Sprout e-course – Pearson Fellowship for Social Innovation

Giving Back

Advisors

TheSprout E-course and the Pearson Fellowship for Social Innovation has benefited from the impeccable wisdom of numerous experts and change agents. Would you like to support our world-changing work  by lending your voice?

Please contact Kristle Calisto-Tavares, Program Manager at kristle(at)takingitglobal.org with your interest.

E-mentors

For the inaugural cycle of the Pearson Fellowship for Social Innovation, mentorship was one of the critical elements of our model and as such, we connected with experienced individuals in various fields who wish to support the development of a young person on their journey to build community and lasting change. The following individuals all gave back by mentoring one of our Pearson Fellows.

Between January and May 2011, their role was to:

• Offer mentorship and support to one Pearson Fellow specific to the launch or growth of their initiatives;
• Dedicate time to communicate with and advise their Pearson Fellow;
• Share personal experiences, resources and insights.

These folks are remarkable individuals with a desire to support a diverse generation of courageous young people who aspire to change their corner of the world for the better.

Kristle Calisto-Tavares

Kristle launched her first social venture at the age of 19 and hasn't stopped since. Today, she inspires, informs and empowers others to build a better world through Inspired Practice. Formally established in 2007, Inspired Practice is Kristle's second social venture - a social-purpose enterprise that creates strategies and tools for conscientious businesses and enterprising non-profits to grow sustainably. Currently, Kristle is leading social innovation programming for TakingITGlobal that is designed to build the capacity of international youth who aspired to be social entrepreneurs. She has been a member of the TakingITGlobal online community since 2004. Before joining the Sprout team as Program Manager, Kristle became involved with the Sprout E-course as an E-mentor to 30 participants and Coach to the Core Team. She is deeply committed to supporting a new genereration of social innovators as they translate their talent, energy and ingenuity into real and last impact.

Nancy Chou

Nancy currently works with the Pearson Foundation to design and deliver literacy and new media integration programs for youth and educators. Developed in collaboration with partners throughout the United States, these programs are designed to create spaces for young people to engage in new media practices that redefine what it means to learn and to create. Currently, Nancy works with the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC, the Field Museum in Chicago, and Frida Kahlo High School in Los Angeles to design and implement engaging, personalized, project-based digital media programs for young people. Before working with the Pearson Foundation, Nancy taught middle school in downtown Los Angeles and worked with outreach programs in the Bay Area. Committed to building opportunities for youth to explore their interests, direct their own learning, and better prepare themselves for living and working in the 21st century, Nancy looks forward to her experience as an E-Mentor with the Pearson Fellowship for Social Innovation.

Eman Ebed

Eman Ebed works as a Senior Analyst for the Crown Prince Court in Abu Dhabi, having recently moved from London where she worked as a Consultant/Project Manager for Adam Smith International (ASI), an international development consultancy. Her assignments with ASI included working with the Ministry of Finance in Afghanistan in strengthening national and provincial budgeting; with the Afghan Civil Service Commission on its Management Capacity Programme; and in Georgia supporting civil society and media organisations to develop mechanisms by which they can hold the government accountable for its use of public finances. Previously, she has travelled extensively in the MENA region and has worked on capacity building projects for civil society organizations, primarily focusing on the role of ICTs in empowering Arab youth. Eman has also been nominated to advise groups as the Evian Group and TakingITGlobal, which work on projects that seek to voice local concerns and include them in reform and decision-making processes. Eman graduated with an MSc in Comparative Politics from the London School of Economics & Political Science, and a BA (Honours) in Political Science and (Minor) Economics from Queen’s University in Canada. French, Arabic, Romanian, and Italian are the languages in which she is fluent.

Marce Guitierrez

Marce is a communications and advocacy professional. Marce is Director of Communications and Development for Terra Peninsular, a conservancy organization working to protect Baja California's natural hotspots. Prior to Terra, Marce was a Program Manager at Wildcoast, where she worked with Latino communities to protect California's biodiversity richness and foster environmental leadership in under-represented groups. As a member of the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative's South Coast Regional Stakeholder Group, she helped design a new network of marine protected areas in California. Currently she serves on the California Sustainable Seafood Advisory Panel, tasked with creating a sustainability and marketing program for California fisheries. Marce majored in Business at the University of Phoenix and studied international strategy at the London School of Economics. An enthusiastic new media fan, Marce moonlights for an award winning communications start-up, Sumazi, and was named one of ten National Council of La Raza's digital

Rahaf Harfoush

Rahaf Harfoush is a social media strategist on the rise. Her interest in technology's impact on governance, education and the workplace began as an analyst at Don Tapscott's thinktank, where she published whitepapers on topics including the Net Generation and women and the web. Her clients include InnoSpa-Unilever, British Telecom Wholesale, and the Web Foundation. She speaks to corporate and non-profit groups on the increasing use -- and vital importance -- of online technologies and the powerful ideas of community that animate them. Rahaf is an Associate Director at the World Economic Forum in Geneva. Previously, she was a part of the Forum's WELCOM Interaction team. Prior to this, she spent three months with the Obama New Media team in Chicago. In love with the written word, Rahaf is the author of Yes We Did, a book about the grassroots groundswell inspired by the Obama campaign. She is the Research Coordinator to the critically acclaimed Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything and a contributor on both Grown Up Digital: How the Net Generation is Changing your World and Everything I needed to Know About Business I learned from a Canadian.

