Silas Wanjala just finished six months as the Friends Relations intern at AFSC. He was born and raised in western Kenya in Kitale. After graduating from seminary in 2003, he worked as a pastor in Elgon East Yearly Meeting. Silas has been involved in community development and peace work. Silas was a member of the Friends Church Peace Team. He has a Masters of Arts in Religion with a focus on Peace and Justice Studies from the Earlham School of Religion. His time at Earlham helped him to further his understanding of conflict transformation.
Patricia Sellick has been serving as the Regional Director for the Middle East for the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) since 2009. Her connection with the Middle East began in 1987 when she served as a volunteer with the British Friends agency, Quaker Peace and Service. She was based for two years in Hebron, in the occupied Palestinian territories, at the time of the first Palestinian intifada.
Since 1998, David Zarembka has been Coordinator of the African Great Lakes Initiative of the Friends Peace Teams. He lives with his wife, Gladys Kamonya, in western Kenya. They are members of Lugari Yearly Meeting and Baltimore Yearly Meeting. He is the author of A Peace of Africa: Reflections on Life in the Great Lakes Region.
Johan Maurer served with Friends World Committee for Consultation in the Right Sharing of World Resources program, and later as general secretary of Friends United Meeting. Currently he and his wife Judy Maurer are teachers in Elektrostal, Russia. They are members of Reedwood Friends Church in Portland, Oregon, and of Moscow Monthly Meeting of Friends in Russia. Johan blogs weekly at Can You Believe?
Marsha Base serves AFSC as Director for Planning and Evaluation.
Paul Sheldon retired from four decades on the faculty in Villanova University's Psychology department, and is currently teaching there as an adjunct. More information about Paul can be found on his website, Peaceful Ways.
Tory Smith is an AFSC campus organizer on Israel/Palestine and a researcher on drones and unmanned aerial vehicles in Philadelphia. He has lived in the midst of the Israel/Palestinian conflict during the 2011 Arab Spring, and he has a degree in peace and global studies from Earlham College. Originally from the Washington, D.C., area, he has traveled widely, and likes to imagine that he learned something from that. He is currently located in Philadelphia, with part of his heart still stuck in Palestine.
Judy Goldberger is a member of Beacon Hill Friends Meeting (New England Yearly Meeting) and of the Boston New Sanctuary Movement, an interfaith immigrant justice coalition. Her heart was first broken open working as a Birth Sister (doula) in Boston's immigrant communities.
Aarati Kasturirangan is a program officer for the Integration and Impact Unit of AFSC. Her name is pronounced Arthi Kus-thu-ree-run-gun. She was born in New Delhi, India; raised in Wilmington, Del.; became an activist, wife, Ph.D., and mother in Chicago; stayed home with her kids in D.C.; and has now settled in Philladelphia. She blogs about identity (aaratikasturirangan.wordpress.com), sings as much as possible, and tells dumb jokes with her kids.
Tai Amri Spann-Wilson is a preschool teacher and youth minister in Lawrence, Kansas. He has deep roots in Philadelphia and among Quakers, ignites a fire in those around him with his messages about radical change, the edges of poverty, racism, spiritual depth and transformation, and the remarkable grace of humanity. He has a degree from the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics and studied theology at the Pacific School of Religion. He served as a co-pastor of a Disciples of Christ Church in Oakland, California for two years during the height of the Occupy Movement.