Members

Faith to Action Initiative Leadership Council

Faith to Action Initiative - Staff

Faith to Action Initiative - Advisory Group


Kerry Olson (Chair)
Founder and President, Firelight Foundation

Kerry Olson is the President and Founder of the Firelight Foundation, (hyperlink is www.firelightfoundation.org) started in 1999 as a private foundation created to support and advocate for the needs and rights of children and families made vulnerable by poverty and HIV/AIDS in Sub-Saharan Africa. In 2010, Firelight became a public charity. Prior to Firelight, Kerry worked for over 20 years as an early childhood educator, the founding director of nonprofit child/parent programs, and as a research social scientist. She holds a Ph.D. in developmental psychology and education from The University of Michigan. Kerry is the lead author of From Faith to Action (2006), a widely endorsed guide for churches and faith-based groups on supporting family and community care for orphans and vulnerable children and coordinating writer/editor of Journeys of Faith (2011).  Kerry is the chair and co-founder of the Faith to Action Initiative.

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John Derrick
Consultant, Cooperative Baptist Fellowship

John Derrick has served as Field Personnel and as the Training Specialist with Cooperative Baptist Fellowship (CBF) Global Missions . Currently he consults on projects related to the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) and coordinates CBF's Vulnerable Children Care Network, including the involvement of network churches in the pilot of Journeys of Faith. John's educational background includes a Master of Divinity. John's career is now focused on pediatric nursing and he is currently working towards an MSN as a pediatric nurse practitioner at Vanderbilt University. Simultaneously, he is completing the Certificate in Tropical Medicine through the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). This training includes the care of immigrants, refugees, and those living in extreme poverty. John's focus and passion in nursing are on the global needs of children affected by trauma, poverty, war, human trafficking, and institutionalization. John and his wife are the parents of two sons Jonah and Toby. They recently transitioned to Atlanta, Georgia.

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C.H. Dyer
President, Bright Hope

C.H. Dyer has been CEO/President of Bright Hope since 1993. After graduating from Talbot Seminary with a Master of Arts Degree in Theological Studies in 1989 and a Bachelor's Degree in Finance and Marketing from Northern Illinois, C.H. has led Bright Hope to focus on assisting the extreme poor, including the orphan, widowed and disenfranchised.  He has developed partnerships with over 600 indigenous churches in nine countries, each program includes relief aid (food, clothing, medical, shelter and education), development programs (micro-lending and skill and wage increasing programs) and evangelism and discipleship programs.  C.H. has traveled to over 50 countries and enjoys visiting the people he serves.  He belongs to the Christian Leadership Alliance Association, The Chicago Council of Global Affairs and The Master’s Program. He has been a frequent featured guest on Moody Radio and Mission Network News and an invited keynote speaker at numerous colleges, seminars, and conferences.  He has preached at over 50 churches throughout the US and internationally.  C.H. is the father of three children. His wife, Anne and he live in Hoffman Estates, Illinois.  The Dyers adopted their two youngest children from Russia and have founded Better Orphan Care to help Russian orphans find loving families in Russia.

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Pamela Harrington
Senior Program Advisor, Bethany Christian Services

Pamela Harrington, Senior Program Advisor at Bethany Christian Services, is passionate about children being in loving and protective families. An advocate and social work clinician with experience in a spectrum of child welfare services, she has experience in family preservation and reunification, foster care, and permanency, including infant, special needs, and older child adoption. After several years in Romania as the Director of Bethany's USAID-funded deinstitutionalization partnership with the Government of Romania, Pamela served as Social Work Program Director at Cornerstone University in Grand Rapids, MI until 2006. Returning to Bethany as Director of Bethany Global LLC she worked with a variety of international child protection-related government and non-governmental organizations in Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe, and Central and South America. She currently manages a variety of projects, one of which is the Faith to Action Initiative Grant. Pam strives to maintain balance by writing, cooking, hiking, water-related activities, and enjoying a Lake Michigan cottage with family and friends.

