Anne-Elizabeth

Anne-Elizabeth lived in rural Tanzania and witnessed first hand the issues surrounding the health care system, where the closest hospitals and clinics were hours away from the villages. She would therefore like to contribute her time to raising money and awareness to help save lives as she prepares to run in the ING NYC Marathon. Anne-Elizabeth is a biologist and works at an environmental consulting firm in New York City.

Eliza

After surviving her first marathon running for Touch in 2009, Eliza is thrilled to be taking on the NYC marathon for a second time with the Touch marathon team. In addition to working for Touch for two years, Eliza has lived in African and Southeast Asian countries working on a variety of issues related to human rights, humantiarian protection and international development. Her experiences have consistently underscored the debilitating effects that insufficient health care services have on countries' development goals and humanitarian priorities, highlighting the need for the work that Touch is doing. Eliza is currently a student at Harvard Law School focusing on interntaional human rights, and she is spending the summer working for INTERIGHTS, a London-based international human rights litigation organization.

Scott

“After doing a half marathon, I thought people doing the full marathon were nuts, or just plain built different!” But when presented with the opportunity to contribute to such a critically necessary function in Tanzania, Scott decided he’d join them.  Recently home from India, Scott lived first hand with the guilt and shame felt from one human to another when confronted with the atrocities bestowed upon the Tibetan people in exile. He also saw indescribable human spirit and giving.  Feeling that from his comfortable home in Canada it was too easy to forget, he decided to join the cause   “I can only imagine what an incredible difference more health care workers in Tanzania would provide, to ease pain and suffering.”

Esther can’t wait to run her first marathon supporting efforts to train health workers and improve access to health care in Tanzania! Esther’s interests and volunteer efforts have centered around education and community empowerment; she is currently starting a program that trains young Latinos on community organizing and is a coordinator and teacher at an all-volunteer nonprofit that serves recent immigrants. She is extremely excited to support the Touch Foundation as it creates lasting and sustainable change through education. Esther is an analyst on a corporate strategy group and is attending Columbia Business School this fall.

Veronica was born and grew up in Tanzania and has loved running from an early age.  Having been born and raised in Tanzania, she has witnessed first hand the issues surrounding the health care system, where the closest hospitals and clinics were hours away from the villages.  Veronica says she has lost relatives, teachers, friends and neighbors due to poor health care, or due to delayed treatment and medication. Most of these deaths could have been prevented with the availability of more doctors or health care workers, facilitating quick health care delivery.  Because this cause is very close to her heart, Veronica would like to contribute her time to raising money and awareness for the Touch Foundation to help save lives in her home country while preparing to run in the ING NYC Marathon.  Veronica is a Sales and Marketing manager at a NYC based FIND New York Magazine, a Sub Saharan consultant and a Swahili language teacher who also does translations and transcription projects for documentary films

Meaghan

Meaghan is the Director of Operations for the Touch Foundation, supporting the efforts of its New York and London offices. She began learning about Tanzania’s severe shortage of health care workers and Touch’s endeavors to improve access to health care five years ago, as a volunteer while working at McKinsey & Company. Last year she attended the graduation ceremony of Weill Bugando’s first medical students, and is thrilled to work to ensure that there are many more graduates to come. This is Meaghan’s first marathon.

Jason is a Californian who is currently an MBA student in New York and has traveled extensively. Last year, he had the good fortune of traveling through Africa and had the opportunity to dive with sharks, witness the sardine run, and summit Kilimanjaro. After witnessing the need for health resources in Africa, Jason is excited to team up with The Touch Foundation to raise money to support this cause. Jason and his wife live downtown with their friendly chocolate lab (and running partner), Mr. Brown

Andrew is a life-long New Yorker, who received his BA at NYU and is currently an MD-PhD student at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine. Andrew serves on the Steering Committee of the East Harlem Health Outreach Partnership, a free clinic providing primary health care for uninsured residents of East Harlem and is captain of a Kiva team aiming to invest $1M in entrepreneurs in the developing world. Andrew is enthusiastic about social justice and building capacity, rather than providing just short-term fixes in the developing world, and thus is excited to run with the Touch Foundation for his first marathon.

Priscilla

Priscilla is a management & strategy consultant for McKinsey & Company.  Having spent six months in Arusha (Tanzania) as a volunteer with the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, Priscilla is very excited about working with the Touch Foundation to improve health care in Tanzania.  Serving underprivileged communities has always been an important priority in Priscilla’s life; she spent a summer as a community sanitation volunteer (building latrines!) in rural Mexico and spent several years co-directing a mentoring program for at-risk teens in Boston.  An avid world traveler and recreational gardener, Priscilla has run five marathons and hopes this will be her best one yet.

