Robert Rosenthal
Robert Rosenthal is Professor of Sociology at Wesleyan University, where he teaches and writes on housing, homelessness, community research, and the use of music in social movements. He’s the author of
Homeless in Paradise and co-author of the forthcoming
Playing for Change; he’s currently working on an edited collection of the papers of Pete Seeger. Mr. Rosenthal has worked for the past twenty years with community groups in Middletown, CT, including as one of the founding directors of Wesleyan’s Center for Community Partnerships.
Rebecca Ann Rugg
Rebecca Ann Rugg currently teaches at the Department of Dramaturgy and Dramatic Criticism at the Yale School of Drama. At Yale, she has inaugurated an multi-disciplinary study abroad course in the arts and public health, an unprecedented collaboration between African Studies, Theater Studies, and the School of Drama. Through collaborations with South African and siSwati artists, U.S. students are introduced to major issues of the HIV/AIDS pandemic in southern Africa, and are challenged to understand health as it relates to a broad cultural fabric, and the arts as they engage with society. Before coming to Yale, she served on the artistic staff at the Joseph Papp Public Theater/New York Shakespeare Festival, under George C. Wolfe, as Dramaturg and Director of New Projects, focusing on musical theater development. She was dramaturg on the original productions of
Caroline, or Change,
Radiant Baby,
Elaine Stritch at Liberty and
Harlem Song, among other pieces. She produced the University network of the 365 International Festival, which organized thousands of artists to produce Suzan-Lori Parks’s
365 Days/365 Plays cycle in a relay from November 2006 to November 2007. This season in Chicago, she has been the dramaturg on
500 Clown and the Elephant Deal with the 500 Clown ensemble and a world premiere of the new play
Fake written and directed by Eric Simonson, both at Steppenwolf.
Bonnie Metzgar
Bonnie Metzgar is an award-winning producer, director, playwright, and dramaturg. Before joining About Face, she was a professor and director of the graduate playwriting program at Brown University. In addition to teaching, Metzgar also served as Artistic Director of Brown’s
New Plays Festival for three years with Paula Vogel.Most notable is Metzgar’s involvement as co-creator and producer of the
365 Festival–a national festival based on
365 Days/365 Plays, a yearlong play cycle written by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Suzan Lori Parks. Metzgar was the artistic leader for this landmark international event, a shared global premiere by hundreds of theaters, universities and art spaces throughout the U.S. and abroad. Time Magazine named the
365 Festival one of its top ten theater events in 2006. As founding producer of Joe’s Pub from 1998 to 2001, Metzgar was the creator of a now world-famous performance venue. Her responsibilities included providing creative vision for all aspects of the new venue–programming, staffing, marketing strategy, identity and designing of the performance space; programming entertainment for the seven-nights-per-week cabaret/nightclub space; working with restaurant partners; and overseeing all show-related operations. Metzgar received her B.A. from Brown in 1986. Her thesis advisor was Paula Vogel. She was an M.F.A. candidate in playwriting in the theater department at the University of Iowa in 1987-88.
Wayne Silver
Wayne Silver is the co-founder and President of the Board of Directors of the American Friends of Kenya. He was formerly a Humanities Professor at Three Rivers Community College, where he also served as the Academic Dean. Mr. Silver is the author of many op-ed articles and scholarly publications. He has also been the author or project administrator of more than 25 grants, including grants from I.B.M., Rockefeller Foundation, U. S. Department of Education, Gloria Dei Foundation, U.S. Agency for International Development. He has previously served as the chair of the board for the Connecticut Parent Advocacy Center and the Florida Council for the Hearing Impaired. Mr. Silver was given an honorary award by the governor of Florida for outstanding service to disabled citizens. Through the American Friends of Kenya Mr. Silver has built libraries and helped many living in poverty.
Bob Patricelli
Bob Patricelli is a businessman and philanthropist in Greater Hartford, Connecticut. Bob received his B.A. from Wesleyan in 1961 and his LLD from Harvard Law School in 1965. Bob served on the Wesleyan Board of Trustee for 15 years, ending in 2005.In 1965, Bob was chosen as a White House Fellow and then embarked on several jobs in the federal government, serving as minority counsel to a U.S. Senate subcommittee, Deputy Under Secretary for Policy at the Department of HEW, and as Administrator of the Urban Mass Transit Administration. He was Vice President of the non-profit Greater Hartford Process from 1971-75, which was devoted to community development activities in the region. Bob’s business career started at Connecticut General in Bloomfield. He became over time head of CIGNA’s health care businesses before starting a new career as an entrepreneur with the founding of Value Health, Inc. in 1987. Under his leadership, Value Health became a Fortune 1000 New York Stock Exchange company, and Bob went on to found and is still CEO of both Women’s Health USA and Evolution Benefits, based in Avon. Bob is or has been involved in numerous boards and commissions at the local, state and national level. He is a member of the MetroHartford Alliance board of directors and chairs its Neighborhood Development Committee, is chairman of the Bushnell, and a member of the boards of Northeast Utilities, the Ocean Exploration Trust, and the CT Science Center. He has served in the past as chair of the CT Business and Industry Association, and as a member of the boards of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the University of Hartford, Hartford Hospital, and Dance CT. His public policy passion is health care reform, and he co-chaired the CT Health Insurance Policy Council in 2006-07 and serves as a member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences.
