. His focus is on improving especially the lives of disadvantaged children and teenagers by accompanying them and helping them to find as well as realize poverty-overcoming opportunities.

Tinne Amalie Damgaard Nissen

Tinne holds a master degree in molecular biomedicine from the University of Copenhagen. She is employed as a research assistant at the Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Basic Metabolic Research focusing on the identification of new drug candidates for the treatment of obesity and diabetes. Tinne is a board board member in the non-profit organization Synapse — Life Science Connect and a board member in the Danish Biotechnological Society. Her work in these organizations includes starting an ambitious mentorship program connecting students and industry professionals and co-organizing an international biotech conference.

Tinne’s motivation for becoming a global shaper is to drive projects that makes the Copenhagen community more inclusive and equal together with a team of visionary change-makers. She is particularly interested in pursuing projects improving the life of homeless in the community and supporting the education of vulnerable young people.

Emilie Jallov-Haag

Emilie is currently studying her master’s degree in ‘Organizational Innovation and Entrepreneurship’ at Copenhagen Business School. Her international and interdisciplinary background has played a large part in shaping her passion for finding sustainable, inclusive and ethical solutions to the current challenges facing us on a local and global scale. This passion has led Emilie to specialize her educational and work-related focus on responsible management practices, sustainability and social entrepreneurship, motivating her to join the Copenhagen Hub as a Global Shaper. Here, she hopes to become part of local projects related to the Sustainable Development Goal #5, ‘Gender Equality’, as she is convinced that real sustainable development only can be achieved with the inclusion and empowerment of women.

Emilie believes that we have a greater chance of creating lasting change and improvement through collaboration, and therefore she is very excited to be part of the Copenhagen-based team with like-minded and inspirational people. Emilie cannot wait to become part in contributing to creating real positive impact through a local project.

Lahiru Elvitigala

With a background in civil engineering and project management, Lahiru is currently working for UNOPS in Denmark where he is helping develop an enterprise project management system for the organization. An ardent advocate of youth led initiatives, Lahiru has represented youth communities in multiple countries including Sri Lanka, Malaysia and the UK and has been a part of several campaigns that have raised awareness on localized social issues. He has also helped start-up three different companies in the UK and Sri Lanka and has been involved in innovation hubs and conferences around the world.

Lahiru joined the Global Shapers hub in Copenhagen to continue his goal of development in a myriad of contexts and for the betterment of a more global and inclusive community. He plans to work with his fellow Copenhagen Shapers to bring change to issues facing the youth community in Copenhagen.