2011-12

Volunteer Professionals

Meet Tremendous Hearts' Team of Volunteer Professionals!

We are thrilled to introduce the talented group of volunteers who will be contributing their impressive expertise, passion, and time to our partner agencies in South Africa. Read on to learn about their important projects and diverse backgrounds.

Current Volunteers

TRANSFORMING THE CARE OF CHILDREN AT SIBONGILE
Johan de Besche, Pediatric Physical Therapist

Follow Johan’s Blog: physiojo.wordpress.com

Johan de Besche, his wife, Sara Stackhouse, and their two children will arrive in Cape Town in August 2011 to serve with Tremendous Hearts for a year.

Johan will work with 36 physically disabled children, many of whom also have HIV/AIDS, and the women who care for them, at the Sibongile Day and Night Care Center in Khayelitsha. Sibongile was founded by Nomasango Xabanisa, a South African mother with a disabled child. Prevalent cultural beliefs in South Africa lead some to think that children with physical disabilities are a curse on the family, and many of these children are abused, neglected, or left to die.  Nomasango saw many disabled children abandoned and orphaned, and decided to take them in and care for them. Today, Sibongile provides 24 children with round-the-clock care in two houses. Sibongile will be opening a new, small physical therapy facility, and has just opened a new daycare center to serve additional disabled children.  Children at Sibongile have never had long-term physical therapy.

Johan will provide direct physical therapy care to children as well as train the staff and parents in techniques they can use to help improve the children’s health.  He will help outfit the new physical therapy facility and develop a sustainable physical therapy program by partnering with local South African providers so children at Sibongile will have consistent long-term care and can reach their full potential.

About Johan

Johan de Besche, Physical Therapist, DPT, has spent the last 13 years helping children to develop, heal, and thrive. He is currently the therapies supervisor at two campuses of The Learning Center for the Deaf (TLC), a school for deaf and disabled children in Massachusetts. At TLC, Johan is responsible for professional development training to educators and staff, provides direct physical therapy services to students, supervises the occupational and physical therapists, and runs an adaptive physical education program, swim program, and movement classes. He recently co-presented TLC's integrated therapies approach at an education conference. Johan is also a professional modern dancer who has performed in New York, Boston, and throughout New England.

Kathleen Callahan

Kathleen Callahan joins Tremendous Hearts from Minnesota, where she recently retired from a career in investment management and state government. Early in her career, she served as the Deputy Commissioner of Trade and Economic Development for Minnesota. Over the years, she has also devoted much of her time to volunteer work with such organizations as the Frogtown Family Resource Center, the Greater Twin Cities YMCA, the Minnesota Opera, and the Friends of the St. Paul Library. Tremendous Hearts is thrilled that she is now putting that spirit of volunteerism to work for the vulnerable children of South Africa.

In addition to sharing her financial systems expertise with the Philani Nutrition Centre in Khayelitsha, Kathleen will provide after-school academic support for the children at Home from Home, which provides supported and supervised community-based foster care for orphans and vulnerable children.

Our 2011 team of Tremendous Hearts volunteers has already made an impact at the organization. Educators Jason Musselman and Rebecca Laders also worked with the  Home from Home children in 2011, providing academic and social support to help them thrive in school after years of interrupted educational. Kathleen will take the torch and continue to mentor them.

Becky Molinini

Becky Molinini will join our Sibongile team in 2012.  She is returning to Cape Town as a Tremendous Hearts volunteer professional, after she found her eight-week stint with another organization in early 2011 was too short. A physical therapist, Becky currently works at a trauma hospital in North Carolina, where she helps children and adults with acute medical conditions. She is responsible for providing individualized therapy services to the hospital's patients with neurological, orthopedic, and cardiovascular impairments.

