Blog #37: Hamme, Lane

We awarded 22 Volunteer Service Awards in 2014, 15 in the spring, and 7 in the fall. In this and the next two blogs, we are introducing the 7 fall recipients. Mary Grace Hamme, a volunteer with Visions Global Empowerment, is working with the deaf community in Bahir Dar, the capital of the Amhara Region, Ethiopia, on Deaf Education and Empowerment.  In addition to participating in the training, she is analyzing the impact of the programs and advising on how to adjust the curriculum to better meet the needs of the students and the community. Helena Lane is spending a year with 2Seeds Network as a Project Coordinator (PC) for the Bombo Majimoto Project in rural Tanzania.  She and her fellow PC will continue to provide individualized training to artisans focused on leadership building, accountability, and basic finance and accounting.  They are also seeking to have the artisans rely less heavily on sales orchestrated by 2Seeds Network’s staff, but instead build a partners’ network and find new buyers so that they will have more self-sustainable group sales.