Open Learning ExchangeUniversal Basic Education 2015

John M. Cook

Retired Chairman and Chief Executive Officer PRG- Schultz International, Inc.
Cook has been the primary benefactor of the Human Development Foundation of Bangkok (Thailand), which supports Mercy Centre, Bangkok’s first AIDS hospice, which focuses on children and mothers with the disease. Seeking to alleviate the suffering of children in Klong Toey, Bangkok’s largest slum community, Mercy Centre also operates an orphanage and a series of schools, helping over 5,000 children a year to qualify for public education.

Cook founded and serves as chairman of the board of the South Asia Children’s Fund, which supports innovative educational programs for disadvantaged children, primarily in Nepal and India.
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Michael Crawford

Michael Crawford is a Senior Education Specialist with the World Bank’s Education Department in the Latin America and Caribbean Vice Presidency, where he leads work on tertiary education and science, technology, and innovation (STI). Michael develops and manages investment projects and analytic studies in university reform, improvement of research and innovation capacity, access to tertiary education, quality assurance and related issues in Chile, Peru, and Brazil. He recently co-led the joint World Bank/OECD review, Tertiary Education in Chile. He previously designed and implemented the World Bank’s first loan for the promotion of science, technology, and innovation capacity in Sub Saharan Africa, the 2004 Uganda Millennium Science Initiative project, and he has developed World Bank policy for STI capacity building. He holds a Master’s degree in Economics and Development from the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), and a Bachelor’s degree in Philosophy and Mathematics from St.John’s College, Annapolis, Maryland.

William F. Foote

William Foote is the president and founder of Root Capital (formerly EcoLogic Finance), a social investment fund that provides affordable credit, financial education and market access to environmentally sustainable, grassroots enterprises in the developing world. Mr. Foote has an extensive background in cross-border investment and economic development in Latin America and Africa.

Mr. Foote is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and currently serves on the Sustainability Committee of the Specialty Coffee Association of America. Since 2005, Root Capital has received the Fast Company/ Monitor Group Social Capitalist Award; the International Chamber of Commerce/ UNDP/ Prince of Wales International Business Leaders Forum World Business Award in support of the Millennium Development Goals; and the Skoll Award for Social Entrepreneurship.
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Richard Rowe

Richard Rowe is a Chief Executive Officer of the Open Learning Exchange, Inc. He received his Ph.D. from Columbia University in clinical psychology in 1963. In the1970′s served as Associate Dean of the Harvard’s Graduate School of Education and as Director of the university’s interfaculty Doctoral Program in Clinical Psychology and Public Practice. He has conducted research concerning assessment of social interventions and has been an advocate for early childhood education. He has served as Chair of the Massachusetts Statewide Advisory Committee for the Office for Children, as a member of the Massachusetts State Board of Education where he served both as Chair of the Selection committee for the Commissioner of Education and of the Education Reform Review Committee. He has served as Chair of the Massachusetts Business Alliance for Education.

Dr. Rowe has focused on domestic and global policy issues related to education and services for children, families and strong communities as well as on public policy and technical issues concerning intellectual property.
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Kitt Sawitsky

Kitt Sawitsky is and attorney with Goulston & Storrs, Councilors at Law in Boston where he served for several years as the firms. He practices general corporate and business law and has a reputation as a deal maker. He represents entities and individuals in connection with asset and stock sales, debt and equity financings, mergers, acquisitions, entity structuring and shareholder and partnership agreements. He also has extensive workout and other general business experience, with a particular emphasis on retail and consumer businesses in their domestic and cross-border operations and strategic transactions.  Mr Sawitsky serves as OLE’s legal counsel.

Paul Smyke

Paul Symke is the Senior Advisor to the Chairman, World Economic Forum.  He has worked with the forum for 22 years and, among other responsibilities, facilitates relationships between the Forum and key leaders in North America.

Cecilia d’Oliveira

Cecilia d’Oliveira is the Executive Director of OpenCourseWare at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Ms. d’Oliveira leads the team that works with MIT faculty to publish MIT’s course materials openly and with organizations around the world who are implementing their own opencourseware programs as institutional initiatives or national education policy. From 2002 to 2008 she served as MIT OpenCourseWare’s Technology Director with responsibility for building the technical infrastructure for the program. Over 25 years she has worked in a variety of information technology positions, focused on technology innovation in support of MIT education, research and business initiatives. Ms. d’Oliveira received a Master’s degree from M.I.T.’s Sloan School of Management and a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from MIT.

David Levenson, Chief Financial Officer, Secretary and Treasurer

David Levenson has more than 30 years of finance, accounting and systems experience in public accounting as well as in industry and the non-profit sector. Currently he is director of finance and operations at a non-profit in Boston committed to ending family homelessness in Massachusetts. Prior to this, he held positions at the controller and CFO levels at debt management and financial services companies providing accounting, HR and systems expertise.