Margaret Patricelli
Margaret Patricelli is currently President and Chief Executive Officer of the Robert and Margaret Patricelli Family Foundation. Since its creation in 1997, the foundation has focused on programs designed to assist low-income neighborhoods in Hartford, Connecticut. It played the leading role in creating the innovative TeacherDollars program now in broad use in Hartford public schools, as well as funding the GospelFest at the Bushnell Center for the Performing Arts for five years featuring an all-Hartford 40-church gospel choir, and providing the initial funding for Hartford’s Crime Stoppers Program. Margaret has previously worked in health planning at the Harvard School of Public Health and the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, marketing and communications at Connecticut General and CIGNA, and public affairs at ConnectiCare, where she created the ConnectiCare Foundation. She is active in numerous local, national and international philanthropic activities, having served on the boards of the Mark Twain House and Museum, Foodshare, Planned Parenthood of Connecticut, Hartford Ballet, and the Simsbury Public Health Commission. Margaret currently serves on the boards of Tufts University’s Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy, Shining Hope for Communities – Kenya, and the Friends of Simsbury Public Library. She has made several trips as a volunteer health worker in rural communities in Haiti. Margaret is a graduate of Goucher College, and has a Masters in Public Health from UCLA.
Melissa Dearborn
Melissa Dearborn teaches a multi-age class at the Integrated Day Charter School (IDCS) in Norwich, Connecticut. As one of the original teachers, she has helped the school grow to become a model program for innovative practice including intensive community building, student empowerment, and student research. She has served as lead teacher, mentor, and board member at IDCS. Melissa received her BA from Goddard College in Vermont and her MAT from Connecticut College. A consultant for Main Street Academix , Melissa has facilitated various workshops on school climate in Connecticut, Tennessee, and New Hampshire drawing upon her extensive background in teaching and learning. Melissa also completed study at the Institute of Expressive Arts at Salve Regina University on integrating the arts into the school day for greater academic achievement as well as personal well-being. Melissa designed the curriculum and provides curricular support for The Kibera School for Girls.
Marvin Farbman
Marvin Farbman retired from his position as the Executive Director of Connecticut Legal Services (CLS) in January of 2007. During his tenure at CLS Mr. Farbman worked on many issues from housing, homelessness, social services, and many others. His many accomplishments include designing Equity in Housing of Middletown, a unique scattered-site limited equity housing cooperative that now serves 37 low-income households. Mr. Farbman has also designed a shelter for homeless families. This shelter was the first apartment-based—as opposed to dormitory-based—family shelter in Connecticut. He has also organized a local social service coalition to sponsor the reconfiguration of a hotel into an apartment complex with supportive services. The new facility, Liberty Commons, was the first of its kind to be completed under Connecticut’s Supportive Housing Program. Mr. Farban is still very active in the legal community. In addition he serves on the board of directors of Middlesex County Coalition for Children, Equity Housing in Middletown, Oddfellows Playhouse (a community arts center for children of all backgrounds), and Russell Library in Middletown. Mr. Farbman received the Legal Services Leadership Award from the Connecticut Bar Foundation in 2007.
Betsy Teutsch
Betsy Teutsch is the Head of Communications for Green Microfinance. She has an extensive background in third-world green technology innovations. She provided the funding and expert input for the launch of our Green Bio-Latrine Center. She consults regarding linking eco-friendly practices to our community services.
Barbara Jones
Barbara Jones is an international library consultant. She recently retired as Wesleyan University’s Caleb T. Winchester University Librarian. She has spent over 25 years in academic and research libraries. For the past 10 years she has focused a great deal of her time on freedom of expression issues in libraries around the world. As a member of the Freedom of Access to Information and Freedom of Expression Committee (FAIFE), she has traveled around the world to “train the trainers” on the role of librarians in an open Internet, public access to HIV/AIDS information, and government transparency. She serves as an adjunct instructor at the University of Wisconsin/Madison and the University of Iowa/Iowa City.