In 2011, working through another organization, Becky provided the children of Sibongile with developmental stimulation through play, and transferred her knowledge to the Sibongile staff so that these services could continue to benefit the children long-term.  We expect that Becky will arrive in June 2012, and overlap with Tremendous Hearts volunteer, Johan de Besche.  The goal is to transition the work he has been doing with the children and caregivers at Sibongile to Becky.  The Sibongile team is eagerly awaiting the arrival of an old friend!

INCREASING FUNDRAISING CAPACITY TO BENEFIT CHILDREN:
Sara Stackhouse and Austin de Besche

Sara Stackhouse, her husband, Johan de Besche, and their two children will arrive in Cape Town in August 2011 to serve with Tremendous Hearts for a year. Austin and Sarah de Besche, Johan’s parents, will join the family in Cape Town in January 2011.  Austin will work with Sara Stackhouse on video projects.

Most South African children’s homes and agencies that care for orphans and vulnerable children lack the knowledge and resources needed to secure funding from the large philanthropic community in South Africa or from international funding sources.  Sara and Austin will assist several agencies, including Sibongile, by producing short documentary films that can be used to engage donors and potential volunteers in the important work of the organizations.

Sara will also work to develop long-term partnerships between American churches and South African NGOs and provide grant writing and fundraising support to Tremendous Hearts.

About Sara
Sara Stackhouse is the executive producer of the Actors' Shakespeare Project in Massachusetts.  Previously, she was the supervising producer of INSIDE This Old House for the A&E television network.  She also served as project manager for cellist Yo Yo Ma for six years and as the associate producer on eight films including Yo Yo Ma: Inspired by Bach.  Sara received a theater degree from Oberlin College.

About Austin
Austin de Besche has worked in the motion picture business for more than 40 years as a cameraman and director. He has photographed several feature films (including Return of the Secaucus 7), television commercials numbering in the thousands, and at present is working primarily in documentaries and children's programming for cable and public television.  His work has received many awards and his Holocaust survivor documentary, Pilgrimage into the Past, was invited to numerous festivals.

BUILDING ORGANIZATIONAL CAPACITY TO ENABLE GROWTH:
Marilyn E. Votaw

Since relocating to Cape Town in 2009, Marilyn Votaw has served as Tremendous Hearts’ first volunteer professional and provided organizational capacity building and technical support to several agencies that care for orphaned, abandoned, abused and vulnerable children including Home from Home and the Masazane Soup Kitchen.  

Home From Home provides community-based foster care, operating 19 homes and caring for more than 120 children in urban and peri-urban settings in the Western Cape Province.  Home From Home is also in the process of expanding to the Eastern Cape Province.  Expanding in the Eastern Cape will involve adapting the Home from Home model to operate in a poor rural area.  Marilyn has given more than 1,500 hours assisting Home from Home’s current staff to develop and implement a staff structure, systems, and tools (including a database and a monitoring and valuation program) that will support the organization’s expansion.  

About Marilyn
Marilyn E. Votaw is the Founder, Executive Director, and Program Director of Tremendous Hearts.  She has also been serving as the organization’s first volunteer professional since she relocated to Cape Town in 2009. Marilyn's career spans more than 25 years of community service, organizational development, marketing, and philanthropy.  Prior to founding Tremendous Hearts, she was a prospect researcher at Harvard Divinity School. An effective fundraiser and business development professional, Marilyn’s career achievements include leading efforts that raised $2.3 million in private donations for City Year Boston and $339 million worth of business for Keane, Inc.  She also developed extensive community relations and philanthropy strategies for technology companies in Boston including Keane, Inc. and Nortel Networks.

Numerous organizations and communities have benefited from Marilyn's service and skills on a volunteer basis, including Pleasant Street Congregational Church, United Church of Christ (UCC) in Arlington, M.A.; the town of Rio Chiquito, Honduras, where Marilyn did construction projects on several mission trips; and the Baphumelele Children's Home in Khayelitsha.

Marilyn holds a B.A. in English composition from DePauw University and an M.A. in English from Northeastern University.  She is a 2010 recipient of The Haystack Award given by the Commission for Mission and Justice Concerns of the Massachusetts Conference of the UCC. She was also commissioned as a missionary by Pleasant Street Congregational Church, UCC in 2009.

