JMU Fellows:
Where are they now?
by Lauren Nicole Hill [ Center for International Stabilization and Recovery ]
Stacy Smith
Stacy Smith, summer 2001 Fellow, was employed by RONCO from June 2002 to January 2010. She worked as a Program Manager for mine-clearance operations and has managed security and training contracts in Afghanistan and Peru. During her tenure at RONCO, Smith had the opportunity to travel to Afghanistan, Angola, Azerbaijan, Peru and Sri Lanka. Smith is currently doing consulting work in the United States for Exploration Logistics, Inc., a subsidiary of Exploration Logistics Group, which provides specialized medical and safety assistance to organizations working in challenging or dangerous environments.
Anthony Morin poses with local children in a village outside Yei, South Sudan, in February 2009. Morin and his team had just finished lunch when they heard a loud explosion. An item of unexploded ordnance had exploded and set the grassy area next to the village on fire; however, the children were much more interested in the team’s cameras and playing a game of soccer than they were in any threat to their village.
Photo courtesy of Anthony Morin
Kurt Chesko
Since the end of Kurt Chesko’s spring-semester fellowship in 2001, he has been working for The HALO Trust, the world’s largest humanitarian landmine-clearance organization. Currently, he serves as Vice President at HALO USA. Chesko’s office works closely with PM/WRA, as well as HALO’s American private donors and colleagues in mine-affected countries around the world. Since joining HALO in 2002, he has worked in Afghanistan, Cambodia, Georgia, Mozambique, the Nagorno-Karabakh region of the South Caucasus, Somaliland, Sri Lanka and Sudan.
Jennifer Lachman
Jennifer Lachman completed her Fellowship with PM/WRA in December 2005 and immediately began working at Mines Advisory Group America in 2006. MAG is an international nongovernmental organization operating in conflict-affected countries to clear the remnants of those conflicts, enabling economic recovery and assisting the development of mine-affected populations. In 2000, MAG started a U.S.-based partner organization, MAG America, to raise awareness and funding in the United States to support MAG’s global conflict-recovery programs. In 2006, Lachman started working as MAG America’s Development and Communications Manager in Washington, D.C., and became the organization’s first full-time staff member. During her time with MAG America, Lachman has helped the NGO grow to a staff of four, and her team now raises nearly US$20 million a year for MAG America’s programs. Her career with the company has allowed her to travel to Cambodia, Iraq, Lebanon and Sudan.