Speakers

Amer Al-Nimr, MD

Dr. Amer Al-Nimr is an Assistant Professor of Medicine and Pediatric Gastroenterology at the Dartmouth Geisel School of Medicine. He has extensive international and global health experience, focusing the last four years on work in Jordan. Here he has visited the Refugee Camps at Za’atari, and later the Mrajeeb El Fhood and Azraq camps, where he has observed the growth of the camps and the health status of the refugees. Most recently, in coordination with the Jordanian Ministry of Health and the UN High commission on Refugees, he has been working to establish a recurring GI clinic at Azraq camp, conduct a survey about Functional GI disorders in these camps, and screen at-risk pediatric patients for Celiac disease.

Dr. Al-Nimr received his BSc in Biology and an MD at AUB. He spent the last 12 years in Cleveland, OH at Case Western Reserve & University Hospitals of Cleveland where he completed residency in Internal Medicine & Pediatrics, followed by a year as chief resident and a GI fellowship. He had dual appointments in Medicine and Pediatrics starting in 2008 and in 2010, took over as Program Director of the Pediatric Global Child Health Program overseeing more than 24 residents annually in the Global Health Track. While at Case Western, he was also awarded two grants to support his work — from the AAP and the UN foundation for Global Vaccine Advocacy, the Arnold P. Gold Foundation to make humanism a cornerstone in Global Child Health Education.

Becky Field, PhotographerBecky Field’s images focus primarily on social documentary issues. Since 2012, she has photographed cultural, ethnic and religious diversity in New Hampshire. Fields holds a Certificate in Photography from the NH Institute of Art and is a member of NH Society of Photographic Artists and Professional Photographers of America. In past work, Becky was communications director with the American Red Cross in New Hampshire where her photographs were used to support the humanitarian work of the Red Cross. Before that, she was a wildlife research ecologist with the U.S. Department of Interior and a university faculty member. Becky holds masters and doctorate degrees in wildlife ecology and lives in Concord, NH.

Karen M. Fondacaro, PhD

Dr. Karen Fondacaro is a Clinical Psychology Professor in the Department of Psychological Science at the University of Vermont and Director of the Behavior Therapy and Psychotherapy Center, a mental health training clinic for pre-doctoral clinicians and interns working towards their doctoral degrees in clinical psychology. In 2007, Dr. Fondacaro established Connecting Cultures, a clinical science program specifically designed to focus on the mental health needs of refugees, immigrants, and asylum seekers. Dr. Fondacaro is co-founder of NESTT (New England Survivors of Torture and Trauma), a partnership between mental health (Connecting Cultures) and legal services (Vermont Law School). The overall goal is to provide a ‘nest’ in which survivors of torture receive integrated and effective services in a culturally relevant, client centered context.  NESTT is based on a social justice framework emphasizing community voice, while acknowledging multi-agency professional expertise and empirically based intervention and evaluation strategies. NESTT also has numerous community collaborators, which enhances access to needed services.

Paul L. Geltman, MD, MPH

Dr. Paul Geltman is Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at the Harvard Medical School and Associate Professor of Health Policy and Health Services Research at the Boston University Goldman School of Dental Medicine. He is also the long-standing Medical Director for Refugee and Immigrant Health in the Division of Global Populations and Infectious Disease Prevention at the Massachusetts Department of Public Health. Dr. Geltman has worked in clinical, policy, and public health settings with refugee populations resettled in Massachusetts as well as in Rwanda. He practices primary care pediatrics with the Cambridge Health Alliance where he is also the medical liaison for inpatient child and adolescent psychiatry.
Dr. Geltman is a graduate of Princeton University and received his MD and MPH degrees from the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences. After his pediatric residency at the Floating Hospital for Children in Boston, he completed a postgraduate academic fellowship in child advocacy and community pediatrics, with a focus on immigrant and refugee children, at Boston Medical Center (then Boston City Hospital). His academic work has produced wide-ranging publications including the most extensive report on lead poisoning among refugee children in the US and a nationwide study of the functional and behavioral health status of the unaccompanied refugee minors known commonly as the “Lost Boys” of Sudan. Most recently he has concluded a major research grant from the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research that supported the largest study ever conducted of the relationships between health literacy, English language skills, acculturation and health status of a US refugee population.

 

Erin Jacobsen, JD

Erin Jacobsen is Assistant Professor and Supervising Attorney at Vermont Law School’s South Royalton Legal Clinic (SRLC). Prior to that, she was the Lead Staff Attorney at Vermont Immigration and Asylum Advocates in Burlington, Vermont. Currently, Erin is the lead project attorney of Vermont Immigrant Assistance (VIA), the SRLC’s immigration program, which provides free legal representation to indigent immigrants, refugees, and asylum seekers. Erin also practices juvenile law, family law, and runs the Clinic’s Prison Project, in which Erin and her students consult with incarcerated women about legal issues regarding their children. Erin is committed to public interest law and to doing work that promotes human dignity and human rights. She is licensed to practice law in the State of Vermont and in the United States District Court for the District of Vermont. She currently resides in Norwich, Vermont.

