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Meet George Okantey

George Okantey is an Extension Educator in the area of Economic and Community Development at the Purdue Cooperative Extension Service in Marion County. Prior to joining Extension in 1999, George worked in London, England as a Financial Planning Consultant where he consulted in the areas of life insurance, savings, investments, and estate planning. He moved to the US in 1992 and in 1993 founded the cultural organization, African Speakers Bureau, Inc in Indianapolis. He was the Executive Director until 2002. As director, he provided leadership, created organizational structure and directed school and community-based cultural networks in Indianapolis. Between 1995-97, he worked at IUPUI Neighborhood Resource Center where he coordinated business development activities of the Westside Business Alliance (WBA) through a Community Outreach Partnership Grant (COPC). As a Lila Wallace Museum Studies scholar, he worked with the Indianapolis Museum of Art and was instrumental in the creation of the first “Africa Fest” celebration in Indianapolis. He also provided leadership on the “Fabric of African Life,” an outreach, traveling exhibition.

George holds a Master of Public Affairs degree from Indiana University School of Public and Environmental Affairs, Indianapolis and a BA in Organizational Communication. He is a graduate of National Training Lab, Transforming Interpersonal Relations and Group Dynamics www.ntl.org and a certified Facilitation Application Specialization Training (FAST) instructor. He is a National Foundation for Teaching Entrepreneurship certified Instructor (CET), and Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes are high. George is a qualified instructor of Myers Briggs Type (MBTI) and Strength Finder instruments. He is committed to lifelong learning opportunities that enable individuals to better themselves and make informed choices. He is dedicated to facilitating best practices leadership development in Indiana communities.

George has a demonstrated record of leadership and expertise in asset-based human and community development. His competencies include coaching, strategic planning processes, building organizational networks, entrepreneurship, and leadership and civic engagement. He enjoys work that taps into his facilitation and project management skills and has a love for inspiring, leading and coaching people from diverse backgrounds and persuasions to experience excellence. His Extension work include collaboration with Junior Achievement of Central Indiana, The Simon Property Group, and Indiana Small Business Center to establish BizPrep Enterprise Academy http://www.ces.purdue.edu/Marion/lcd/lcd.htm a youth entrepreneurship academy in Indianapolis. He created and directed the Science Bound parents program with financial support from USA Funds Group to assist parents in supporting their children in the Purdue Science Bound program. Prior to Science Bound, George provided leadership to a similar program “High Hopes” a silver medalist of Epsilon Sigma Phi Extension Programs of Excellence in 2002.

George established a partnership with Marion County Jail II to teach positive parenting to pre-release non-custodial fathers. He also created and coordinated Youth Financial Literacy and Leadership Academy in three Indianapolis High Schools. He collaborated with the Indianapolis Chapter of Black MBA Association to establish the Leaders of Tomorrow program (LOT) to teach leadership skills to youth in Marion County. He represented the north central region on Extension Committee on Organization and Policy, National Diversity Task Force. George facilitated the National Extension Diversity Task Force to establish Pathways to Diversity Reaffirmed (2003), a systems document, focused on diversity and pluralism in the Land Grant University System http://pubwiki.extension.org/mediawiki/files/9/93/pathways.pdf.

George is a member of Purdue Intercultural Action Committee, an ECD innovator award winner, and currently serving on the board of directors of IEEA representing the central district. George serves on the boards of the Indianapolis Neighborhood Resource Center www.inrc.org. He assisted in the creation of the Indianapolis Community Building Institute (ICBI)—a leadership development program for veteran and aspiring community leaders in Indianapolis. He is also vice president of the Indiana Leadership Association www.indianaleadership.com. George is a United Way of Central Indiana Agency Evaluator, a 2007 Leadership and Renewal Outfitters Executive Journey Fellow, http://renewal.typepad.com/fellows, volunteer coach at Beyond Your Best Coaching, www.beyondyourbest.com, and principal at MpactPlus Training and Consulting, LLC— www.mpactplus.com, a consulting company with a focus on building leadership capacity of non-governmental organizations in developing countries.

In February 2009, George provided Crucial Conversations training for 498 University of Wisconsin Extension educators and faculty in four districts. He has accepted an invitation to conduct a workshop at the 2009 Public Issues Leadership Development conference in April http://www.jcep.org/pild.htm. George is providing leadership on the Marion county Program of Excellence team that is working on helping the Southeast Neighborhood implement their Quality of Life plan. http://www.greatindyneighborhoods.org/. He enjoys working with people to solve their own problems. He feels present when facilitating people to think and explore different perspectives on issues. He is committed to making a difference in the lives of people every day. George can be reached at 317-275-9263 or e-mail: [email protected].

