Virginia de Graça is Co-Founder and Master Facilitator of the Sport for Life movement, Coordinator of Youth for Life in Timor-Leste (promoting human development through education), and Impact Consulting Project Manager. She leads a movement of volunteers from all municipalities, training them on facilitation, strategic planning, leadership and management skills, and coaching and mentoring them to replicate the project in their communities. She launched and provides the inspiration and energy for a true volunteer movement in Timor-Leste, with over 4,000 youth trained and dozens becoming project multipliers in their communities.

A strong believer in truly empowering participants, Virginia developed solid questioning and coaching skills and created Sport for Life’s 5-step methodology for powerful facilitation. She has been trainer, facilitator, translator and guest speaker in national and international events, workshops and retreats, with a variety of organizations, including UNDP, Oxfam, GIZ, US Embassy, Peace Corps, UNESCO, UNICEF, The Asia Foundation, World Vision, Marie Stopes, Australia Pacific Training Coalition, Youth Off the Streets, etc.

Virginia was Timor-Leste representative to the 9th UNESCO Youth Forum (Paris, 2015), where she was selected as Asian youth representative to the UNESCO 38th General Conference. In 2016 she took part in UNESCO’s Stakeholders Forum (Jakarta) in the 22nd Asia Pacific Youth Conference (Bandung) and in One Young World Summit (Ottawa). In 2018 she was nominated by the US Embassy in Timor-Leste as Woman of Sports Leader and participated in the State Department’s Global Sport Mentoring Program in the US. In the same year she attended the seminar of Young Societal Leaders in Singapore.

Virginia is a graduate from the School of Economics and Business at João Saldanha Institute. She speaks fluent Tetum, Bahasa Indonesia, English and Portuguese.