Russell

Russell is an attorney in New Hampshire, and had the extraordinary opportunity to teach last year at Tumaini University in Iringa, Tanzania for several months.  Through that experience he became aware of the acute need for better medical care there and was delighted to find that he could combine entry into the ING NYC Marathon with supporting such a good cause.

Our team consists of 5 mates from South Africa who are keen to challenge their endurance on the streets of New York whilst raising awareness and money for a great cause in Tanzania. Most of us have visited Tanzania and other sub-Saharan African countries and we are acutely aware of the health care challenges that exist there.  We all grew up in Cape Town, South Africa and now live around the globe in South Africa, United Kingdom and Australia.  We work in an array of industries including banking, insurance, property management and sports pr/media management.  Ross, Brent and Howie will be running their first marathon and they will be keen to upstage Ryan and Steve who have both completed the New York marathon over the past couple of years.

Christine

Originally from Hawai'i, Christine taught mathematics as a NYC Teaching Fellow following her studies at Brown University, and is currently a data analyst at McKinsey & Company. Though no longer a teacher, she remains actively invested in the community as the leader of several local volunteer projects focused on education and greenspace development. She is a little nervous about running her first marathon, but thrilled to be supporting the Touch Foundation in its critical mission.

Laura

This will be Laura’s third NYC Marathon, but first time running for a charity.  As a native New Yorker, the NYC Marathon has become a very special day for her and her family.  Both of her parents ran it twice, and the second time Laura ran it, she started dating her (now) husband after attending his post-marathon party!
Laura currently works in the NYPD Intelligence Division as an intelligence research analyst.  She has been there since August ‘09.  Laura got her master's degree at Columbia School of International Affairs (SIPA) in May 2009, and before that spent seven years working in journalism.
Laura first got to know about the Touch Foundation through her friend and classmate, Marc Allen, who worked there while they were in school and immediately afterwards.  She is very impressed with the concrete measures Touch is taking to address heath care conditions in Tanzania.  She is looking forward to learning more about the foundation as she trains and meeting her fellow runners!

Ian

Ian is a student at Harvard Law School, focusing on business law. Before going to law school, he studied history at Queen’s University in Canada. He looks forward to helping the Touch Foundation take on the challenge of providing a sustainable solution to health care development issues in Tanzania. He also looks forward to taking on the challenge of running his first marathon.

Richard & Jenny

Richard and Jenny are from Coleraine in Northern Ireland. Richard is 25 years old and Jenny is 26. Richard is a private podiatrist working from his clinic in Coleraine and Jenny is an accident and emergency doctor working in Craigavon hospital. Neither of them has ever run a marathon before and they are very excited and just a little scared.  Jenny has volunteered in hospitals in both South Africa and Kenya and Richard has helped in the construction of an orphanage in Romania.  These experiences have allowed them to realize first hand just how important a country’s health care system is to the development of that country.  For this reason, they are excited to do their little bit for the Touch Foundation.

Marc

Marc is an architect in Atlanta, GA that decided to run the New York Marathon after running the ING Georgia Marathon / Half Marathon for the past four years. He became interested in various African issues after reading a couple of books taking place in Malawi & Congo. Marc is also currently involved in the early stages of a library-building project in rural Ghana. He is excited to be raising money for a foundation that is able to be an agent for change on so many levels by empowering local people to make a difference.

Samantha

Samantha is a second year medical student at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine. As an undergraduate student at Wellesley College, she had the opportunity to take a few courses in the Africana Department with an exceptional professor. She traveled to Ghana during winter of 2005 through a school program to further explore her interest. While in Ghana, she witnessed the impact economic disparity has on healthcare. Those individuals who were the poorest and often times the sickest were the ones unable to receive the care they needed. In Bangladesh ('08-'09) on a Fulbright Scholarship, she further witnessed the healthcare challenges confronted by the developing world. The Touch Foundation’s focus on increasing health care workers in Africa will allow her to make her contribution towards increasing accessibility and improving care for those in need. This is Samantha's second marathon and she is thrilled to be participating.

Sarah

Sarah traveled around East Africa in 2001 to do community service. It was so easy for her to fall in love with the land, the people, and the culture. When experiencing first-hand the desperate needs there, she decided to give back as much as she could. Despite having finished 6 full marathons, 4 triathlons, 4 half marathons, and a handful of 10K's, this year's NYC Marathon will be her first time to run for a charity and will make the 26.2 miles result in something more than just muscle cramps and blisters. Sarah owns a cosmetic studio and spa on the California coast. She will travel to NYC this November to run with the Touch Foundation team in hopes of making a difference in Tanzania.