Meet Brad Clinehens, Lake County

Brad Clinehens is an Extension Educator in the area of Economic and Community Development at the Purdue Cooperative Extension Service in Lake County. Prior to joining Extension in 2005, Brad held a similar position with the University of California Cooperative Extension Service in Bishop, California.  He worked in the area of Community & Rural Development in the beautiful Eastern Sierras. His job involved developing small business and workforce development programs and providing educational programs to the regional Chambers of Commerce. 

Also, Brad served in the Peace Corps from 1999-2001 in Mauritania, West Africa as a Community Agro-forestry Volunteer. He worked on village-based agriculture and environmental projects along the Senegal River bordering the neighboring country of Senegal. Mauritania is one of the poorest countries in Africa, with extreme heat (120 plus) and the occasional sandstorm or seasonal flooding. The country is 100% Muslim and he spoke an Arabic-Berber dialect during his service.

Brad has a M.S. in Community Development from Penn State and a B.A.in Sociology/Anthropology from Goshen College in Goshen, Indiana.

Through his work with Extension, Brad provides training on various topics of leadership and civic engagement, diversity, entrepreneurship education, and community food systems. He actively partners with organizations in Lake County and Northwest Indiana to advance economic and community development.

Brad assisted with starting a local foods network for Northwest Indiana beginning with a Local Foods Forum in 2006. He was an active part of a team that planned the Local Foods Expos in Northwest Indiana and Elkhart County in 2007. He has also been working recently with several Extension Educators in the state on promoting community foods systems as a viable program area that includes food entrepreneurship, community kitchen incubators, local foods networks, and community gardens.

Brad serves on the board of the Northwest Indiana World Trade Council. He is a member of the Northwest Indiana Quality of Life Council and is an alumnus of the Leadership Northwest Indiana program. Brad is certified as a NxLevel Entrepreneurship Instructor and completed the Ball State, “Economic Development Course” for Indiana professionals working in economic development.

As an Extension Educator, Brad enjoys meeting and working with a diverse citizenry on important issues of local concern. Also he likes doing a wide variety of educational programs and knowing that participants are learning and see value in Extension programs. Brad can be contacted by phone at 219-755-3240 or by [email protected].

Meet Carmen DeRusha, Marion County

Carmen E. DeRusha is an Extension Educator in the area of Economic and Community Development at the Purdue Cooperative Extension Service in Marion County.  Carmen,originally from Colombia, moved to the USA in 1986.  She has worked successfully in the area of neighborhood development in two urban neighborhoods in the City of Indianapolis.  Most recently, she has focused her time working with the Hispanic community in Indiana.

Carmen served a the Executive Director of La Plaza from March of 2003 to December 2004, a partnership organization of The Hispanic Center, Fiesta Indianapolis, The Indianapolis Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, and the Hispanic Education Center. In October of 2004 she was asked to serve as the Interim Director of the Hispanic Center a 34 year old Hispanic Organization dedicated to serve the social and health needs of Hispanics In Marion County.

Carmen believes very strongly in the power of people working together towards a shared vision.  She would like to contribute to the creation of community-based organizations within the Hispanic community as a way to strengthen the presence and positive influence of the people of Hispanic origin in the community at large.

Carmen has served as a volunteer on the Board of Directors of Fiesta Indianapolis, Inc.,four years as President; the Board of Directors of Marion County Commission on Youth,Imagine Campaign for the Marion County Public Library and La Plaza Inc., the Mayor’s Latino Commission and the American Pianists Association. In 2002 Governor Frank O’Bannon appointed Carmen to the Indiana Heritage and Cultural Council.

Currently she is Board member of the Goodwill Industries Foundation, the Hawthorne Community Center, President of Sociedad de Amigos Colombia, SADCO, member of the Local Initiative Support Corporation, LISC Advisory Committee and the IndyNeighborhoods Implementation and Demonstration Working Groups.

Carmen is passionate about building bridges of understanding between Latinos and the community at large. Carmen has provided leadership in organizing and implementing the following events: Fiesta Indianapolis, 1999 to 2002, co-chair of the Latino Summit “The Changing Face of Indiana from 2001 to 2004, Latin American Symphonic Music Concerts from 1997 to 2007 and as chair of the First Conference on Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault, 2006.

As a guest speaker, Carmen addresses the topics of diversity, culture and Latino issues in general.

In 2002, Carmen received the Indiana Extension Educators Association Innovator Award for Leadership and Community Development. She has also received a Cultural Vision Award from NUVO news weekly, the Hispanic-American Service Award from the Hispanic Education Center and a “Paul B. Crooks Award” from Purdue University Cooperative Extension Service.

Carmen is a participant in the National Training Laboratory, Diversity Practitioner’s Certification Training.

Carmen can be contacted by phone at 317-275-9305, Ext 253 or by email.