Janet Klees

Janet Klees has interwoven her own family life together with the lives of people with disabilities and families in community for over 25 years. She has been coordinator with the family-governed Deohaeko Support Network since its beginnings 18 years ago when families designed and built a 105-unit housing co-operative which seven of their sons and daughters with disabilities now call home. Janet has been deeply affected by the lives of the people with disabilities and their families that she has come to know within that group and through other life experiences. She is the author of two books which are directly rooted in the Deohaeko experience, (We Come Bearing Gifts; Our Presence has Roots) and which are now sold around the world to present the unique options of this family group.  Janet also presents, consults and teaches across Canada and in Holland, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, the United States and other countries around the world.

Lindsay Menard-Freeman

Lindsay is currently the Program Officer with the Global Youth Coalition on HIV/AIDS. While completing her M.A. program at Columbia University in Human Rights Studies, Lindsay served as a Program Intern at GYCA through the summer/fall of 2008. Her focus within human rights is gender/women's rights and public health. She has conducted research on sex workers' rights and HIV/AIDS, trafficking into forced prostitution, reproductive rights, and sexual health.  Lindsay graduated cum laude from the University of New Hampshire in 2006 with a double major in English and Women's Studies. While in New Hampshire, she worked at a non-profit community women's health clinic as a counselor and, as a result of this experience, Lindsay's interest in reproductive health and rights started to grow. She is excited to continue working in this sector by joining GYCA's staff.

Mary McGrath

Mary McGrath is Co-Founder and Executive Director of Small Change Fund. Mary’s passion is in organizational development and management in the environmental non-profit sector. Mary was the first Executive Director of Citizens’ Environment Watch (CEW), a provincial charity that she sustainably transformed from a small organization with two staff to a multi-program  organization with 12 staff. Mary previously held the position of Program Manager and Acting Executive Director at Environmental Defence Canada, where she also played a lead role in positively transforming the organization, as well as developing two successful public right-to-know programs (PollutionWatch.ca, FoodWatch.ca). 

Mary has worked in the private sector as Assistant Manager of Environment and corporate Affairs for Lever Ponds (Unilever Canada), and in the public sector as Environmental Education Technician with Otonabee Conservation. Mary’s approach to her personal and professional life has been influenced by her experiences working and living in West Africa and the Caribbean while working in the area of environmental education. 

Alberto Nardelli

Alberto Nardelli is the Social Network Manager at UnLtd – the foundation for social entrepreneurs, where he develops and manages their social networking strategy. He previously acted as Special Projects Coordinator at TakingITGlobal, managing partnerships and collaborative initiatives with UN agencies, international organisations and the private sector, especially around creative expression. He also facilitated communications for the Youth Caucus of the UN World Summit on the Information Society, has advised numerous companies, start-ups and organizations and has spoken at a dozen international conferences about social networking and ICT4D.

David Pell

David joined Street Kids International as Chief Executive Officer Director in January 2006. His introduction to Street Kids International was as a volunteer on the Fund Development Committee in 2004. Before joining Street Kids International, David operated his own business, worked for the government, universities, colleges and of course the voluntary sector. David was a partner in Development Initiatives Inc. a consulting firm that worked throughout Canada and internationally. He was the founder and President of the Community Business Resource Centre in Toronto a highly successful entrepreneurship training centre and consulting organization in economic development. As the CEO of the Canadian Youth Business Foundation (CYBF) and the Canadian Youth Foundation, David expanded the organization’s lending, mentor support and career planning programs for young people across Canada. His work throughout Canada, the United States, the European Community as well as several developing countries has provided him with opportunities to learn from many experienced community practitioners and community leaders.

Charlotte Young

Charlotte Young, Ph.D. is the Director of Practice at ENVision… synergy. For twenty-five years she has worked to promote sound environmental solutions by: involving the public and stakeholders in decisions and improving how governments and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) operate. She operates ENVision… synergy -- a small, independent environmental organization that implements project-based work in organizational effectiveness and policy improvement. In her work both as a facilitator and evaluator she has been involved with diverse projects. She developed evaluation tools for a provincial level land use conflict management program. She has worked on environmental assessments for cleaning up nuclear wastes in two Ontario communities.

Prior to ENVision, she designed and launched a professional development “internal university” for natural resources staff at a municipal parks department. She also spent nearly a decade at a national research laboratory developing applied evaluation methods, innovative public consultation programs and researching organizational effectiveness.