[liberationtech] Fellowship Opening: Village Hopecore in Kenya

[Yosem Companys]

fyi

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Courtney Burks <cburks at stanford.edu>
Date: Wed, Jan 18, 2012 at 1:32 PM

*Village Hopecore International*****

*Fellowship in Global Health*****

* *****

*June 28th, 2012 to July 25th, 2013*****

* *****

*Overview*****

Village Hopecore International is offering a fellowship in global health
for individuals and graduate students who are interested in and have
backgrounds in the areas of public health, nursing or medicine at its
project site in Chogoria, Kenya. The fellowship will begin on June 28th,
2012 and end on July 25th, 2012. The fellow will receive a $500 per month
living stipend. ****

 ****

*Fellowship Description*****

Village Hopecore International is a non profit organization registered in
Kenya and the United States with a mission to eradicate poverty and improve
the health and living conditions of the Wameru people of Chogoria, Kenya.
At this time, the project affects approximately 6,000 villagers and 6,000
students in our school-based mobile clinics. The project has been operating
for the last 11 years and is situated on Mt. Kenya, four hours north of
Nairobi by car at 5,000 feet elevation in a lovely area of tea and coffee
farms. It is located approximately 20 miles south of the equator. ****

 ****

In 2000, HopeCore began a unique and innovative poverty eradication project
that combines a Grameen style micro enterprise village bank, and an adult
education program with a village level health care program. The health care
program focuses on child and maternal health issues, and HIV and malaria
prevention. ****

 ****

In 2009, HopeCore received funds to begin a comprehensive malaria education
and prevention program which involves proving mosquito nets to people
receiving microloans. The program involves educating individuals about the
prevention and treatment of malaria. The distribution of the nets are
followed by home visits to each of our families to be sure that the nets
are being used correctly. At the time of the home visit, health data are
collected on our families and further education on safe water, good
nutrition, child-maternal health issues, family planning and HIV prevention
and testing is provided. We now have a full time, Kenyan project nurse and
four community health workers as part of our public health team, and a
full-time peace corp volunteer is now working in Chogoria with our
microenterprise program.****

 ****

Since February 2011, HopeCore has been operating a school-based mobile
clinic program by making a partnership with 16 primary schools and 8
secondary schools in the Chogoria area. Each mobile clinic begins with
health education on various topics including malaria, HIV/AIDS, hygiene,
and nutrition.  Subsequently, students in our 24 schools receive free
health services for the most common health issues (e.g., malaria, typhoid).
In 2011, HopeCore conducted 55 mobile clinics and benefited 4,441 patients
in total. We are now installing water tanks and water chrolination systems
in all 24 schools, and by the summer 2012, we hope to have all our students
under long-lasting insecticide treated malaria prevention bed nets.****

 ****

The Fellow is responsible for all operations, including financial and
budget management, human resources, and reporting to donors. The Fellow
will also work on grant writing and fundraising. ****

 ****

The fellow will participate in a hands-on fashion with this ongoing
community health project. The fellow’s major responsibilities will be to
supervise the public health and malaria prevention program including the
mobile clinic, mosquito net distribution and health education activities.
The fellow works closely with the Kenyan nurse, Community Health Workers,
and local schools, hospitals and government offices. HopeCore will provide
training and supervision to the fellow to accomplish the responsibilities
listed above. The fellowship began in 2009 and our current fellow is the
fourth in our program.****

* *****

*Fellowship Start Date and Duration*****

The dates of the fellowship are from *June 28th, 2012 to July 25th, 2013.***
**

It is critical for all applicants to be able to comply with the exact dates
above. The extra four weeks at the end of the fellowship will allow the
outgoing fellow to help orientate and train the new incoming fellow. The
outgoing fellow will be paid appropriately for the extra four weeks. If one
cannot comply with the listed dates, please *do not* apply for the
fellowship.****

* *****

*Compensation and Lodging*****

HopeCore will provide a $500 per month stipend to the fellow. The stipend
is designed to cover all lodging and living expenses in Chogoria as well as
travel expenses and health insurance expenses. HopeCore has a safe and
secure one-bedroom apartment for the fellow in our local hospital’s
compound. The apartment has cooking facilities, refrigerator and complete
bathroom facilities. The rent for the apartment is $80 per month and will
be paid out of the $500 per month stipend. Food costs in the village should
run about $60 per month. It is required that for the fellow’s own
protection, each fellow must have health insurance and evacuation
insurance. The stipend was designed to provide $100 per month to help with
the cost of health insurance and evacuation insurance. The fellow will be
responsible for transportation costs to and from Kenya. Roundtrip airfare
from the west coast of the US to Nairobi will be around $2000, less
expensive from the east coast. The fellow will receive four weeks of
vacation during the fellowship. The $500 per month stipend should cover all
of the fellow’s transportation expenses getting to Kenya, all of the living
expenses while in Chogoria and most if not all the cost of health insurance
while in Kenya. The stipend is designed to allow a fellow to spend a year
in Kenya without having to incur additional educational loans.****

 ****

*Application and Selection Process*****

The application and selection process will involve three stages. In the
first stage, applicants e-mail a one page, cover letter stating the reason
for their interest in our fellowship and a CV to Phil Rasori, MD, Medical
Director of Hopecore at prasori at aol.com and Liz Applegate, former global
health fellow, elizappligate at gmail.com. The cover letters and CV’s will be
evaluated and a selection will be made of competitive applicants. In the
second stage, competitive applicants will be interviewed over the phone.
Following the phone interviews, a group of finalists will be selected. In
the third stage, the finalists will have an in-person interview or another
phone interview if geographical considerations do not allow for an
in-person interview. References will be obtained at this time. All
finalists will have a chance to talk by phone and e-mail with the current
Hopecore Fellow to ask questions about the position and living conditions.
We plan to make the final selection of the fellow by the middle of April,
2012. ****

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*Further information  *****

More information on HopeCore can be found at *www.villagehopecore*****



****

--****

*Courtney Burks, MPH, MA*

*Educational Programs Coordinator*

** **

*Office of Community Health*

*Stanford University School of Medicine*

1265 Welch Road MSOB x3c59****

Stanford, CA 94305-5404****

p: 650.723.9907  |  f: 650.725.7855****