American Friends of
The School of St Jude Board

Cindy Skarbek and her family have been supporting St Jude’s since 2005. Her background is in insurance underwriting and she has extensive experience in school governance, as a long-serving board member of an independent college prep K-12 school in Kentucky, as well as on the board of Wesley Seminary in Washington D.C.

Cindy has a great enthusiasm for St Jude’s and her commitment to the school has grown tremendously. Cindy and her family are impressed with and support the mission of St Jude’s which includes the commitment to finding the best teachers and to educate students to be moral leaders in their communities. She takes special joy in watching the St Jude’s graduates begin their adult lives by living out the spirit of the school – putting younger siblings through school, helping their parents, and contributing to their society.

Cindy is a founding member of the American Friends of The School of St Jude, a similar organization channeling American support to The School of St Jude.

Meghan’s involvement with The School of St Jude and Tanzania began in 2014 when she volunteered as a member of the marketing team, aiming to increase awareness and support coming from the United States.

After two years at St Jude’s, Meghan remained in Tanzania to work as the General Manager of Arusha Medivac, a start-up air ambulance service and volunteered as a Marketing Communication Consultant at another Arusha nonprofit, The Plaster House. After five years in Tanzania, she returned to the US and started supporting AFSJ. She officially joined the board in 2019.

Meghan has 15 years of experience developing marketing and fundraising strategies and managing projects and campaigns end-to-end. She is currently the Vice President of Marketing at First American Equipment Finance.

Veronique Kessler currently works for the Galloway School where she has been the CFO for almost 10 years. She earned her CPA license while working for Deloitte and Touche in the San Francisco Bay Area where she grew up. After working in the financial sector, she moved into the non-profit sector working as a consultant for Stanford University and as CFOO for Wikipedia. She holds dual nationality (United States and France) and spent the first three years of her life in Burkina Faso. She is married with two children and hopes to make a visit to Tanzania and The School of St Jude in the near future.

Laurel had the privilege of hearing Gemma Sisia and Felix Mollel speak about The School of St Jude at the Rotary International Convention in Sydney, Australia. She was enthralled by the presentation and immediately set out to learn all she could about the school. Laurel began sending supplies and sponsored a student’s scholarship. Since then, she has spoken about the school to fellow Rotarians, friends, and colleagues. Laurel visited the school in September of 2018 and is committed to helping further the work of St Jude’s.

Laurel has 37 years of educational experience as a teacher, staff developer, site administrator, district administrator, assistant superintendent, university instructor, and consultant. She has a Master’s degree in Special Education and a Doctorate in Educational Administration. Her Master’s project focused on education of the gifted while her dissertation addressed the role of professional organizations in staff development. In her various roles she has conducted small and large group workshops, developed curriculum, led strategic planning initiatives, conducted curriculum audits, written grants, developed budgets to support goal attainment, and coached teachers and leaders.

Laurel is a member of several professional organizations across the country and currently serves as past-president and Deputy Executive Director of California ASCD, the state affiliate of the International ASCD. In addition, she is a member of the International Literacy Association and Phi Delta Kappa. Laurel is the Board Chair of the Cultural Arts Rotary Foundation and the Chair of the International Committee of the Cultural Arts Rotary Club of Fresno.

Dr James Calleroz White and his family have supported The School of St Jude and its students since the summer of 2014. He first traveled to Tanzania to with a group of educators to support the work of St Jude’s teachers through a partnership known as Kufundisha Pamoja. Since his first visit, James has championed the school by continuing to support teachers’ professional development and partnership by sending teachers from his schools in Louisville, Kentucky and Atlanta, Georgia to Tanzania. His family also hosted teachers from St Jude’s when they came to the United States.

Dr Calleroz White is currently the Head of School at The Galloway School in Atlanta, GA. He was previously the Head of School at Louisville Collegiate School in Louisville, Kentucky. Before moving to become a Head of School, James worked at schools in Boston, New York City, and Phoenix. James has over 20 years of experience in education including teaching, administration, and leadership at the JK–12, university, and nonprofit level and has served and held leadership positions on multiple local and national non-profit Boards.

Dr Calleroz White attended Harvard University where he earned a B.A. in Government in 1995 and a M.Ed. in Administration, Planning, and Social Policy in 2001. He also earned his Ed. D. in Educational Leadership, Teaching, and Administration from Arizona State University in 2012. Born and raised in Hopkinsville, Kentucky, James is married to Dr Mistalene Calleroz White, who currently serves as Adjunct Professor and Enrollment Consultant for Spalding University, and has two daughters and a son who he hopes to bring to St Jude’s in the near future.

