Kandyma Sar serves as a Co-Founder and Board Chair of Upequity. In this role, Kandyma is responsible for keeping the organization on track toward fulfilling its mission and molding a collaborative board culture to engage fellow members in ways that capitalize on their strengths.
Kandyma is currently the Grants and Finance Administrator for Children’s National Hospital for the Sheikh Zayed Institute for Surgical Innovation. She is also the Founder and CEO of Grantfunding.co, a consulting practice that promotes social innovation and ensures entrepreneurs striving to make a meaningful impact have a chance at success through funding consultation. Kandyma’s professional history has always revolved around health impact and equity. At the Hemophilia Federation of America, Kandyma served as a Program Manager for Helping Hands; a financial assistance program dedicated to alleviating financial burden during medical crises; as well as a Special Projects Manager to address universal crises such as natural disasters and to develop global initiatives such as leadership development and networking for women as they are key areas that disproportionately affect not only rare bleeding disorder communities but also communities of color. She worked directly with the CEO to develop and elevate these programs to ensure that there was full representation in the rare bleeding disorder community at HFA. At FACETS, a small non-profit with a mission to end poverty, she worked with individuals and families that were going through homelessness or living in a public housing program to gain stability and achieve resiliency. Finally, she gained Clinical Trials knowledge and gained the appreciation and importance of research participation through her work at the Henry M. Jackson Foundation.
Kandyma is not only an advocate for health DEI but also represents a face amongst the community affected by inequities. She was diagnosed with Systemic Lupus Erythematosus as a teenager and has struggled with a myriad of complications that many individuals with a chronic disease have; all the while trying to thrive personally and professionally to make an impact in other people’s lives so that they may have a chance at an easier pathway. Kandyma’s cumulative experiences in grants, research, program development, and strategic partnerships were key indicators that led her to dedicate her mission in working together collaboratively to solve some of the world’s most complex and stubborn problems in health inequities. Through research, education, collaboration and volunteer engagements, she believes that we can make significant strides in health impact together.
Kandyma earned her Bachelor of Science in Psychology at George Mason University and Master of Arts in Community/Mental Health Counseling at George Washington University. She was selected for the Majority Leader inaugural cohort through SuperMajority to receive training and promote multiracial and intergenerational mobilization to encourage the development in community leadership who will lead the fight for gender equity.