Alice Hadler
Alice Hadler has been teaching writing at Wesleyan for 15 years, encouraging people to tell their stories and think critically by considering multiple perspectives. Her areas of interest include literature and the arts, the literature of medicine and public health, travel writing, and food. Her own immersion in the cross-cultural began with insisting on going to school early in the 5
th grade to learn French (the only way to do it in those dark ages of American education), and continued in the intervening decades through degrees in German and applied linguistics, work with international educational exchange programs, acquisition of several languages, and extended stays to study or work in culturally challenging places around the country and around the globe. Those places include Japan, Switzerland, New York City, the Navajo Nation (Window Rock AZ), the Samoan Islands, Hunan province in China. It was in Changsha, Hunan, that she found herself in front of a classroom teaching English to medical students and became a reluctant teacher. In the exhilarating 25+ years since, she has reveled in the chance to spend every day talking about ideas with sharp young minds, and in the relationships with people from every conceivable (and inconceivable) background and life story.
Joshua Posner
Joshua Posner has developed affordable housing over 25 years in a wide variety of settings in New England and other parts of the United States. Mr. Posner founded Rising Tide Development LLC in 2001 to focus on the creation of new small-scale, mixed-income residential communities in Massachusetts. Prior to Rising Tide Development, Mr. Posner played a number of senior roles over 12 years at The Community Builders, a leading regional and national nonprofit developer of affordable housing. He has specialized in the construction and rehabilitation of community-based housing, the preservation of affordable housing nearing the end of its regulatory period, and the redevelopment of large-scale dilapidated public housing projects in various locations around the country. In 1998, Mr. Posner served as President of Cornerstone Housing, a private development firm focused on public housing revitalization, and from 1999 through 2000, he served as Vice President of Development for Trinity Financial, Inc. in Boston. Earlier in his career he founded and led a community development corporation in Brockton, Massachusetts (1972-77) and played a senior role in the growth and operation of Massachusetts Fair Share, a statewide community organization focused on economic justice and community improvement (1978-83.) Mr. Posner has been engaged in a variety of community activities, including currently serving on the Board of the Cambridge Health Alliance and the Cambridge Health Alliance Physicians Organization. CHA is a $1.2 billion enterprise consisting of three hospitals, 12 community health centers and an insurance company covering the health needs of 160,000 low and moderate income members. He is also a member of the Board of Shared Interest, a US-based nonprofit that provides financing to microfinance institutions and emerging black-owned enterprises serving low income people in South and Southern Africa. He is a former Board President and Director of The Guidance Center, the largest mental health and family support social service organization in Cambridge and Somerville.
Rebecca Ann Rugg currently teaches at the Department of Dramaturgy and Dramatic Criticism at the Yale School of Drama. At Yale, she has inaugurated an multi-disciplinary study abroad course in the arts and public health, an unprecedented collaboration between African Studies, Theater Studies, and the School of Drama. Through collaborations with South African and siSwati artists, U.S. students are introduced to major issues of the HIV/AIDS pandemic in southern Africa, and are challenged to understand health as it relates to a broad cultural fabric, and the arts as they engage with society. Before coming to Yale, she served on the artistic staff at the Joseph Papp Public Theater/New York Shakespeare Festival, under George C. Wolfe, as Dramaturg and Director of New Projects, focusing on musical theater development. She was dramaturg on the original productions of Caroline, or Change, Radiant Baby, Elaine Stritch at Liberty and Harlem Song, among other pieces. She produced the University network of the 365 International Festival, which organized thousands of artists to produce Suzan-Lori Parks’s 365 Days/365 Plays cycle in a relay from November 2006 to November 2007. This season in Chicago, she has been the dramaturg on 500 Clown and the Elephant Deal with the 500 Clown ensemble and a world premiere of the new play Fake written and directed by Eric Simonson, both at Steppenwolf.
Wayne Silver is the co-founder and President of the Board of Directors of the American Friends of Kenya. He was formerly a Humanities Professor at Three Rivers Community College, where he also served as the Academic Dean. Mr. Silver is the author of many op-ed articles and scholarly publications. He has also been the author or project administrator of more than 25 grants, including grants from I.B.M., Rockefeller Foundation, U. S. Department of Education, Gloria Dei Foundation, U.S. Agency for International Development. He has previously served as the chair of the board for the Connecticut Parent Advocacy Center and the Florida Council for the Hearing Impaired. Mr. Silver was given an honorary award by the governor of Florida for outstanding service to disabled citizens. Through the American Friends of Kenya Mr. Silver has built libraries and helped many living in poverty.
Melissa Dearborn teaches a multi-age class at the Integrated Day Charter School (IDCS) in Norwich, Connecticut. As one of the original teachers, she has helped the school grow to become a model program for innovative practice including intensive community building, student empowerment, and student research. She has served as lead teacher, mentor, and board member at IDCS. Melissa received her BA from Goddard College in Vermont and her MAT from Connecticut College. A consultant for Main Street Academix , Melissa has facilitated various workshops on school climate in Connecticut, Tennessee, and New Hampshire drawing upon her extensive background in teaching and learning. Melissa also completed study at the Institute of Expressive Arts at Salve Regina University on integrating the arts into the school day for greater academic achievement as well as personal well-being. Melissa designed the curriculum and provides curricular support for The Kibera School for Girls.