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Mark Lorey
World Vision International

Mark Lorey leads the Child Development and Programme Effectiveness (CDPE) group within World Vision (WV) International. CDPE provides global technical leadership for World Vision's work in education, child protection, child participation, gender, disability, peace building, urban programming, local partnering and advocacy, and other technical areas. Mark has worked with WV for more than a decade. His first role with WV included leading co-creation of WV's approach to community-led care for orphans and vulnerable children. A subsequent role focused on leading co-creation of WV's development programme approach: working with communities and partners toward the sustained well-being of children within families and communities - especially the most vulnerable. Mark has lived and worked in Malawi, South Africa, and Zambia. He currently lives near Washington, DC with his wife and two daughters.

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Wendy McMahan
Mobilization Manager, Food for the Hungry

Wendy McMahan serves with Food for the Hungry as Mobilization Manager, equipping American followers of Christ to advocate for the world's most vulnerable people. Wendy hosts Poverty Unlocked, an audio program exploring the Christian response to poverty and injustice. She holds a B.S. in Agricultural Systems & Environment, and an M.S. in International Agricultural Development. Wendy lives with her family in Southern California and serves as City Pastor at her church, Rock Harbor Mission Viejo. 

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Tanya Medrano
Sr. Technical Officer for OVC, FHI 360

Tanya Medrano is the Senior Technical Officer for OVC (orphans and vulnerable children) at FHI 360 located in Durham, North Carolina. She has 20 years of experience in program management and HIV/AIDS. She has national and international experience designing and implementing programs for vulnerable children and youth. She was the founder and director of PROINFANCIA, the first NGO established in the Dominican Republic to address the needs of children and youth affected by HIV/AIDS. She has also designed and implemented programs for inner city children and youth affected by HIV/AIDS in the U.S. Tanya holds a masters degree in Management of Social Services and a certificate in Early Childhood Education.

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Diana Millner
Program Officer, Stoneleigh Foundation

Diana Aubourg Millner currently serves as a program officer with the Stoneleigh Foundation, which supports outstanding individuals whose work unites research, policy and practice to improve youth serving systems. At Stoneleigh, she oversees two fellowship programs and the work of both senior and junior fellows.

Previously, Diana served as a Senior Policy Analyst with Bread for the World Institute, focusing on foreign aid reform and related global hunger and poverty issues. Prior to this, she served as Executive Director of Save Africa's Children (SAC), an African-American church initiative that supports orphan care programs throughout Sub-Saharan Africa. In this capacity, she led the disbursement of more than 400 grants to hundreds of grassroots and faith-based organizations serving orphans and vulnerable children in Africa, and represented SAC to faith-based organizations and policy and advocacy groups addressing the global aids pandemic.

Diana has worked closely with Firelight Foundation's founder and president, Kerry Olson, as a founding member of the Faith to Action Initiative and was a co-writer of the publication Journeys of Faith. Diana earned a bachelor's degree in policy studies from Syracuse University and a master's in international development planning from MIT. She is happily married to Rev. Marlon Millner and the proud mother of 2 children.

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Karl Mueller
Justice Pastor, Mission Community Church

Karl Mueller is the Justice Pastor at Mission Community Church in Gilbert, AZ. Karl has been in ministry for more than 35 years. He has served in leadership with Youth With A Mission, the North American Baptist Conference and Visionledd. He was also president of a Bible College and has worked in local church leadership for almost 15 years. His ministry has taken him to more than 35 nations of the world. For the past 10+ years he has been active in building partnerships between North American churches and churches and ministries in Guatemala, Turkey, Indonesia, Fiji, Mexico and Malawi. Karl is a graduate of the University of Alberta and Fuller Theological Seminary (Missiology). Since 2005 Karl and his wife, Debbie, have invested much of their lives in catalyzing, connecting and coaching North American churches in the process of walking alongside African churches and ministries in the battle against AIDS and for transformed communities. They frequently travel to Africa where they are involved in building relationships and the capacity of African churches and ministries engaged in community transformation. Karl and Debbie live in Mesa, Arizona. They have one son.

