Allyson Goldsmith, Executive Director and Chairwoman of the Board
Allyson Goldsmith is a senior at Brandeis University majoring in Sociology and is minoring in both International and Global Studies, and Politics. She graduated from Rockbridge County High school in 2006 where she was active in the Interact Club or Junior Rotary, and the National Honor Society. At Brandeis, Allyson is the Executive Director of Positive Foundations, a student club working towards alleviating extreme global poverty. Allyson plans to focus her career on helping girls gain access to, and support for, their educational goals as a means of providing them with the skills needed to achieve great socio-economic well being and to make greater contributions to their communities.
Arthur H. Goldsmith, Chief Financial Officer
Arthur H. Goldsmith is Jackson T. Stephens Professor of Economics at
Washington and Lee University. He teaches courses and conducts research
on social issues, including education and poverty. He is Vice President of the Southern Economics Association. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of the Health Foods Cooperative in Lexington, Virginia and served for many years on the Board of Directors of the Montessori School in Lexington, Virginia.
Leslie Alan Goldsmith
Leslie Alan Goldsmith is a graduate of the School of Veterinary Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. He earned a B.S. in Biology from the University of Miami and a Ph.D. in Pharmacology and Toxicology from the University of Rhode Island prior to attending the University of Pennsylvania. For over two decades he worked for Johnson and Johnson, and for most of this period served as a Board Member and held the rank of Vice President of Product Safety and Regulatory Affairs for McNeil Nutritionals, one of the many companies that comprise the Johnson and Johnson Family of Companies. He is active in civic affairs and serves on the Parents Board for the University of Miami.
Advisory Group for ELEVEate
Lauren Ehrlich
Lauren Ehrlich is a junior at Brandeis University majoring in Women’s and Gender Studies, with a minor in Anthropology. Academically, Lauren’s interests focus on the various roles and conditions of women in developing countries. Throughout her college career, she has been involved with Positive Foundations, a student club working towards alleviating extreme global poverty and she will be serving as the organization’s Director of Outreach for the fall ’08 semester. Lauren was instrumental in developing and running an after-school program for school aged children in a Waltham public housing development and she founded and directed a summer camp for 5 to 9 year olds in the same housing project. She also works as a research assistant at Brandeis’ Women’s Studies Research Center during the school year.
Bridget Fay
Bridget Fay holds a J.D. from the Washington & Lee School of Law. Prior to law school, she worked as an engineer at Foster-Miller, Inc. in Waltham, MA. She graduated from Tufts University earning degrees in Chemical Engineering and Classics. She has over a decade of experience teaching and tutoring, much of which was spent as an educator for Science Club for Girls, a program that pairs science and engineering students at Boston-area colleges with groups of girls. The aim of the program is to encourage more girls to consider technical fields as viable career options and to promote self-confidence.
Mohamed Kamara
Mohamed Kamara received his BA from Fourah Bay College in Freetown, Sierra Leone and holds a Ph.D. in French from Tulane University. He is Associate Professor of Romance Languages at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, VA where he teaches African literatures in both French and English. He also teaches all areas of French and Francophone literature, with specific interest in Eighteenth Century French literature by women. Mohamed has published articles on, among other subjects, Sierra Leonean literature, Leopold Sedar Senghor and human rights, as well as on French colonial education and the literary representations of the African bourgeoisie. Professor Kamara is an expert on the Senegalese writer Cheikh Hamidou Kane, and is currently writing a book on the politics and consequences of French colonial education in sub-Saharan Africa.
Jan Kaufman
Jan Kaufman is the Director of Health Promotion at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Virginia. She holds a Master's Degree in Public Health from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She has an interest in helping people achieve optimal health and well-being. Jan is currently co-president of the Board of Fine Arts in Rockbridge, and on the advisory board of the Virginia Tobacco Settlement grants.
Amy Richwine
Amy Richwine is Associate Director for International Education at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Virginia. In addition to serving as an advisor to international students she is responsible for a variety of international education initiatives at Washington and Lee over the past decade. During 2005-06, she helped to develop and lead a six-week course for W&L students in Senegal. Prior to coming to W&L, Ms. Richwine was a management consultant for Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu ILA Group for 10 years, with 3-year assignments to Malawi and Botswana, where she worked primarily in the areas of financial management and private sector development. Ms. Richwine was a Peace Corps volunteer in Mauritania from 1981-1983, where she lived in a Wolof-speaking village on the Senegal River. She holds an MS in Development Management from American University, Washington, DC, and a BA in Russian Language and Literature from the University of Virginia.
Liz Schecter
Liz Schecter is a graduate of Montclair State University with a B.S. in Mathematics. She worked in banking administration with The Trust Company of New Jersey prior to staying home to raise her children. Liz has for many years been an active volunteer in the Kinnelon Schools, often serving as a substitute teacher. She is on the Board of Directors of Push to Walk, and in this capacity has organized several successful fundraisers.