Marvin Farbman retired from his position as the Executive Director of Connecticut Legal Services (CLS) in January of 2007. During his tenure at CLS Mr. Farbman worked on many issues from housing, homelessness, social services, and many others. His many accomplishments include designing Equity in Housing of Middletown, a unique scattered-site limited equity housing cooperative that now serves 37 low-income households. Mr. Farbman has also designed a shelter for homeless families. This shelter was the first apartment-based—as opposed to dormitory-based—family shelter in Connecticut. He has also organized a local social service coalition to sponsor the reconfiguration of a hotel into an apartment complex with supportive services. The new facility, Liberty Commons, was the first of its kind to be completed under Connecticut’s Supportive Housing Program. Mr. Farban is still very active in the legal community. In addition he serves on the board of directors of Middlesex County Coalition for Children, Equity Housing in Middletown, Oddfellows Playhouse (a community arts center for children of all backgrounds), and Russell Library in Middletown. Mr. Farbman received the Legal Services Leadership Award from the Connecticut Bar Foundation in 2007.
Betsy Teutsch is the Head of Communications for Green Microfinance. She has an extensive background in third-world green technology innovations. She provided the funding and expert input for the launch of our Green Bio-Latrine Center. She consults regarding linking eco-friendly practices to our community services.
Barbara Jones is an international library consultant. She recently retired as Wesleyan University’s Caleb T. Winchester University Librarian. She has spent over 25 years in academic and research libraries. For the past 10 years she has focused a great deal of her time on freedom of expression issues in libraries around the world. As a member of the Freedom of Access to Information and Freedom of Expression Committee (FAIFE), she has traveled around the world to “train the trainers” on the role of librarians in an open Internet, public access to HIV/AIDS information, and government transparency. She serves as an adjunct instructor at the University of Wisconsin/Madison and the University of Iowa/Iowa City.
Alice Hadler has been teaching writing at Wesleyan for 15 years, encouraging people to tell their stories and think critically by considering multiple perspectives. Her areas of interest include literature and the arts, the literature of medicine and public health, travel writing, and food. Her own immersion in the cross-cultural began with insisting on going to school early in the 5th grade to learn French (the only way to do it in those dark ages of American education), and continued in the intervening decades through degrees in German and applied linguistics, work with international educational exchange programs, acquisition of several languages, and extended stays to study or work in culturally challenging places around the country and around the globe. Those places include Japan, Switzerland, New York City, the Navajo Nation (Window Rock AZ), the Samoan Islands, Hunan province in China. It was in Changsha, Hunan, that she found herself in front of a classroom teaching English to medical students and became a reluctant teacher. In the exhilarating 25+ years since, she has reveled in the chance to spend every day talking about ideas with sharp young minds, and in the relationships with people from every conceivable (and inconceivable) background and life story.
Joshua Posner has developed affordable housing over 25 years in a wide variety of settings in New England and other parts of the United States. Mr. Posner founded Rising Tide Development LLC in 2001 to focus on the creation of new small-scale, mixed-income residential communities in Massachusetts. Prior to Rising Tide Development, Mr. Posner played a number of senior roles over 12 years at The Community Builders, a leading regional and national nonprofit developer of affordable housing. He has specialized in the construction and rehabilitation of community-based housing, the preservation of affordable housing nearing the end of its regulatory period, and the redevelopment of large-scale dilapidated public housing projects in various locations around the country. In 1998, Mr. Posner served as President of Cornerstone Housing, a private development firm focused on public housing revitalization, and from 1999 through 2000, he served as Vice President of Development for Trinity Financial, Inc. in Boston. Earlier in his career he founded and led a community development corporation in Brockton, Massachusetts (1972-77) and played a senior role in the growth and operation of Massachusetts Fair Share, a statewide community organization focused on economic justice and community improvement (1978-83.) Mr. Posner has been engaged in a variety of community activities, including currently serving on the Board of the Cambridge Health Alliance and the Cambridge Health Alliance Physicians Organization. CHA is a $1.2 billion enterprise consisting of three hospitals, 12 community health centers and an insurance company covering the health needs of 160,000 low and moderate income members. He is also a member of the Board of Shared Interest, a US-based nonprofit that provides financing to microfinance institutions and emerging black-owned enterprises serving low income people in South and Southern Africa. He is a former Board President and Director of The Guidance Center, the largest mental health and family support social service organization in Cambridge and Somerville.