U.S.
Betsy Dickey
Founder and Executive Director of Ready for Reading: Betsy is a writer with a Masters in Creative Writing from Manhattanville College in Purchase New York and a BA from Georgetown University. She taught before working as manager of Martha Stewart’s catering business. Betsy was Poetry Editor for Inkwell, the literary journal of Manhattanville and has published poems and essays in several anthologies and has judged poetry contests and conducted poetry workshops for grade school children at Tuckahoe Library in Eastchester, New York.
David Middleton:
David Middleton is a long-time writer, author and photographer who has produced a dozen books. His photography and writing have been featured in many magazines, books and calendars. Of late, David is helping non-profit organizations- Save the Children: the Vermont Nature Conservancy: New Course; Nomad Travel; the Sitka Conservation Society; I-KODI, Kenya; the Vermont Land Trust- more effectively tell their story and with more powerful and effective words and imagery.
Allen Moore:
Allen is the Consulting Architect of Ready for Reading. He is a Founder and Principal in the firm of Allen Moore and Associates in Newburyport, MA. He has experience in all phases of architectural practice. Allen has been directly responsible for planning, designing and supervising the construction of many educational, museum and library spaces in his over 40 years of practice throughout the Northeast. Allen has also worked in the French West Indies on commercial and urban planning projects as well as many housing projects throughout the entire West Indies. He has also served as an environmental design instructor/consultant at the Harvard Graduate School of Design and Department of City and Regional Planning.
Richard Dickey
Richard worked on Wall St. for almost 20 years in the institutional equities business. He was a principal at Morgan Stanley from the mid-1980s to 1992 and then worked as a Partner/Director of Research at Dillon Reed in NYC. From 1996 to 2000 he was a Managing Director and head of global equity sales at Lehman Brothers. Since leaving Lehman he is a private investor. Richard has done work raising money for a variety of nonprofit organizations including Miami-based Shake-a-Leg, whose mission is to help those with physical and developmental challenges; and is a founding contributor to Chicago Hope Academy, a high school on the South Side of Chicago.
Lesley King
Lesley worked at JP Morgan for 15 years and retired as a Managing Director in Fixed Income Sales management in order to focus on non-profit work. She served as Interim Executive Director of Trinity Church in Greenwich, CT where she was also co-head of the Rwanda Council. Lesley is on the Board of Directors for Partners In Health and is a Regional Representative for PIH where for the past few years she has led a “community of concern” to open and support the PIH Rukira Health Center in southwest Rwanda. She and her husband, Bill, live in Old Greenwich with their four children.
Dr. Felix Rwabukwisi Cyamatare
Dr. Felix is currently PIH/IMB District Clinical Director of Kayonza were he has been working for four and a half years, spearheading pediatric HIV+ Prevention of HIV mother to child transmission program and children living with chronic diseases. He is also the East Africa representative for Pediatric and Adolescent AIDS treatment for Africa, a pan African networking organization for all clinical related practitioners in Pediatric HIV; and Chair of the Continuous Professional Development Plan Task Force for Doctors in rural Rwanda.
“My innermost convictions have been to live in solidarity with all people and to protect the common good. As a medical professional, I have learned that health care delivery needs to be accompanied by strong advocacy for basic human rights. I believe in the value of early childhood development and education as real prevention and cure for generations, it should be a among top preoccupations for the public health institution and public authorities toward a sustainable, healthy and just world.”
Advisors
Barbara Bryant
Barbara is passionate about literacy and education and has been involved from the start in advocating and supporting and fundraising for the RCLLC. She is on numerous boards; the University of Virginia, the Shakespeare Festival in St. Louis, the African Health and Hospital Foundation and she is a founding member of the Woman’s Steering Committee of the Bowery Mission in New York City. Barbara is co-founder of the Bryant Family Vineyard in Napa Valley and the author of The Bryant Family Vineyard Cookbook, and is donating all proceeds from the sale of her book to the Bowery Mission and other charitable organizations.
Michael Clark
The head librarian of the Lower School at Hackley School in Tarrytown, NY. Michael is a key advisor on book collection development and programming and professional development, working with Rwandan counterparts to set up systems and organize the library space. In July 2012, Michael spent a month in Rwinkwavu, helping to set up the library space and training our local library staff.
Didi Bertrand Farmer
Didi is a medical anthropologist who has worked extensively with Partners In Health in Haiti. Based in Rwanda she is currently the Director of Community Health and Social Development Programs. Didi works closely with the Rwandan government developing and implementing a nationally co-ordinated Community Healthcare Worker system.
Dr. Paul Farmer
Paul Farmer is a founding director of Partners In Health (PIH), an international non-profit organization that provides direct health care services and undertakes research and advocacy on behalf of the sick and poor. Dr. Farmer began his lifelong commitment to Haiti in 1983 while still a student, working with villages in Haiti’s Central Plateau. Starting with a one-building clinic in the village of Cange, PIH’s project in Haiti has grown into a multi-service health complex. Over the past 20 years, PIH has expanded to 10 sites throughout Haiti, as well as nine other countries worldwide. Dr. Farmer and his colleagues in the US and abroad have pioneered community-based treatment strategies that show quality health care can be delivered in resource-poor settings. Dr.Farmer was recently appointed UN Deputy Special Envoy to Haiti by former President Bill Clinton. He is the subject of Pulitzer Prize winner Tracy Kidder’s bestseller Mountains Beyond Mountains, which chronicles the development of Dr. Farmer’s work in Haiti and beyond.
Kate Parry, Ph.D.
Kate is co-Director for Friends of African Village Libraries: East Africa (FAVL:East Africa). A Professor of English at Hunter College, City University of New York, Kate co-founded Kitengesa Community Library in Uganda in 1999 and is Chair of the Board for the Uganda Community Library Association.
Michael Southwick
Michael is a Special Counsel in the Financial Services Group at Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft LLP in New York. After beginning his career at Cadwalader in 1988 Michael left the firm in 1994 to join a derivative products company in Connecticut where he was Vice President and Counsel. Michael returned to Cadwalader in 2005 where his practice is now focused on derivatives, structured finance and ERISA. Michael is on the Board of Directors of the Perrot Memorial Library in Old Greenwich, CT where he has served as Treasurer and is currently serving as Vice President.