Mark Wagner and his family have supported The School of St Jude for over ten years. He has almost fifteen years of experience in strategic network design, construction, and operation.

Mark joined Bay-Tek Consulting in July of 2014 to help run operations and to manage State of Maryland business. Prior to joining Bay-Tek Consulting, he was a Senior Account Executive and Business Development Director at Zayo, Inc. in charge of the Baltimore region. Mark was a Founder and Managing Partner of Litecast, LLC. Litecast was the largest privately held fiber optic network in the City of Baltimore and provided network services for most of Baltimore’s major businesses, institutions, and organizations. Litecast was sold to Zayo in 2013.

Mark was the Technical Lead for the City of Baltimore Google RFI Submission and is currently a member of the Mayor’s Smart City Task Force in charge of coming up with a Broadband Strategy for the City of Baltimore. In addition, Mark is on the Board of the Emerging Technology Center, and is a Trustee for the Baltimore Museum of Art where he chairs the Technology Committee.

Mark holds a law degree from the Catholic University of America and a bachelor degree from Guilford College.

Alex Elifas is a 2015 graduate of The School of St Jude who completed a Biomechanical Engineering degree at Stanford University.

Alex is committed to helping fellow Tanzanian students thrive. He has interned with the Tanzania Students Achievement Organization, an NGO that identifies the strongest academic students from schools throughout Tanzania and then prepare them for the challenges of applying for university admission in top universities in the U.S. He is also the first St Jude alum to sponsor a St Jude’s student’s scholarship.

Pat Sutliff’s involvement with The School of St Jude began in 2003 when she heard Gemma Sisia (the Founder of St Jude’s) speak at the Rotary International Conference. Since then, she and her husband Willis have been sponsoring scholarships for St Jude’s students and encouraging others to sponsor too.

In 2009 Pat and her husband, a pediatrician, traveled to The School of St Jude where they performed the annual school physicals. Since then she has been helping Rotary clubs become involved with the school through donations and grants.

Pat has served as a volunteer and been on non-profit boards for most of her adult life. Her most recent activity has been as Secretary of the local Habitat for Humanity Board and the local and district Boards for Rotary, including a term as District Governor for Rotary International. Currently, she is Board Secretary for the Dakota Travel and International Visitor Program.

Pat graduated from Colorado State University with honors and a Bachelor of Science. After completing her internships, she became an Occupational Therapist and worked as a Pediatric Occupational Therapist for several years. Pat and Willis raised five children and are the proud grandparents of nine grandchildren.

Kelly’s involvement with The School of St Jude began in 2014 when she joined the Donor Relations team at the school as a volunteer, supporting fundraising initiatives from conception to completion to help the school continue fighting poverty through education.

After 18 months at the school, Kelly moved to Washington, D.C. and joined the United Nations Foundation working to fund malaria interventions for refugees and vulnerable populations throughout sub-Saharan Africa and the Western Hemisphere.

In 2019 Kelly received an MSc in International Development and Humanitarian Emergencies from the London School of Economics and joined the nonprofit international development organization Pact. At Pact Kelly serves as a Program Specialist for East and West Africa, backstopping UN and USAID projects in Tanzania, Liberia, Nigeria, Ghana, and Sierra Leone.

Beyond Kelly’s love for the continent of Africa, she enjoys playing with her adorable dog Bruce, reading, yoga, podcasts, and the occasional half marathon.

Enock Kivuyo is 2015 graduate of The School of St Jude. He attended the University of Rochester as a MasterCard Foundation scholar, majoring in Financial Economics and Business and graduated in 2021.

Elected as the President of the MasterCard Scholar Council, Enock coordinated scholar council activities across 11 partner universities in North America, Africa and Germany. Enock is an astute enthusiast of consulting, finance, philanthropy, and education. He is an International Director for Africamoja Youth Society where he determines, selects, approves and plans youth programs on leadership skills, gender training and youth advocacy beyond borders. He also organizes and facilitates youth camps and holiday programs.

Enock interned with Issoff Foundation under City Hall LLC New York, EFE Washington, DC, The School of St Jude and Builders of Future Africa (BFA). Following his university graduation, Enock returned to Tanzania and now uses his skills to assist other graduates of St Jude’s, through his work in the Beyond St Jude’s team.

In his free time, Enock enjoys playing soccer, photography, dancing, hiking and writing business plans.