He has spent many years in financial management positions at high tech companies. From 1998-2003 he was self-employed as an interim controller/CFO working with start-ups and early-stage venture-backed organizations including andover.net which went public in 1999. Earlier in his career, he was CFO of intranetics.com which was ultimately acquired by Webex. He also has 15 years of public accounting experience, including 10 years as a self-employed CPA and business advisor.

He is a CPA, has an MS in accounting/MBA from Northeastern University and an MS in taxation from Bentley College. His undergraduate degree was from Boston University. He has also spent a numbers of years on the boards of various non-profit organizations, as board member, treasurer and president.

Kari Mruz, TeacherMate Project Director

Kari joined the OLE Consortium as the Administrative Officer working directly with the Chair and CEO on all aspects of the work of the Cambridge office. She then took on the role of Project Director for OLE Rwanda where she is currently leading a project piloting the use of TeacherMates for improving the English literacy of primary level students in Kigali.

Kari holds a Bachelor and Masters degree from Clark University, both in International Development and Social Change. Her research at Clark focused on development in conflict and post-conflict settings. Kari has also worked as a research assistant for a feature length documentary film that examined the role of economic development in Afghanistan.

In addition to working at OLE Kari works with the African Community Education program for African refugee students in Worcester, MA. She also has experience working in Namibia with Forum for the Future, a local non-governmental organization that focuses on democracy, human rights, and economic justice.

Colleen O’Neal, Manager, Library Development

As Manager of Library Development, Colleen has developed a content acquisition and collection development strategy for the OLE Billion Kids Library. She is responsible for sourcing and adding K-12 open source educational content to the library.

Colleen is an anthropologist who has worked with immigrants and refugees in the US for more than two decades. Previously, she worked for the American Fund for Czechoslovak Refugees and Jewish Vocational Services resettling East European, Soviet and Southeast Asian refugees in the Boston area. She also worked with Cambodian refugees in Lowell, MA, Silver Spring, MD and Greensboro, NC. Her doctoral research links the history of immigration to the development of philanthropic institutions in the US. Her thesis documents immigrant perspectives on a job training program for refugee and immigrant women. Colleen has also done research on Cambodian traditional healers in the US for the Indochinese Psychiatric Clinic at St. Elizabeth’s Hospital and analyses of maternal and village health in Nepal for the Boston Health Policy Institute.

In addition to her research, field and organizational experience, Colleen has served on the Boston Mayor’s Refugee Advisory Council and the Massachusetts Governor’s Education Council for Refugees. She has reviewed articles for Comparative Studies in Society and History, written for the American Ethnologist and edited the historical monograph, Networks of Empire, published by Cambridge UP.

Colleen received a BA in Anthropology and Community Health from Tufts University and an MA in Anthropology from the University of Michigan. She is currently ABD in the dual degree program in Anthropology and History at Michigan and has taught undergraduate classes at both institutions. She speaks French and Khmer.

Chris Rowe, Technical Director

In December of 2007 Chris received his Masters in Educational technology with a focus on the use of System Dynamics and virtual worlds to help people understand complexities related to sustainable development.

Chris worked for the Center for Maximum Potential Building Systems beginning 2002 on a wide range of projects combining his skills and interest in sustainable design, computer modeling, technology strategy, learning systems design, and project management.

At Hampshire College Chris studied education, software design and sustainable business with a thesis project on the use of technology to increase community participation in community planning.

At OLE he has consulted on educational technology strategy, Fundraising, and organizational technology solutions. He is currently focusing on our toolkit development plan.

Richard Rowe, Chief Executive Officer

Richard Rowe is a Chief Executive Officer of the Open Learning Exchange, Inc. He received his Ph.D. from Columbia University in clinical psychology in 1963. In the1970′s served as Associate Dean of the Harvard’s Graduate School of Education and as Director of the university’s interfaculty Doctoral Program in Clinical Psychology and Public Practice. He has conducted research concerning assessment of social interventions and has been an advocate for early childhood education. He has served as Chair of the Massachusetts Statewide Advisory Committee for the Office for Children, as a member of the Massachusetts State Board of Education where he served both as Chair of the Selection committee for the Commissioner of Education and of the Education Reform Review Committee. He has served as Chair of the Massachusetts Business Alliance for Education.Dr. Rowe has focused on domestic and global policy issues related to education and services for children, families and strong communities as well as on public policy and technical issues concerning intellectual property.
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Kitt Sawitsky, Goulston & Storrs, Councilors at Law

Kitt Sawitsky is and attorney with Goulston & Storrs, Councilors at Law in Boston where he served for several years as the firms Co-Managing Director. He practices general corporate and business law and has a reputation as a deal maker. He represents entities and individuals in connection with asset and stock sales, debt and equity financings, mergers, acquisitions, entity structuring and shareholder and partnership agreements. He also has extensive workout and other general business experience, with a particular emphasis on retail and consumer businesses in their domestic and cross-border operations and strategic transactions.  Mr Sawitsky serves as OLE’s legal counsel.