 

Former Ambassador Ronald Kuchel

Ambassador Roland Kuchel is a retired career Senior Foreign Service Officer who last served as US Ambassador to Zambia. During the course of his 36-year long career at the US Department of State, he specialized in US relations with Europe (notably with Eastern Europe during the era of communist rule) and Africa. After early postings in Eritrea, Nigeria and Romania, he then served as Deputy Head of the Political Section in Rome, Italy, Deputy Chief of Mission in Budapest, Hungary, Director of the Office of East European Affairs, and Deputy Chief of Mission in Stockholm, Sweden.

Kuchel is a graduate of Princeton University where he majored in history.  He currently resides in Fairlee, Vermont.

 

Yvonne Kwan, PhD

Dr. Yvonne Kwan is a sociologist in the Dartmouth Society of Fellows Postdoctoral Program. Dr. Kwan conducts research on how social trauma and violent histories are transmitted from one generation to the next, thereby producing refugee subjectivities that circulate around transgenerational trauma. In her study of Cambodian American refugees, she has found that despite almost 40 years since the fall of the Khmer Rouge, the older generation continues to experience acute mental health issues, which have ultimately affected intergenerational family relationships and dynamics.

 

Paula Mahon, MD

Dr. Mahon, originally from Worcester, MA, is a graduate of Wellesley College. She volunteered with Peace Corps in Kenya as a high school math and English teacher. Her years in the Peace Corps informed her decision to attend medical school at Dartmouth Medical School. Dr. Mahon completed her family medicine residency in Rochester, NY, and started her postgraduate career at Manchester Community Health Center where she had her most concentrated exposure to refugee medicine. As a result of that exposure, she made a commitment to the International Institute to see their patients, which she did after leaving the MCHC and working in private practice for five years, and then again for Catholic Medical Center in 2001 in the guise of a refugee clinic done at first as a volunteer project and then later as a collaborative practice with funding from United Way for a couple of years. That clinic provided not just medical, but also mental health services. As a civil surgeon, she also provided green card exams for permanent residence. She completed the Harvard course in refugee trauma in 2013. She has given talks on refugee health for the NH Medical Society, the North American Refugee Health Conference, and on The Exchange with Laura Kinoy on NHPR.

 

Sara Mostafa, MD

Dr. Mostafa graduated from the Faculty of Medicine Benghazi University, Libya in 2010. She worked as a Senior House Officer in the Benghazi Psychiatry Hospital in Libya from 2010-2013.  During the Libyan Civil War in 2011, she served as a Mental Health and Psychosocial Program Officer for International Medical Corps (IMC), providing humanitarian aid to internally displaced people, helping to conduct the Libya Mental Health Assessment, and providing psychiatric consultation and referrals. She also trained first responders and volunteers throughout Libya as part of IMC’s Psychological First Aid program, and helped start a program addressing gender based violence.

She also worked for the Dignity Danish Institute Against Torture, providing consultation and networking and assisting in training and capacity building of mental health workers in Libya. She became the first female Teaching Assistant in the Department of Psychiatry Benghazi University. In 2013 she became a certified Narrative Exposure and Cognitive Behavioral Therapy practitioner, applying these techniques at Al Tarahum Charity Clinic in Benghazi where she was volunteering.

In 2013 she moved to the US to pursue her career. A few months after her arrival she was granted a scholarship from Benghazi University, but due to the situation in Libya, has never received any money and found herself struggling to study and survive in the US with no income. Her support system from family in Libya and friends in the US keeps her going. She is currently studying to get her medical license in the US and recently she joined International Rescue Committee in Glendale, California as a Refugee Reception and Placement volunteer.

 

James Nachtwey, Photographer

James Nachtwey grew up in Massachusetts and in 1970 graduated from Dartmouth College, where he majored in both Art History and Government. Images from the Vietnam War and the American Civil Rights movement had a powerful effect on him and were instrumental in his decision to become a photographer. He has worked aboard ships in the Merchant Marine, and while teaching himself photography, he was an apprentice news film editor and a truck driver.

