Keynote Speaker

It all started with a fur ball called Nikita, a 9-pound dog, a Maltese, who came into my life in 1999. The strong bond I formed with this little innocent creature and the lessons of unconditional love, loyalty, patience, and commitment I learned from his presence in my life have led me down a path of reverence for all life and an intense commitment to protect and fight for those who, for reasons of health , poverty, age, or belonging to a certain species, class, sex, color, or creed, cannot protect themselves. My first initiation in to the world of compassion and suffering stared in 2003 when I returned to my motherland, Ethiopia. There, I saw babies dying of diseases that were treatable and preventable. I saw animals being needlessly tortured, as they are elsewhere. I saw homeless little children sleeping on concrete. When I returned to the United States, I realized what my mission was in life, and the idea of the International Fund for Africa was born in memory of my mother who died in 1961. IFA's mission to bring first-world medical support and care to babies in Ethiopia, Africa by establishing a well-equipped and staffed medical facility.

I was born in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. My father being a career diplomat, I traveled extensively with my parents to parts of Africa, Europe, and the U.S. when I was a child. After graduating from St. Joseph's High School in Addis Ababa, I attended Davidson College in Davidson, North Carolina, studied medicine in Romania, and did a residency in emergency medicine in Washington, D.C. I have been a board certified emergency-room physician since 1988, practicing in Houston, Texas.

My extra-professional activities include promoting a vegan diet by giving lectures on the health benefits of veganism, working with the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine by writing articles in medical journals, and participating in Vegan World Radio!, a radio show in Houston , Texas, dedicated to promoting veganism and animal protection. I am also involved in rescuing, sheltering and finding homes for abused and homeless dogs.

I currently live in Houston, Texas, with my dogs Nikita, Lucky, Sasha, Duke and my new Ethiopian rescue Suzie Q.

Dr. Bizunesh Wubie is currently an associate professor of early childhood education at Marshall University Graduate School of Education and Professional Development, South Charleston, West Virginia, U.S.A. She earned her first degree in Ethiopia at Addis Ababa University, and was trained as an early childhood educator at Froebel College, Copenhagen, Denmark, and at Maria Montessori International Organization, London, England. For over 20 years, she held various early childhood education related positions in the Ministry of Education and in the former National Children's Commission of Ethiopia. With awards from CIDA (Canadian International Development Agency), OGS (Ontario Graduate Scholarship) and from the prestigious Canadian doctoral scholarship agency known as SSHRC (Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada), she earned her master's degree in early childhood education and her Ph.D. in curriculum instructions with emphasis in early childhood education from University of Toronto, Canada.

 
Home and School Partnership: Implication to Children of Diverse Backgrounds
The notion of home as the first educational institution and the parents as the first teachers of young children is a widely accepted notion. The home is an important, if not the most important, educational institution for young children of early childhood age. Since the care and education of young children takes place both at home and out of home institutions such as nursery schools, preschools and kindergartens, partnership between home and out of home institutions is a key to effective and productive care and education of young children. Particularly, for children of diverse backgrounds with different cultural and linguistic backgrounds, strong partnership between home and schools plays a vital role in promoting positive identity, self-esteem and pride, Based on literature review and the presenter's many years of experience as an early childhood educator, the major purpose of this presentation is to examine the importance of partnership between home and early childhood education settings. The presentation also highlights areas of partnership, barriers to effective partnership, ways of alleviating barriers and related cultural and linguistic issues.

W.I.S.E. UP! for ChildrenOne of the biggest challenges for children and teens who were adopted is to respond to questions and statements about adoption that are based on misperceptions and misunderstandings. Kids need tools to choose how to handle the numerous and varied situations they will face on their own. The W.I.S.E. Up!^sm program empowers kids to handle both expected and unexpected situations. It helps them to understand that they are WISE, but others are not, thereby lowering the level of anger and frustration that can result from questions and comments. W.I.S.E. UP! is a never-forgotten, lifelong tool for anyone who joined their family through adoption.

W.I.S.E. UP! for AdultsThere are a number of parenting tasks which are unique to families formed through adoption. Perhaps the most difficult is supporting our children when they are called upon to explain adoption to the rest of the world. They are not asked whether they would like to shoulder this role. Instead, there is an assumption that they are the best source of information, and worse, that their adoption stories and love for their family should be open to investigation. There is no doubt that comments and questions occur most frequently for families where adoption is obvious.

Ellen Singer, Adoption Therapist and Parent Educator with Cynthia Cubbage, L.C.S.W from C.A.S.E. will lead the W.I.S.E. UP! workshop

Growing up in America

Meheret Endeshaw is a 2008 graduate in Psychology from Whitman College in Washington State. Her interest in heath education started at a young age. Throughout college she volunteered nationally and internationally at various organizations dedicated to improving then reproductive health of women and the lives of people living with HIV. In the summer of 2008, she went back to her homeland and launched her project, "Reducing Stigma for Ethiopian Children Orphaned to HIV/AIDS." The self-initiated project funded by 100 Projects for Peace grant focused on improving the lives of orphaned youth by providing educational books, a soccer and volleyball league and a safe place for reading and recreational activities. In the 2009/2010 school year, Meheret was a Heath Educator with City Year, an AmeriCorps program. As a member of the City Year HOPE team, Meheret worked in Washington, DC Public Schools teaching a CDC approved HIV/AIDS prevention curriculum to middle and high school students. She also served as an HIV testing coordinator intern at Metro TeenAIDS, a community health organization dedicated to supporting young people in the fight against HIV/AIDS. Meheret will be attending the University of Washington in the fall of 2010 to earn a Master of Public Health degree in Leadership, Policy and Management. Learn more about Meheret's Summer 2008

Project: http://www.davisprojectsforpeace.org/

Growing up in America

Eskinder Zewdu is a senior Electrical and Computer Engineering major at Duke University's Pratt School of Engineering. He hails from Durham, North Carolina and is currently an intern at Education Services International, a startup career training company in the Raleigh-Durham area. He has also worked as a Globalization Intern at the SAS Institute, a privately held software company in Cary, NC. At Duke, he has held leadership positions in the National Society of Black Engineers and Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc. He was also helped charter the Duke Ethiopian Student Transnational Association (DESTA), the Ethiopian student organization on campus. In his downtime, he has followed his passion for music as a baritone saxophonist in the Duke University Jazz Ensemble. Upon graduation he will pursue a career in electrical engineering and/or consulting. He plans to return for either a M.B.A. or Masters in Electrical Engineering within the next four years and hopes to work abroad before then.

