Project & Partnership Volunteers
Michelle Stoner - Niger Country Director
A native of Northern California, Michelle completed her undergraduate studies at Sonoma State University where she majored in French and Geography. While attending university, Michelle studied abroad for a year in Paris, France, where she lived in a predominately North and West African neighborhood of the city. She pursued African studies, literature, and dance, and decided to join the Peace Corps upon graduation.
In the Peace Corps, Michelle spent two and a half years serving as a Community Youth Education volunteer in Niger, West Africa and as the Gender and Development and HIV/AIDS Project Coordinator for Peace Corps Niger. In Niger she completed many successful development projects, learned a local dialect full of proverbs, and feels a great admiration for the deep African belly laugh that manages to shake the continent out of even the most difficult of struggles.
Contact: michelle@f4freedom.org
Sujata Das - Gopalwadi School Project Leader
Sujata is a computer scientist working for Adobe Systems.
Besides work, she enjoys Indian classical music, philosophy and traveling. She is interested in working on literacy and female empowerment projects in rural areas.
Contact: sujata@f4freedom.org
Suchismita Sen Chowdhury - Pragati School Local Project Leader
Suchismita is a pursuing her PhD in Anthropology at the University of Calcutta. She currently is the Secretary of the Rajdanga Pragati Society, based in Kolkata, which runs the Pragati School.
Her research has taken her to study women and children's issues across India and Bangladesh to acheive her personal goals of working for the development of disadvantaged women and children. We are excited to have her on board and look forward to Suchismita to taking a larger leadership role within the FFF in South Asia.
Contact: suchismita@f4freedom.org
Sri Debiprasad Nag - Shiksha Mandir School Local Project Leader
Debiprasad is a retired government accoutant who is dedicated to education in his retired life. His father was an educator who wrote one of the most popular math books in India.
His wife is also a retired teacher. Under his guidance the Shiksha Mandir School has grown from 10 students in 1992 to 64 students. He is brought to Shiksha Mandir as it is his native viallage.
Lachlan Chambliss - Roura School (Niger) Local Project Leader
Lachlan was born near Ithaca, New York in 1979, and lived in that area through high school. In the fall of 1997 he entered the State University of New York at Plattsburgh, studying Environmental Sciences. In the fall of 1999 he transferred to Binghamton University, and changed his field of study to Anthropology. In the fall 2000 he took advantage of a program administered through State University of New York at Oswego to spend a year in foreign study at Tsukuba University in Japan.
In the 2001 he returned to Binghamton University, where he graduated the following spring with a BA in anthropology. Lachlan has always been interested in different cultures, and has always enjoyed travel, and those things combined with his desire to do some good in the world made the Peace Corps a natural choice. Has assignment to Niger was entirely fortuitous, as he has developed a great affection for the people and the place.
Jayanta Haldar - Main Coordinator Gazipur, India
Jayanta is the main coordinator of Foundation for Freedom's schools in Gazipur, India.
Aside from looking after our schools, Jayanta helps out in rural development with microcredit projects, clean water, septic toilets and medical clinics through his Bansberia Rural Development Society.
He is an exemplary worker with humility and tireless dedication.
Dan Shibru - Ethiopia Coordinator
Daniel is a colorectal surgeon and a faculty member of the Kaiser Permanente/UC Davis program.
He makes annual trip to his motherland of Ethiopia with his mentor Dr. Sakti Das for medical missions and to look into potential projects.