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Elli Oswald
Director of Mission and Outreach, Bethany Community Church

Elizabeth Oswald is the Director of Mission and Outreach at Bethany Community Church in Seattle, Washington.  Elli is a graduate of Pepperdine University (BA in Religion and Non-Profit Management) and received her Masters in Cross Cultural Studies and International Development from Fuller Theological Seminary. She has worked with a wide variety non-profit organizations both locally and internationally.  Most recently she was the Children in Crisis Research and Communications Coordinator for World Vision International's Child Development and Rights Technical Team, where she specialized in community-based care for children deprived of parental care.  Elli has also worked in the Los Angeles area, including, Union Station Homeless Services and Habitat for Humanity.  She lives in Seattle with her husband, Forrest, an Economist for the Federal Treasury Department.

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Severine Chevrel
Senior Coordinator, Better Care Network

Severine Chevrel is the Senior Coordinator for the Better Care Network. She has worked in the field of child protection at global and country levels for the past eight years. Prior to joining the Better Care Network, Severine was with UNICEF Haiti, initially within the emergency response in the aftermath of the January 2010 earthquake, and then supporting the Haitian Government on alternative care and birth registration. Previously, Severine led the Capacity Strengthening Program with Watchlist on Children and Armed Conflict where she worked with local organizations in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Colombia, Nepal, and on the Thai-Burma border. Prior to Watchlist, under the guidance of UNICEF, Save the Children and the International Rescue Committee’s Steering Committee, Severine oversaw the development, implementation and coordination of the Inter-Agency Child Protection Information Management System and related tools to support child protection programs in over 10 countries. Severine is French-American; holds a master's degree in Applied Mathematics to Social Sciences from Dauphine University, as well as a Master in Business Administration from EM Lyon Business School and a professional certificate in Non-Governmental Organizations from New York University's School of Continuing and Professional Studies. Before joining the field of child protection, she worked in the publishing sector.

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Jon Singletary
Associate Dean and Professor, Baylor School of Social Work

Jon Singletary is Associate Dean and Professor of Social Work at Baylor University (in Waco, TX) and Diana R. Garland Chair of Child and Family Studies in the Baylor Center for Family and Community Ministries. His teaching, research, and practice focus on Christian responses to global poverty from the perspective of strengthening families through building communities. Before coming to Baylor, Jon served as a Mennonite pastor in Virginia. As a volunteer advocate with Bread for the World, he had the opportunity to participate in a ONE Campaign delegation to the G-8 summit in Edinburgh, Scotland in 2005. He currently serves on the Family and Children committee of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the USA and edits the journal Family and Community Ministries.

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Sarah Gesiriech
Coordinator

Sarah Gesiriech serves as Coordinator for the Faith to Action Initiative. She recently served as Director of Federal Relations for Casey Family Programs, a private foundation focused on U.S. child welfare. Sarah has worked in the field of child and family protection for more than 18 years. Sarah was a member of the White House Domestic Policy Council, informing child protection policy and program decisions, including child welfare, missing and exploited children, and domestic and international adoption policy. She served as Education Advisor to the Office of the First Lady at the U.S. Department of Education, acting as senior advisor and primary liaison for domestic and international education policy issues and events. She was also Director of the Department's International Affairs Office. Prior to that, she served at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, assisting the Secretary and Deputy Secretary in policy development, oversight and approval of Department regulations for priority areas including child and family services and youth development, international HIV/AIDS, and trafficking in persons. Sarah also worked on Capitol Hill as a senior advisor to U.S. Senator Charles Grassley on child welfare, health care, and foreign affairs policy. As senior staff on the Pew Commission on Children in Foster Care. As Associate Director for Grants/Communications at the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption, she administered foundation giving and policy development.

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Tammy Johnson
Administrative Assistant

Tammy Johnson is the Administrative Assistant for the Faith to Action Initiative. She holds a bachelor’s degree in Spanish from Geneva College in Pennsylvania. Tammy worked for eight years in the role of Executive Assistant for the Senior Vice President at CHF International, a non-profit international development organization. She has traveled to many parts of Europe and Latin America planning conferences and organizing logistics. She left that post to become a stay at home mom. Tammy loves assisting with church mission trips especially when she can serve in the role of translator or logistics coordinator. She currently lives in Dallas with her husband and their three kids - Tyler, Caleb and Gracie.

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