Board of Directors
Fernando Javier Morales
Fernando was born and raised in Honduras and currently lives in Mexico City. He first became involved with Chispa in summer of 2016, spending time working on Chispa’s educational programs and traveling to far away and welcoming areas of Honduras. He is now the Sr. Impact and Environmental Social Governance Manager at a global impact investing fund manager. In his job he has traveled to 10+ countries to work with business support centers and investment funds to maximize their impact, including ensuring companies’ Environmental, Social and Governance policies enable them to receive investment and have a positive social or environmental impact in their communities. He comes to this board after literally bumping into Chispa’s director at a security line in an airport in Costa Rica.
He is drawn mostly to nonfiction, particularly books with historical and social content that provide a better understanding of our world. When it comes to fiction, his favorite authors are José Saramago and Kurt Vonnegut.
Leah Hodder, Treasurer
Leah is a strategic finance and accounting leader with a passion for solving complex challenges. An active CPA with a background in FP&A, she utilizes her expertise to help organizations make informed decisions with improved accuracy and transparency of financial reporting. She earned her master’s and bachelor of science in accounting from Penn State University. Leah comes to Chispa Project with years of experience auditing and consulting for a variety of US-based nonprofit organizations.
It's impossible to pick a favorite book, but she credits her lifelong passion for reading to childhood memories with an amateur sleuth named Nancy, a wizard named Harry, grandparents with revolving currently-reading and to-be-read piles on the coffee table, and her dad, who let her read past bedtime.
Gustavo Ochoa
Gustavo is from Santa Lucia, a small town in the mountains of Honduras. His day job is marketing movies and series at Amazon Prime Video and he is currently based in Seattle, WA. He earned an MBA at the University of Minnesota and a BFA in Film from the Academy of Art in San Francisco.
In the past, he has worked as a consultant for nonprofits and managed communications for a violence reduction program focusing on youth in Honduras.
Reading John Steinbeck novels was a primary driver in getting him to apply to colleges in California and he thinks about details from 100 Años de Soledad (100 Years of Solitude) at least five times a week. Aside from reading and nonprofits, Gustavo enjoys riding bikes, watching bike races, saunas, and hot springs.
Comfort Sampong
Comfort Sampong shares stories of justice to spark international action and relationships. For the past four years, she has worked at the Association for a More Just Society-US, which uses its Spanish initials ASJ, a nonprofit organization dedicated to making public systems like education, health, and security, work for the Honduran people. As ASJ’s Program Coordinator, Comfort develops creative monthly communications, facilitates research connections, and supports storytelling and advocacy initiatives. She studied Economics and International Development at Calvin University, and previously worked as a research assistant at DataWise Consulting. The Ghanaian-American daughter of immigrants, Comfort is passionate about celebrating the bonds and justice movements between the African and Latin American diasporas. Comfort calls many places home and currently lives in Washington, D.C.
Connect with Comfort on LinkedIn
Karen Schuder
Karen is an author and speaker who promotes resilience among people in professional and personal helping roles. She has been working with a variety of groups in Honduras since 2015 and said, “I love the people of Honduras. I am blessed to know so many wonderful people who are working hard to make the world a better place. I committed to Chispa Project’s work, because I want to help children and families expand possibilities for their future through literacy. When we help people open a book, we help them open doors to new worlds.”
Karen’s education includes a degree in child development and a doctorate in educational leadership. She has worked with young children, children with special needs, youth, and adults by leading workshops or working with US and Honduran organizations such as World Vision, UNAH Facultad de Medicina y el Hospital Docente (Tegucigalpa), Sociedad Amigos de los Ninos, and public or private schools.
Her book Resilient and Sustainable Caring: Your Guide to Thrive While Helping Others provides an array of strategies for people in helping roles based on theory, experience, and interviews with people around the world. Karen loves to read and has enjoyed story-telling to people of all ages. Favorite books include those she read as a youth and then again to her children when they were growing up, such as A Wrinkle in Time, the Narnia series, and the Lord of the Rings series.
Maiko Uchida, President
Maiko is an international development professional and has managed agriculture and nutrition projects for the UN agencies and bilateral government agencies for over 10 years. She has worked in Timor-Leste, Indonesia, Zambia, and South Africa, and currently resides in Tegucigalpa. She earned an M.A. in International Development at the University of California, San Diego.
As a mother of three, it has given her great delight to see her children learning to love reading. She looks forward to supporting Chispa as they bring the joy of reading to many more children in Honduras. During her childhood in Japan, her favorite books were a Japanese detective series in which a girl, with help from her grandfather, solves mysteries in her community. She now enjoys reading the Harry Potter series with her children.
Connect with Maiko on LinkedIn
Kelsey Schreiber, Secretary
Kelsey is a research support specialist in the Charles H. Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management at Cornell University. She holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Systems Engineering and Design and a Master of Science degree in Agricultural and Biological Engineering, both from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Professionally, she manages a fellowship program that provides mentoring opportunities to young-career scholars in low- and middle-income countries. She also works closely on research projects related to U.S. public and private food assistance, international food and water security, and agricultural extension systems.
While at Illinois, she also co-founded a nonprofit that provided consultation on rural drinking water projects in Senegal, Honduras, and Guatemala. She comes to Chispa Project excited and uplifted by its mission and with over five years of nonprofit board experience. Her most recent favorite read was Recursion by Blake Crouch.
Emily Smith, Vice-President
Emily first met the Chispa Project team in 2017 when she was serving as a bilingual primary school and resource teacher in San Pedro Sula, Honduras. She fell in love with the mission to get books into the hands of Honduran kids and hasn’t looked back. Since moving back to the US from Honduras, Emily has spent time as an academic assistant and internship program coordinator for the William J. Perry Center for Hemispheric Defense studies, a government research center where she specialized in Women, Peace and Security and focused on preparing student interns for their future careers. She then returned to her passion for immigration and citizenship, serving as the Citizenship Program Manager and Paralegal for CARECEN DC, an organization that provides low or no cost immigration benefits for individuals from Central America in the DC Metropolitan area. Emily now works as a Senior Project Coordinator for EnCompass LLC, collaborating with USAID’s Monitoring & Evaluation for Learning and Sustainability platform in Peru, Paraguay, and Brazil. Born in Anchorage, Alaska, Emily has a B.A. in Psychology and Spanish from Dickinson College. In her free time, Emily can be found doodling mural ideas, training for marathons, hiking with her rescue pup Obi, and talking excitedly to anyone who will listen about her latest, favorite read.
Emily’s favorite book is usually whichever she is currently reading, but some of her all time favorites include Wild by Cheryl Strayed, Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain, and anything by Chloe Liese or Sarah J. Maas.
Robert Gates
Robert brings over 20 years of experience in governmental auditing and accounting. Robert's career is defined by his commitment to ensuring transparency, compliance, and efficiency in federal and State grantee and contractor financial operations. Specializing in regulatory compliance and financial reporting, Robert provides invaluable insights and solutions to public sector clients. He earned his MBA from Portland State University and is an active CPA.
Beyond his professional achievements, Robert draws inspiration from his favorite book series, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. This passion for adventure is reflected in his personal life as an avid scuba diver and cyclist, pursuits that mirror his adventurous spirit and love for exploration.