SMATCH
US
Board of Directors
Sylvana
Ehrman, our President, has a political
science degree from L’Ecole des Sciences Politiques de Paris and a
degree in literature from the University of Lisbon. She is a
graduate gemologist and co-founder of the Brazilian Institute of
Gemology, Sao Paulo and, in conjunction with Sao Paulo’s art museum,
organized an exhibit on “Brazilian Gems and Jewelry.” She was
Smithsonian Cultural Liaison for Italy and Portugal during the 1976
Washington, DC Bicentennial celebration. During her husband’s
Foreign Service career, she assisted Peruvian anthropology Professor
Amat with research on the Chavin civilization and was a docent at the
Ayala Museum, Manila. She speaks French, Italian, Spanish and
Portuguese.
Maria
MacKay, our Vice President, is a senior
executive in the US Department of Commerce Import Administration
She has over 20 years of experience in the international trade area,
both in the private and public sector. She lived in Italy and
Germany prior to settling in the United States and has traveled
extensively throughout the world. Before coming to the US she
taught Italian and Russian at Ca Foscari University, Venice and at
Schiller College in Germany . She also worked as interpreter
(Russian/Italian) in commercial trade negotiations. She holds an
MA in International Economics from Georgetown University and a
Doctorate in Foreign Languages from Ca' Foscari She speaks
Italian, Russian and German.
Deborah McDonald, our Treasurer,
is a Support
Services Specialist in the Secretary of State's Executive Office.
She began working for State at the American Embassy, Rome, where she
served as Community Liaison Officer and rover secretary, and worked in
the Office of Caucasus and Central Asian Affairs after returning to
Washington. She has taught Spanish in Baltimore County and City
Public Schools and English as a Second Language in Washington, DC,
Texas and Louisiana. She holds degrees in Spanish Education (BA)
and Teaching English as a Second Language (MS) from the State
University of New York at Albany. She speaks Spanish and Italian.
James
Ehrman, our Secretary, spent 22 of his 38
years as a US Foreign Service Officer at postings abroad (France,
Italy, Portugal, Brazil, Peru, India, Philippines, Thailand). He
headed the State Department’s International Labor Affairs office in
1996-98 and retired after completing his last foreign assignment, Labor
Minister Counselor at the American Embassy, Rome. He has a BA in
political science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and did
graduate work at the Harvard University’s Littauer Center (now the
Kennedy School of Government). He speaks French, Italian, Spanish
and Portuguese.
Mary
Ann Allin, our Fundraising Chair, is President of Swashbuckler
Enterprises, Inc., an arts
consultancy based in Washington, DC with an office and charitable
foundation in St. Petersburg, Russia She is the founder of the
Faberge Arts Foundation (Washington and St. Petersburg) and has
organized traveling exhibitions, documentary films, books and website
projects on various topics in the field of culture and the arts.
She received an honors degree in political science and Russian language
from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, with graduate work in
education, and subsequently held positions at the White House, Treasury
Department and American Enterprise Institute.
Hanne
Caraher, our Programs Editor, has the equivalent
of a Master’s degree in conference interpreting and translation from
the University of Heidelberg, Germany. She acted as Cultural
Liaison for Germany during the Smithsonian Institution's Folk Life
Festival in 1975 and for Germany and Austria during the Smithsonian’s
Bicentennial celebration in 1976 in Washington, DC. She now works
as an editor, a desktop publisher and a translator. Besides her
native language, German, she speaks Spanish and has a reading knowledge
of French.
Joel Ehrman, Member at Large, is a Senior Sales
Manager at ARINC Inc, the world's largest aviation communications and
navigation company. He has over 11 years of international sales
experience working with airlines and the business aviation
community. He holds a degree in gemology from the Federal
University of Ouro Preto (Minas Gerais, Brazil) and a degree in
political science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He
has special interest in the history of Imperial Rome. Joel speaks
French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese and Thai.
Lucy
Hamachek, member at large, is a graduate of Georgetown University
in French and economics and pursued graduate studies in economics at
the Universite' de Strasbourg as a Fulbright scholar. She served as an
economist for Congress' Joint Economic Committee and in various
capacities in the US Department of Commerce, including Deputy Assistant
Secretary for Economic Policy from 1977-1980. She is a student of
Italian, having pursued studies both in Italy and the US. She has
served on the boards of the National Italian American Foundation (NIAF)
and the Italian Cultural Society of Washington, DC. She is a volunteer
teacher of English to adult immigrants. She speaks French and Italian.
Anna Lawton, Member at Large, holds a PhD in
Russian Language and Literature from UCLA and a Doctorate in Languages
and Institutions of Eastern Europe from Istituto Universitario
Orientale, Naples, Italy. She has been an Associate Professor of
Russian studies at Purdue University and has taught courses in film
studies and visual culture at Georgetown University for 15 years.
She has published numerous articles and books on Russian/Soviet film
and has served on the National Gallery of Art’s Film Advisory
Board. She is Managing Editor of the World Bank magazine
Development OUTREACH and is the Publisher of the independent press, New
Academia Publishing. She has lived in Italy and Russia and speaks
Italian, Russian and French.
Dian Olson, Member at Large, has a BA in
psychology from Lewis and Clark College and an MA in psychology from
North Carolina State University. The wife of a US Foreign Service
Officer, she has lived 15 years abroad in India, Austria, Tunisia and
Panama. She served as a consular officer and community liaison
officer at three embassies and, in the US, has been a mental health and
substance abuse counselor. She speaks Persian, French and Spanish.
Tom
Wukitsch, Member at Large and Webmaster, spent the first 7
of his 35 years of US Government service in the Navy and the rest as a
State Department Foreign Service Officer, working principally in Middle
East and European assignments. Between military and Foreign
Service employment he designed computers for a major US communications
company and taught ancient history. He has BA
(History/Archeology -- Loyola-Chicago) and MA (Strategic Asset
Management -- JMIC, Washington DC) degrees. He now
teaches Roman history at the Arlington Learning in Retirement Institute
(George Mason
University, Arlington, Virginia). (Web site: http://www.mmdtkw.org/ALRItkwPages.html.)
He speaks Arabic
and Italian and has
worked in German,
ancient Greek, Latin,
Hebrew, and other
classical languages.
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Some members of the SMATCH Board of
Directors at an April, 2006 meeting