Hair & Skin Care Session

Hair and Skin care has been a growing topic and concern for parents of all ethnic backgrounds. The key is to have a positive outlook about natural hair especially when engaging with the children. It happens to be a task of which there is no way out but to face the task at hand. Having the right tools is key. For example, the right combs, brushes, moisturizing shampoos, and hydrating conditioners. Even the technique of handling hair is important. It is no surprise, that children with well-kept hair look healthy. Using the right terminology of hair when talking to the kids is important and reminding them how beautiful their hair is will support their own self-esteem. Keep it positive!

Kirigo Kabuga Williams, Natural Hair Coach from Natural Hair Journey will hold the Hair & Skin Care Session. She will show you easy steps when caring for natural hair as well as recommend tools and products needed. In addition to the general session, she will be available for personal consultation.

LIVING ON THE FAULT LINE, WHERE RACE AND FAMILY MEET

An opportunity to think about and discuss issues surrounding transracial and transcultural parenting based on a movie called Living on the Fault Line: Where Race & Family Meet and talk about ways we can help build healthier transracial/transcultural families in 2010. Living on the Fault Line, Where Race and Family Meet is a documentary film that explores the intersection where family love meets racial injustice in the experience of transracial families created through adoption. An honest open-hearted look at race in America, it is an intimate portrait that reveals the challenges transracial families face as children of color grow up in communities where racial discrimination, stereotyping and white privilege are often unspoken and undeniable realities. Shot in a naturalistic style, Living on the Fault Line profiles nine families telling the untold story of transracial adoption, revealing the complex, challenging and emotional costs of racial discrimination brought into the privacy of the family.

BEVERLY N. CLARKE, MSW, LCSW-C, LICSW is the Director of Project Wait No Longer: Permanency for Foster Youth, a Barker initiative that seeks to find permanent homes for children currently in the public foster care system. She is responsible for the Project's overall administration, including recruitment, training, outreach and matching. Beverly has 13 years of experience as a social worker and clinician, with many of those years focusing on children and families. Beverly’s past experience includes work with the foster care system, family preservation programs as well as domestic and international adoption work. As an adoptive parent (twins from Ethiopia) herself, she brings both a personal and professional understanding of the adoption process as well as a passion for achieving permanency for at-risk children.

ETHIOPIAN ETTIQUETTE

How do you great a person politely in Ethiopia? What is the right way to address once elders? And more will be covered as we review the Ethiopian Etiquette throughout the weekend especially for the kids.

Dereje Desta graduated from the Addis Ababa University, in 1991, with a Bachelor's Degree in Ethiopian Language & Literature with special focus on the Amharic. He has also worked as journalist, editor and publisher for the last 18 years at various positions. He is the Executive Editor and Publisher of Zethiopia, the highly regarded, Washington, D.C. based, bilingual (Amharic and English) newspaper. Ato Dereje will also conduct the Language Class for Youth.

Nothing will replace the experience of traveling to Ethiopia for the opportunity to connect our kids with their heritage and culture. We are pleased that ATO KAGNEW F. ASFAW, Regional Director USA & Canada for Ethiopian Airlines will be joining us. Ato Kagnew will be discussing travel to, as well as, within Ethiopia. He will cover topics such as where to travel, length of time for the trip, places to visit, to name a few.

Ethiopian Airlines - Gateway to Historic Ethiopia and Wild Africa one of the largest and fastest growing airlines in Africa, made its maiden flight to Cairo in 1946. With the recent service additions to Conakry, Mombassa and Monrovia, Ethiopian provides dependable services to 36 cities in Africa and to a total of 57 destinations worldwide. Currently, Ethiopian is making a huge investment to expand its fleet and broaden its network. Including the recent orders of five B777-200LR and twelve A350-900, Ethiopian has 35 new airplanes on order direct from the manufacturers which will enable the airline to operate one of the newest and environment-friendly fleet in Africa. In July 2009, Ethiopian won "Airline of the Year 2009" award at African Business Award organized by the London based African Business Magazine and Common Wealth Business Council.

What Is Good About Ethiopia?

In this workshop kids will participate in highlighting/identifying 5 positive aspects of life in Ethiopia:

• Diversity as the strength of the nation
  - people, languages, cultures, terrain, climate, natural resources.
• Hospitable nature of the people to each other and their guests
• Home of unique and rare indigenous animals
• Home of world renowned and one of a kind historical sites
• Producer of dominant world and Olympic champion distance runners

Kelemsis Gedlu, a native of Ethiopia, has been a teacher by profession for over 15 years. His experience includes teaching English as a foreign language at high school level, as well as having taught university courses in logic, civics, psychology. Ato Kelemsis was most recently Dean of Students at the Pan Africa Distance Education Academy in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. He is also a founder of Ararya Yemelkam Zega Keresa Mahiber, a local NGO working to disseminate good moral values and promote youths' positive self perception in Ethiopian. Ato Kelemsis will also hold the Language Class for Adult and Youth.