Ashley Chandler, M.A. ’06, wrote her thesis on Haitian immigration to the United States during the Cold War. After graduating from GW, Ms. Chandler earned an M.S. in global politics at the London School of Economics and Political Science, again writing her thesis on Haiti, this time focusing on the diplomatic maneuvers and policies of international organizations during the 1991-1994 crises in Haiti.
“The more I learned about Haiti, the more interested I became in the shared-island nation,” says Ms. Chandler, a research associate in the international securities program at the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Strategic and International Studies.
Ms. Chandler, who traveled to Haiti in January 2009 with a small group of medical professionals, teachers and representatives from nonprofit organizations, is one of several members of the GW community who has visited or is an expert on Haiti. Haiti’s first lady, Elisabeth Delatour Preval, M.B.A. ’88, is also a GW alumna.
“The news coming from friends on the ground is not good,” says Vinette Brown, M.A. ’06, who was a Peace Corps volunteer in Haiti from 1997 to 1999. “Haiti simply does not have the resources to mobilize rescue efforts on its own quickly, and it has a complete lack of food and water resources.”
Ms. Brown, director of development at the national capital region of College Summit, was an agricultural extensionist for the Peace Corps, which means she worked with farmers on reforestation and agricultural export projects.
“It was one of the best experiences I have ever had, despite the challenges of living in a place where my neighbors and friends struggled to make ends meet on a day-to-day basis,” she says. “I was, and am, constantly awed by the unbreakable spirit of the Haitian people and their ability to maintain hope in the face of hardship.”
Ms. Chandler is also optimistic that Haiti will prevail. “The one comfort that I can take away from this catastrophe is that it might provide the impetus needed to propel smart aid and investment in Haiti,” she says.
“Of course, I am a realist about the logistically challenging coordination effort required for disaster relief, which will be further hampered by damage sustained to the transportation infrastructure in Port-au-Prince,” she adds. “Personally, I think the United States should adopt a new mantra in regard to Haiti that borrows a key phrase from Secretary Clinton’s speech on development last week: Aid chases need; investment chases opportunity.”
Bryan Schaaf, M.P.H. ’05, a former Peace Corps volunteer, who served in Haiti from 2000 to 2002, and a policy analyst at the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Population Refugees and Migration, has been assigned to the United States Agency for International Development to assist with the crisis. In his spare time, he writes the blog haitiinnovation.org.
“This is going to be a long-term recovery operation. Right now it seems like the coverage of Haiti will last forever but it will not,” he wrote in one post. “There will be other emergencies in other places and the attention of the international community may wane. We cannot let that happen. .... As our neighbors, as our friends, as our family, as citizens of a country whose history and fate are intertwined with ours, they deserve no less than our strong commitment and our best efforts.”
“The GW community ought to raise funds for humanitarian responders, encourage others to do so (in lieu of sending commodities) and stay engaged throughout Haiti’s recovery process,” says Mr. Schaaf. “Let others know there will be a recovery, and despite everything, there is hope for Haiti. Haitians are survivors. They have made it through other disasters, and they will make it through this. Solidarity is greatly needed from friends and family and students.”
“Many Americans live ‘paycheck to paycheck,’ but most people in Haiti literally live ‘day by day’ and their prayers for God to give them their daily bread are sincere,” says Marcus Stouffer, who earned a master’s certificate in project management from GW in 2006.
Mr. Stouffer, fraud and litigation program manager at AOL, has taken three trips to Haiti for development projects with the Mission Evangelique Baptiste du Sud d’Haiti (MEBSH) and the United Methodist Church
“Personally, I am keeping my eye open and seeing what will happen as people leave Port-au-Prince and flee to the countryside,” he says. “In many of these small country coastal towns, there is barely enough food to support the town, and I’m anxious to see how these small coastal towns will be able to handle a surge of desperate people that need food, shelter and water.