Helping Hands

Each month, Helping Hands features a mortgage professional or group that has volunteered to lend a hand to others in need. Kirsten Terry is a Seattle-based freelance writer.

Name: Lisa Schreiber, LSK Consultants LLC

Project: The Grandmother Project

Sites: International, including Senegal and other West African countries

How: This past September, Schreiber, LSK’s managing director, met Judi Aubel, co-founder and director of The Grandmother Project. The project, a nonprofit ac- tive in West Africa, Asia and Latin America, encourages other organizations to include grandmothers in their health-education campaigns, including those related to malnutrition, malaria and HIV/AIDS prevention. It provides tools and training services for these groups.

The project is based on the premise that grandmothers can be valuable sources of knowledge and influence — especially in developing societies — and must be included in public-health programs.

Schreiber says she recognized that her work experience could aid the nonprofit. In December, she traveled to Senegal to attend workshops and spent time in different villages with grandmothers and other family members who have participated in the project’s efforts.

The project has several initiatives in Senegal, including a joint venture with nonprofit World Vision to create and distribute a booklet about grandmothers’ role in village society.

Why: Schreiber says she shares the project’s belief that grandmothers can contribute to building healthier families and communities. Her own grandmother had a great impact on her life while she was growing up, she says.

But it’s the timing of her meeting with Aubel this past fall that sealed the deal, Schreiber says. The mortgage company where she had worked filed for bankruptcy the previous month, and she was temporarily out of a job.

“Meeting Judi in September, following my company’s demise, was a true opportunity for me,” Schreiber says. “I could see how I could put the business skills I had to work for a great cause.”

Impact: Schreiber is now a member of the project’s advisory group, acting as a special adviser on private-sector resource mobilization. She says she is also helping the nonprofit develop its presence in the United States.

Try it: Grandmotherproject.org; to read Schreiber’s journal from her trip to Senegal, visit LSKConsultants. com/grandmother-project/

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