STAFF

The World Leadership School, based in Denver, Colorado, has extensive experience with international travel, leadership training and managing student groups overseas.

Ross Wehner, Executive Director of the World Leadership School, has worked as an instructor for the National Outdoor Leadership School and as a journalist, teacher and a mountain guide.

After graduating from the University of Virginia in 1989, he moved to Chile where he covered the end of the Pinochet regime for the San Francisco Chronicle. He spent four years reporting from Peru, as well as Bolivia, Ecuador, Argentina and Mexico. He has written about climate change, outdoor adventure, the organic movement and other topics for Mother Jones, Utne Reader, Outside and Ski magazines. He most recently worked as a reporter for The Denver Post.

Ross is also a dedicated teacher. He has been a Spanish teacher at The Miller School of Albemarle in Crozet, Virginia, The Bush School in Seattle and the University of Virginia, where he earned his M.A. in Spanish American literature in 1999.

He taught leadership as a wilderness instructor for the National Outdoor Leadership School both in the U.S. and in Mexico. He continued his work with leadership and risk management as a mountain guide for Alpine Ascents in Seattle. He has guided clients on high-altitude rock and ice climbs in the U.S., Canada, Peru and Ecuador.

Ross first experienced the educational impact of service learning while leading high school volunteers in Costa Rica for Global Routes, a volunteer organization based in Berkeley, California. He then spent nearly two years managing Volunteer Adventures, a Denver-based volunteer organization.

The World Leadership School combines Ross’ experience with global issues, leadership training and service learning. He lives in Denver with his wife Renée del Gaudio, with whom he co-authored Moon Peru. Ross and Renée have two young children, Sebastian and Francesca.

David Maher, Academic Director of the World Leadership School, is a life-long teacher. Over the last 25 years, he has held a variety of teaching and leadership positions at both independent and public schools in the U.S. and abroad.

David began his teaching career in Virginia, where he was an English teacher the Albemarle County Public School system and then Assistant Dean at Miller School of Albemarle. He then worked five years at Oldfields School in Glencoe, Maryland, where he taught English and served as a mentor for new faculty. He is currently Academic Dean and English Department Chair at Fountain Valley School in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

David has a deep interest in experiential education. He is founder of PEAKs, a leadership and outdoor education program that takes kids each summer to Colorado’s Rocky Mountains and Utah’s Canyonlands. He has also led student groups to Europe, Costa Rica and Belize and is director of Fountain Valley School’s Outdoor Education Program.

David lives on the campus of Fountain Valley School with his wife of 14 years, Laura, his two children, Lulu and Owen, and a dorm of upperclassmen.

As Academic Director of World Leadership School, David is responsible for developing curriculum and helping train teachers and instructors.

Alecia Berman-Dry, Global Partnerships Director, is an experienced speaker and workshop leader who has worked in environments as varied as Washington, D.C. law offices, church basements and college classrooms. Along the way, she has helped school administrators, teachers, and parents make informed decisions about internet safety, social networking, website development, the use of computer programming to teach math, Web 2.0 tools and global education. Her summer teacher training sessions, "World Village Training," are her favorite hands-on workshops to present. Alecia is passionate about helping teachers establish and maintain their own meaningful classroom partnerships both nationally and internationally.  

She currently teaches technology at St. John's Episcopal School, a K-8 Independent School just outside of Washington, D.C.  Previously Alecia served as St. John’s Technology Coordinator for 8 years. She is a Japan Fulbright Memorial Fund Scholar, as well as the 2006 Best White Paper award winner at MICCA, Maryland’s annual conference for educational technology. Alecia also serves on the Technology Committee of the AIMS (Association of Independent Maryland Schools).   

Alecia received an M.A. in Liberal Studies from Loyola College in Maryland in 2009. Her field of research focused on social networking communities, such as Facebook and Club Penguin, and how these communities affect identity development in adolescents. You can read her blog, entitled Ed Tech Axis, at http://www.ed-tech-axis.blogspot.com

Erin Lasky, Director of Programs for World Leadership School, has a wide range of experience when it comes to both managing and leading service learning programs.

Prior to joining World Leadership School, Erin served as a Director of Programs for Camp Fire USA, a youth development non-profit that focuses on service-learning and summer camps. While at Camp Fire, Erin developed new programs for after-school, in-school and summer camp settings using the traditional Camp Fire USA curriculum. Before that, Erin helped design and manage inner-city youth programs for Big Brothers Big Sisters in Tucson, Arizona.

Erin has also led a variety of service learning trips throughout Latin America and the American West. She has worked several seasons as an expedition leader for Road Less Traveled, an adventure and community service travel company based in Chicago. Most recently she helped lead a World Leadership School program to Ometepe Island, Nicaragua, where a group of students built sinks for a local elementary school. Through these programs, Erin enables, engages, and encourages students to see their full potential as caring and productive citizens.

Erin grew up in Great Falls, Virginia, a suburb of Washington DC, and she graduated from George Mason University with a degree in Psychology. She has been living in Denver since 2006 and spends a lot time in the mountains. She spends her free time training for half marathons, rock climbing adventures, snowboarding expeditions, and anything else that challenges her mind and body.

COUNTRY DIRECTORS

Country Directors work and live year-round in our host communities. Each director has a long track record of handling volunteers in their country. They conduct thorough background screenings of host families and are responsible for all in-country logistics and support.

M. Kennedy Leavens, Peru Ground Coordinator, lives in Ollantaytambo, a rural village in the Andes of Peru, where she has founded and runs Awamaki (www.awamaki.org), a small non-profit organization that works with indigenous women weavers from the impoverished Quechua communities in the mountains above Ollantaytambo. She also runs a volunteer program through Awamaki's U.S. partner, Awamaki U.S., that places volunteers in local health clinics and schools, and supports local families through its homestay program.

Kennedy moved to Peru in 2007 after graduating from the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University, where she studied Latin America and international development, and learned Spanish studying abroad in Ecuador and Chile. Originally from Seattle, Washington, she first visited Ollantaytambo in 2001 with The Lakeside School, on the first trip of what would later become Lakeside's Global Service Learning program. The trip inspired her interest in Latin America and international development, and set her path to Georgetown and back to Ollantaytambo.

Kennedy loves the pace and quality of life in Ollantaytambo. She enjoys hiking the mountains that rise above the town, running along the river, cooking favorite foods from home and hanging out with her boyfriend and
their big sweet slobbery dog, Apu.

Instructors are professional teachers with extensive international experience. They speak the local language, have graduated from the World Leadership School instructor training program and have requisite first aid training.

ADVISORY BOARD
World Leadership School’s advisory board serves as a source of experience and counsel on a wide range of issues. Members of the advisory board are:

Gerald Prolman
CEO
Organic Bouquet
San Rafael, California

Lara Mendel
Executive Director
Mosaic Project
Berkeley, California

John Zurn
Headmaster
St. John's Episcopal School
Olney, Maryland

Greg Courtwright
Chief Operating Officer
Lincoln Property Company
Dallas, Texas

Sam Schlehuber
President
Schlehuber Insurance Agency
Dallas, Texas

R. Haynes Chidsey
Partner
The Decatur Group
Denver, Colorado

Dr. Charles Ehrhart
Coordinator
Climate Change, CARE International
Nairobi, Kenya