Past Volunteers

YOUTH DEVELOPMENT AT HOME FROM HOME: 
Becca Laders and Jason Musselman

Follow Jason and Becca’s Blog: http://ourjourneyforhope.tumblr.com/

Jason Musselman and Becca Laders will begin a two-month project in June 2011 at Home From Home, a South African foster care agency with 19 homes throughout the Western Cape province.  Jason and Becca will work to develop self-esteem and improve academic performance for more than 30 HIV + youth living in foster care in Khayelitsha through photography, tutoring, mentoring, and soccer coaching.

Jason and Becca’s primary focus will be a photography class through which students can develop a sense of empowerment, as well as an artistic skill that would not have otherwise been available to them.  The children, while learning the basics of photography, will be encouraged to tell their own story in photographs.  Jason and Becca have secured more than a dozen donated, used digital cameras so each child will be able to work with his/her own camera.  The children will develop a portfolio of their work and the class will also present a show of their best images to the local community at the end of the course.  Jason and Becca have also partnered with Parkside Christian Academy in Roxbury, M.A., to create a “buddy” program in which Parkside students and Home From Home children will exchange photographs and letters.  

Jason and Becca will also plan and lead, with support from other local volunteers, a program to be run during the school winter break which will include academic support, arts and crafts projects, outings, and a soccer clinic.

About Becca
Rebecca Laders will graduate with a B.A. in English from Hartwick College in Oneonta, N.Y., in May 2012.  After going on a January-term trip to Taiwan, Becca was inspired to look deeper into the world of international teaching, and would like to teach overseas after getting her masters in education. Becca is on the Challenge Staff at Hartwick College which works with teams and organizations in the Hartwick and the Oneonta community on the high and low ropes course. In addition to her youth leadership work, Becca is an avid photographer.

About Jason
Jason Musselman graduated from Hartwick College in 2008 and will be starting work on a masters in education at Lesley University in September 2011. Travel and education have been a staple of Jason's upbringing, including experiences in New Zealand, India, France, England, Honduras, and Italy.  An experienced photographer, youth leader, soccer coach, and service worker, Jason's long-term goal is to become a high school history teacher.

IMPROVING CHILD HEALTH AT EMASITHANDANE:
Janet and Gary Clarke

Janet and Gary Clarke will begin work in November 2011 on a child health management system for the Emasithandane Children’s Project in Nyanga. Emasithandane provides basic care for 35 orphaned, abandoned, and abused children, some of whom are HIV + and/or being treated for TB. The home is currently lacking a system to regularly monitor and track the children’s health, medications, and medical appointments. Janet and Gary will work closely with the staff to assess the children’s overall health, develop care plans for those children living with chronic diseases, and create system appropriate to the Home’s resources to ensure that the local staff can provide basic preventative care and properly maintain the children’s health records.

About Janet and Gary
Janet and Gary Clarke are retired, happily traveling, and enjoying visiting with their four adult children and six granddaughters and families. Janet is a retired registered nurse who has worked with general medical-surgical patients in hospitals and as a visiting nurse. Prior to her retirement, she spent five year working on an HIV team. As a visiting nurse, Janet spent years visiting with patients and families in their homes, taking in the complex aspects of care that arise from complicated disease issues and family and social situations. Janet has been actively involved at her church in many areas. Gary spent most of his career as a pilot. For many years he flew the C-5 around the globe in the Air Force Reserves as well as the 747 for the FAA as an inspector pilot.

Janet and Gary enjoy summer on their 32-foot sailboat sailing in Buzzard’s Bay in Massachusetts. They love the water and SCUBA dive and snorkel as they travel to their destinations. For Janet, volunteering in Africa and helping out in whatever way possible is something she has always wanted to do and she is grateful that Tremendous Hearts and Gary have made this opportunity possible.