StudentsTeach: Deployment Team, Partners and Advisers

This page contains lists and descriptions of deployment team members, partners and advisers, as well as letters of support.

StudentsTeach: Tanzania Deployment Team

Three deploying team members seek to deploy 100 XO laptops at St. Pius English Medium School in Tarakea, Tanzania:

• Cate Elander: Educational Coordinator; US Partnership Coordinator

• Jeff Mascornick: Technical Lead; Web-Learning Coordinator

• Fratern Tarimo: Tanzania Partnership Coordinator; Local Expert

Cate Elander is a graduating Masters student in the School of Urban Affairs and Public Policy at the University of Delaware . She is studying Community Development. A community organizer for the past three years, she has extensive experience working with underserved communities and believes strongly in the power of community participation and leadership. She also runs a youth council in a low-income Delaware neighborhood, working with young residents to identify and leverage their assets and power to raise awareness and initiate change. Her resume is located here: http://wiki.laptop.org/images/4/45/Elander_cate_resume.doc

Cate became interested in Tanzania and the Tarakea community in particular when she began working with fellow student and StudentsTeach: Tanzania team member Fratern Tarimo on a volunteer tourism project called Volunteer Tanzania. Through the early development of this project, she met with leaders at local schools in the area, discussing potential volunteer placements and capacity to support long term volunteers. During these visits, she met with Reverend Marandu of St. Pius and toured St. Pius English Medium. Serving as the US Partnership Coordinator and Education Coordinator for the StudentsTeach: Tanzania team, she is contributing the following to the development of this project:

•Proposal and budget development

•Experience facilitating collaborative and community-based problem solving in underserved communities

•Experience working with youth to identify and use their knowledge to serve their communities

•Identification and coordination of partnerships with Duke University Office of Community Affairs and Forest View Elementary School

•Identification of and collaboration with advisors to the Cultural and Community Exchange Project (CCEP), including Global Partners Junior and Arusha, Tanzania-based DukeEngage "Literacy through Photography" program

•Provision of consistent volunteers through Volunteer Tanzania

Jeff Mascornick is a graduate student at the University of Delaware focusing on nonprofit management. His resume is available here: http://wiki.laptop.org/images/c/c6/Jeff_Mascornick_Resume.doc He has a strong social science background and holds a Masters Degree in Sociology: Rural and Environmental Change (GPA 3.85), and B.A. in Geography and Anthropology (GPA 3.83) – both from the University of Montana. During the past two years Jeff was an AmeriCorpsVISTA member at a comprehensive social service organization working as a grant writer securing approximately $1 million in grant funding during this time. He has served as board member and/or volunteer at several nonprofits focusing on environmental sustainability, early childhood development, and social justice over the past several years. He is motivated by the desire to work towards social justice and environmental sustainability in a world where so many have so little and so few have so much and where greed and apathy continually threaten ecosystems and social structures. He is committed to the mission of OLPC and believes that the program has the potential to create an Open Source collaborative learning environment that could promote possible solutions to both of these problems by educating and empowering children one laptop, one text message, one collaborative project at a time.

Jeff brings the following skills to the StudentsTeach:

• Project planning, development and evaluation

• Utilizing web 2.0 technologies for educational, cultural exchange and fundraising purposes for this project

• General fundraising

• Nonprofit governance and leadership

• Analytical and critical thinking skills

• Serving as a link between IT specialists and team members, teachers and students: Although Jeff does not have a technical background he is comfortable enough with information technology to succeed in providing a bridge between the students and teachers and the IT specialists his team will be working with pre-deployment and in Tarakea. After all, in order to bridge the technology gap, the ability to utilize technology must become (and is becoming) a tool that the average person (not only technicians) can utilize to connect, collaborate and effect change within an Open Source environment in the Information Age.

Fratern Tarimo was born and raised in Kilimanjaro, Tanzania. He attended college at Gettysburg College, PA where he graduated with a bachelor of science in Chemistry and a minor in religion. He is a graduating Masters of Public Administration Student in the School of Urban Affairs and Public Policy at the University of Delaware. His concentration is Nonprofit Leadership. He has worked as a volunteer and is currently one of the members of board of advisors for Trans Regional Environment Technology (TRETA), a local partner organization for StudentsTeach: Tanzania. Fratern has considerable experience working with children; he recently worked as a coordinator/ director of the summer recreation program in the City of New Castle, Delaware. His resume is located here: http://wiki.laptop.org/images/7/7a/Fratern_Tarimo_Resume.doc Fratern is interested in the OLPC project because he believes that the project has unprecedented capabilities to empower children and their communities in developing countries. As the Tanzania Partnership Coordinator, Fratern will contribute the following tasks to his team:

• Searching and providing the necessary information about Tarakea and Tanzania in general

• Coordinating activities on the ground while in Tanzania

• Managing local volunteers

• Translation of English-Swahili or vice versa whenever necessary

• Helping with local paperwork including application for local cyber café license

• Other duties as necessary

US Partners and Advisers

•US Classroom Exchange Partner: David Stein, Senior Schools Partnership Coordinator, Duke University Office of Community Affairs:
http://community.duke.edu/index.php

•US Classroom Exchange Partner: Linda Tugurian, Technology Coordinator, Forest View Elementary School: http://www.forestview.dpsnc.net/
Stein and Tugurian Letter of Support:

• Student Exchange Adviser: Thea Williamson, Program Manager, Global Partners Junior:
http://www.nyc.gov/html/unccp/scp/html/outreach/people_to_people.shtml

• Technology/Learning Adviser: Elena Rue and Katie Hyde, Co-Project Coordinators, Literacy through Photography, Tanzania:
http://dukeengage.duke.edu/blogs/tags/Arusha

• Technical Adviser: Kevin Hunter, Doctoral Student, North Carolina State University, Computer Engineering

Tanzania Partners/Advisers

• NGO Partner: Vitalis Kimario, Director, Trans Regional Environment Technology Association (TRETA)
TRETA Letter of Support: Media:TRETA Letter of Support.doc

• Deployment School Partner: Reverend Valerian Herman Marandu, Director, St. Pius English Medium
St. Pius Letter of Support: Media:St. Pius English Medium Letter of Support.doc
• Local Technical Advisor: Benjamin Crispin, Engineer, Zain Communications