Lester B. Granger ’18 Award for Lifetime AchievementIn 1988, Michael Mascari became the Executive Director of AHRC Nassau and its affiliate organizations. Nassau AHRC is Long Island’s largest non-profit agency serving children and adults with intellectual and other developmental disabilities, including autism. As the Executive Director of these organizations, he is responsible for supporting more than 4,000 individuals.
Following his graduation from Dartmouth in 1965 as a history major, Mascari joined VISTA, the domestic Peace Corps. For three years he worked as a community organizer in low-income communities in Cleveland before earning a master’s degree in social work administration from Case Western Reserve University.
Mascari’s career in the field of intellectual and developmental disabilities began when he was a social worker working with parents of children with intellectual disabilities in New York City. Later, he became the live-in community residence manager in NYC’s first group home for adults with developmental and intellectual disabilities.
Mascari entered public service as the Assistant Director for Mental Retardation Services for New York City. His joint appointment as the Assistant (later Associate) Commissioner for both the NYC Department of Mental Health, Mental Retardation, and Alcoholism Services and the NYS Office of Mental Retardation was groundbreaking. From 1981 to 1988, he acted as Associate Commissioner for the rural counties of upstate New York and the Capital District.
Mascari’s legacy in New York State is far reaching. At the start of the deinstitutionalization era, he led the initial phases of the implementation of the Willowbrook Consent Decree, in which a community-based system of supports was created for persons with disabilities who formerly lived in state institutions and for those residing with their families. Under his leadership, Nassau AHRC grew from a single organization serving 500 people into one of the largest and most successful multi-service agencies in New York State. The organization has been recognized for the high quality of its services eight years consecutively by the New York State Office for People with Developmental Disabilities. Nassau AHRC and its affiliate organizations now provide early intervention, pre-school, school-age education, and related services; habilitation, vocational, and job placement services; respite; recreation; guardianship; and residential care. Through its affiliation with the North Shore–LI Health System, the agency's diagnostic and treatment clinic provides a range of comprehensive support and medical, dental, and consultation services to adults and children with developmental disabilities and autism and well as to families and school districts.
In addition to his work with Nassau AHRC, Mascari serves on the board for the Westbury Friends School, a multi-racial Quaker school for young children, having previously served as its Clerk (Chair) for nine years. He is a member of the Trustees of the New York Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers). He also serves on the board of the Long Island Alliance for Persons with Developmental Disabilities. Past service includes the Advisory Council for the Nassau County Court System and the Nassau County Mental Health Advisory Board/Developmental Disabilities Subcommittee.
Mascari and his wife, Dr. Lisa Gasstrom, have two sons, Paul, of Beijing, China, and John, a member of Dartmouth’s Class of 2013, as well as two grandchildren, Maia and Michael.
Ongoing CommitmentChidi Achebe completed undergraduate studies in natural sciences, history, and philosophy at Bard College. He earned an MPH at the Harvard School of Public Health, an MD at Dartmouth Medical School, and an MBA at Yale University’s School of Management. He completed his residency in both internal medicine and pediatrics at the Texas Medical Center in Houston.
Achebe served as Medical Director of the Whittier Street Health Center before becoming an Assistant Professor at Tufts University School of Medicine and Medical Director of the Harvard Street Neighborhood Health Center, the latter of which he is now President and CEO. The Harvard Street Neighborhood Health Center provides world-class clinical care to and promotes the general health of a demographically diverse and underserved population of families and children of the North Dorchester, Mattapan, and Roxbury communities of Boston as well as to the City of Boston in general. It is certified as a “Provider of the Underserved” by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and is located in a federally designated “Empowerment Zone.”
Achebe sees the struggle against inequalities in health and health care as the next stage of the Civil Rights Movement. He makes church calls and speaks at youth summits, conventions, conferences, schools, and barber shops—focal gathering areas where he can reach underserved patients—in order to remind the community of the value of health care and preventive care and of the quality of service readily available at Harvard Street.
While expanding his unique implementation of “medicine without borders,” Achebe works as a passionate advocate for the global community through writings that call attention to worldwide health concerns including the HIV/AIDS pandemic and prostate cancer. His efforts have earned him a featured TV appearance on Basic Black, profiles in the Boston Globe and AOL Black Voices, an interview on WUMB-FM’s Commonwealth Journal, and feature-length articles in several international periodicals, journals, and newspapers.
Achebe serves on several boards and committees, where he continues his mission to bridge disparities in the health care system.
Emerging LeadershipJessica is the Co-Founder and Associate Director of The Mariposa DR Foundation, a community-run organization that provides sustainable and creative solutions to end extreme poverty in the Dominican Republic, especially empowering girls to achieve their full potential. Jessica fell in love with the Dominican Republic in 2003 while on vacation in Cabarete. It was here that she was inspired to join the fight against social injustice. Shortly after graduating from Dartmouth, Lawson began her career in non-profit leadership in Cabarete as a full-time volunteer in a rural public school, where she ran a library and created extracurricular programs for at-risk youth.
After serving her volunteer term, Lawson moved to San Francisco, where she joined The Trium Group, a management consulting firm that helps leaders align, equip, and mobilize their organizations to solve complex business problems and execute multi-dimensional strategies. At The Trium Group, Lawson worked with several public sector clients including the World Bank and the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research to help their leaders inspire passion and performance in their people.
Jessica returned full time to the Dominican Republic in 2008 as a non-profit consultant. There, she recognized the need for programs designed specifically for girls. In partnership with Patricia Suriel, she developed the concept of The Mariposa DR Foundation and has become an advocate for girls’ education and empowerment. The Mariposa DR Foundation (www.mariposadrfoundation.org) achieves its goals through programs in education, sports, health, and leadership, as well as partnerships with schools, community centers, and early childhood development programs.
Originally from Chicago, Lawson holds an A.B. from Dartmouth in international relations and Spanish language, culture, and society.
Emerging LeadershipBecca Heller is the Co-founder and Director of the Iraqi Refugee Assistance Project (http://refugeerights.org/), a non-profit organization that provides direct legal aid to refugees overseas who are applying for resettlement in the U.S., Canada, and other safe countries. She co-founded IRAP during her second year as a student at Yale Law School. In recognition of her work with IRAP, she has received a Skadden Fellowship, Echoing Green Fellowship, Gruber Human Rights Fellowship, and Asia 21 Society membership. Since its founding, IRAP has expanded to chapters at 20 law schools worldwide and has provided legal services to more than 300 families.
In addition to her work with IRAP, Heller has been appointed a Visiting Clinical Lecturer at Yale Law School, where she teaches a seminar on refugee law and processing.
Heller graduated summa cum laude from Dartmouth in 2005. While at Dartmouth, she received a number of awards in recognition of her public service to the community, including The Dartmouth's Milton Sims Kramer Award for Community Impact, the Grace and James Parks Senior Class Day Award for Community Service, and the 2005 Dean’s Award for Community Service. Between college and law school, she spent a year as a Fulbright Scholar in Malawi.
Students For Africa (SFA) works to raise awareness about the economic and political issues affecting the African continent, to develop methods to tackle these issues of social justice and development, and to showcase and share African culture with the Dartmouth community. Members of SFA have implemented a wide variety of projects in areas ranging from education reform to water sanitation to youth leadership. Recently, the organization held its inaugural Mbele Africa Convention, which focused on the theme “Youth’s Role in Taking Africa Forward.” The convention, which drew more than 100 participants from 12 colleges, addressed current social, political, and economic affairs in Africa and explored the roles that young people can and do play in contributing to development across the continent.