In 1976 he started work as a newspaper photographer in New Mexico, and in 1980, moved to New York to begin a career as a freelance magazine photographer. His first foreign assignment was to cover civil strife in Northern Ireland during the IRA hunger strike in 1981. Since then, Nachtwey has devoted himself to documenting wars, conflicts and critical social issues. He has worked on extensive photographic essays throughout Central America and the Middle East, including the war in Iraq, three wars in Afghanistan, as well as the wars in the Balkans, Chechnya, Rwanda and Sri Lanka. He has also worked throughout Africa and Southeast Asia.

Nachtwey has been a contract photographer with Time Magazine since 1984. He was a member of Magnum Photos from 1986 until 2001, and in 2001 he became one of the founding members of the photo agency VII. He has worked independently as a photographer since 2008.  

Nachtwey has received numerous awards from the journalism profession, as well as for his contributions to art and to humanitarian causes. In 2001 he received the Common Wealth Award. In 2003 he was awarded the Dan David Prize. In 2007 he received both the TED Prize and the Heinz Family Foundation Award. In 2012 he was awarded the Dresden Prize.

Five times Nachtwey has been awarded the Robert Capa Gold Medal, for exceptional courage and enterprise. He has received lifetime achievement awards from the American Society of Magazine Editors, the Overseas Press Club and TIME, Inc. He has been named Magazine Photographer of the Year seven times, received the top prize from the World Press Photo Foundation twice, the Infinity Award for photojournalism three times, and the Bayeaux Award for war correspondents twice. In addition he has been the recipient of the Leipzig Foundation award for the advancement of freedom of the press, the Dr. Jean Mayer Global Citizenship Award, the Henry Luce Award for corporate leadership, and the W. Eugene Smith Grant for Humanistic Photography.

 In 2001, “War Photographer”, a feature length documentary film about the life and work of James Nachtwey was nominated for an Academy Award.

Nachtwey’s photographs are included in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, the Bibliotheque nationale de France, the Getty Museum and the Museum of Fine Arts Houston among other venues.  

He has had solo exhibitions at the International Center of Photography in New York, the Bibliotheque nationale de France in Paris, the Palazzo Esposizione in Rome, the Museum of Photographic Arts in San Diego, El Circulo de Bellas Artes in Madrid, the Currier Museum of Art in Manchester, NH, the Massachusetts College of Art in Boston, the Carolinum in Prague, the Hasselblad Center in Sweden, and the Hood Museum of Art at Dartmouth, among others.

He has been awarded four honorary doctorate degrees, including one from Dartmouth. 

Kate Semple-Barta, JD

Kate Semple-Barta founded the Welcoming All Nationalities Network of the Upper Valley in 2011 with fiscal sponsorship from WISE, Inc., and is now the Director and Attorney for WANN. In 2013, WANN began providing immigration legal services to low income and indigent immigrants in the Upper Valley and throughout NH and VT. Before moving to the Upper Valley in 2006, she worked as an Asylum Attorney for the International Institute of Boston and was a staff attorney for the Midwest Immigrants’ Human Rights Center in Chicago.

 

David Sussman, PhD

Dr. David Sussman is a lecturer at Tufts University, focusing on forced displacement and refugee resettlement, as well as natural resource conflicts. Since volunteering in Kakuma Refugee Camp while an undergraduate, he has dedicated his career to the study and support of people who cross borders in order to build new lives. As a scholar-practitioner his expertise bridges between research and academia, and practical experience in the field. David served in program management at the CDC’s International Emergency and Refugee Health Branch, and while a case manager at the International Rescue Committee in Boston oversaw the office’s Special Medical Program. Additional professional practice includes time at the International Organization for Migration, UNHCR (on detail), and the MA Office for Refugees and Immigrants. He founded the Tufts University Refugee Assistance Program, a student organization, and received a Fulbright to evaluate the livelihoods of Colombians living in Caracas. David earned his BA in Government from Dartmouth (magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa), and MA and PhD degrees from the Fletcher School, Tufts University. He grew up in western Massachusetts, is the oldest of four children, and loves playing soccer as often as possible.

Kim-Yen Vu, MBA

Kim-Yen Vu was born in a village of Cam Ranh Bay, Vietnam. She attended high school in Nha Trang, a beautiful coastal town, and college in the city of Sai Gon – the name non-communist Vietnamese people continue to call as they never accepted the name “Ho Chi Minh City.” She obtained her bachelor’s degree in American & English Literature and Education, and was an English as a second language teacher for high school and college students for 17 years.

Kim-Yen Vu entered the United States as an immigrant in 1992 and attended school the same year at New Hampshire College (now known as Southern University of New Hampshire). In 1997, she received her MBA. This was also the year she was sworn in as an American citizen. From 1992-1999, she worked with refugees/immigrants. She also started and ran a Refugee Clinic at Hitchcock Clinic Manchester NH from 1994-1999. She then started to work with people with disabilities in 1999 and has been in this field since then.

 

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