Board of Directors
Laura Spero is the founder and Executive Director of Jevaia Foundation. She has spent over a decade volunteering, teaching, and designing programs in rural Nepal. Laura makes spends a few months per year living in the village of Kaskikot and working closely with local residents, both within Jevaia’s programs and informally in daily rural life. Laura speaks Nepali and brings a sensitive connection to the issues our programs to address, the context in which we operate, and a familiarity with the successes and challenges of other development projects in the region. Laura is also a freelance journalist, writer, and radio producer. You can read Laura’s personal blog, All the Pieces, about the village of Kaskikot, where she has been visiting her adopted Nepali family every year since 2002, when her experiences teaching in a primary school and working side by side with Nepali villagers provided the inspiration that became Jevaia.
Don Spero is a founding General Partner at New Markets Venture Partners, a venture capital firm investing in software, IT, healthcare and education. Previously he served for five years as the Director of the University of Maryland’s Dingman Center for Entrepreneurship. As founder and CEO of Fusion Systems Corporation, he has a successful and distinguished career in business management, consulting, strategic planning and executive leadership. He also has extensive experience as a director on the boards of public and private companies, as well as small and large non-profit organizations.
Nancy Chasen, JD began her career as a public interest attorney and contributes substantial advocacy and public relations skills to Jevaia’s Board. She has also worked as a TV reporter and producer. She served as Chair of the Advisory Board for the Montgomery County, MD Office of Consumer Protection and is currently a board member of the educational non-profit Living Classrooms, in Washington DC.