Our Advisory Board

Friends of Yimbo is a non-profit organization that is 100% run by volunteers. The network of friends span the U.S, Italy and Kenya. We look forward to expanding this to many more who wish to join us in assisting the community of Yimbo.

Dr. Charles Odipo,
Co-Founder, FOY
Charles is a clinical psychologist with over 12 years experience in community development, clinical supervision and conducting mental health/psychological assessments. He is currently a clinical psychologist with the State of California conducting clinical work and forensic mental health evaluations. He is also in private practice working with children, adolescents and adults in Sacramento, California.

Prior to coming to the United States he worked with non profit organizations in Kenya writing successful funding proposals for HIV/AIDS counseling and home based health care projects. He also served as a liaison with international funding sources and coordinated joint programs with US AID.

Charles has used his experience in clinical as well community non profit work to network with friends who share a similar passion for empowering impoverished populations. Charles and his brother Ben co-founded FOY to continue the work of their father Joseph W. Odipo whose passion was providing quality education to the villagers while fostering self sustainability.

Charles has a degree in Sociology/Community Development from the University of Nairobi, Kenya, a master’s degree in behavioral psychology/sociology and a doctorate in counseling psychology from the University of the Pacific, Stockton, USA. He is also an associate member of the Sacramento Black Chamber of Commerce.

Ben Odipo
Co-Founder, FOY
Born in Kenya and the fourth son of Joseph W. Odipo. Now residing in California, Ben and his brother Charles make visits to their village of Muguna every two years. Following in the footsteps of their father, the Odipo family have always given assistance to those in need in the village but a lot more was required to overcome the many dire needs of the villagers.

To serve these needs, Ben and Charles founded Friends of Yimbo to mobilize friends to assist the people of Yimbo. With a background in computer Science and business, Ben has worked in K-12, and higher education integrating technology with education. A longtime believer in the power of networking and the sharing of ideas, he also served on the board of directors for Sacramento Entrepreneurs Academy for 3 years. The academy provides opportunity for young entrepreneurial spirits the basics of innovation via business plan writing and mentorship from accomplished local business community leaders. Ben is passionately commited to providing a sustainable way of life to those in need while fulfilling the organizations mission to support and promote the inter-cultural exchange with the Kenya people.

Larry Vrieling
Advisory Board Member
Larry is a retired College Counselor and International Student Coordinator/Advisor (American River College, Sacramento, California). He was Ben's Counselor while studying in Sacramento.

Prior to completing an MS degree in Counseling and his academic career, Larry served in the American Peace Corps in Bangalore, India (1965-67) working in agricultural extension. He followed this assignment with training of Peace Corps Volunteers while attending graduate school. He also continues to farm (almonds) in the Central Valley of California.

Larry has continued his interest and knowledge in international education and development for over fifty years by way of travel, reading, and organization participation. He is very excited about the possibilities of being involved with the village of Yimbo and its people.

Dr. Bill Herrin
Advisory Board Member
Bill is a professor of economics at the University of the Pacific in Stockton, California. He just returned from a year working as a senior research economist for the Federal Housing Finance Board in Washington, DC, and is now resuming his academic duties. In addition to teaching development economics, housing economics, and econometrics, he continues to research housing markets in less-developed countries. He has published work on Ugandan housing markets, and is currently analyzing the impact of household migration on wealth accumulation there. He spent two years teaching and doing research at Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda, and has traveled to East Africa six times since 1994. He spent time in Nairobi and Western Kenya, including time in Yimbo, on past visits to Kenya.

Bill received a BS in business administration and economics from Wilkes University in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania (1980), as well as an MA (1982) and PhD (1986) in economics from Binghamton University-State University of New York. He currently resides is Stockton with his wife Michelle, who is also a professor of economics at Pacific, has an interest in health issues in less-developed countries, and has traveled to Kenya and Uganda. Michelle and Bill are beginning a new research effort that studies the relationship between housing quality and health in East Africa.

Dr. Leonard Chadwick
Advisory Board Member
Born in Oklahoma and raised in Colorado, he is the son of Leonard G. Chadwick, Sr. During his childhood; he was exposed to jazz music and the musicians of the era. Also, at a very early age he began to play football. Both of these experiences played a part in shaping his life. He received many awards and publicity for playing high school football that opened the doors to playing at the university and professional levels. Leonard attended the University of Colorado and completed his undergraduate degree at California State University, San Francisco. His graduate study was completed at San Francisco State as well as the University of California Berkeley. He holds credentials from the state of California that includes Pupil Personnel: Counseling/Psychology, Resource Specialist, Learning Handicapped, and Standard Secondary. He has worked extensively with at risk students in urban settings in the areas of behavior modification and remediation of learning problems.

Additionally, he is the founder and president of L CHAD II, a management organization, dealing with professional athletes and entertainers. He has had extensive representing and negotiating contracts. Also, he has produced jazz/music festivals internationally. He now resides in Sacramento, California and would like to see the goals of the Friends of Yimbo realized. The goals of this organization are an extension to the ones that he and his father have held-giving back to the community and helping others to improve their lives.

Aaron Stabel,
Advisory Board Member
Aaron is a Board Certified Behavior Analyst living in Sacramento, California. As a behavioral and educational consultant for school districts and families, he assesses and implements interventions for children with ASD, ADHD, emotional disturbances, and other developmental disabilities. He has presented seminars and workshops at various conferences including the United States Department of Defense Education Activity and the Northeastern Nevada Professional Development Conference. In addition, Aaron has shared clinical experiences and partnered with educational professionals in countries such as Italy, Slovenia, Guatemala, and Canada. The Friends of Yimbo project was immediately appealing to Aaron, as it matches his passions for international education and travel.

Mrs. Joyce Odipo
Advisory Board Member
Mrs. Joyce Herin Odipo is a mother of seven, five boys and two girls. She was widowed in 1992 after the passing of her husband Joseph Odipo. From the day Joseph and Joyce got married, the two always had their doors opened to those in need in the village. Many in Yimbo today will attest to the fact that to staying at the Odipo home whenever they visited. Joseph worked with the East African Railway Corporation so they moved to many towns within Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania. Many from Yimbo had the chance to visit them and even find jobs in these towns with Joseph’s help. Joyce also worked for the Railway Corporation a secretary for over 30 years. She retired back in 1996 and has spent most of time raising her grandson Denis.

Joyce continues to help community members. One example is the small disbursements of tuition money, that her sons help her raise, which go to the brightest kids in Muguna Primary School. She has spent countless hours in mobilizing the community to rally behind and understand the partnership that FOY brings and the match the expectations.

Judy Odipo
Advisory Board Member
The second born child to Joseph and Joyce Odipo, Judy worked in Kenya for 13 years as an international trade negotiator. She worked with entrepreneurs in micro-enterprise development in both developed and developing countries namely: Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, South Africa, Malawi, India, Japan, Italy, UK and Switzerland including 178 member countries of the World Trade Organization. Working in environments with diverse economies has provided great experiences, which will help integrate the use of available resources and micro-enterprise development for economic self-sufficiency in Yimbo. Additionally, she worked on small business projects in rural communities funded by the United Nations Conference for Trade and Development, International Trade Organization, United Nations Industrial and Development Organization, USAID and the World Trade Organization.

Currently, she works as a micro-enterprise coordinator for a social service organization assisting individuals with special needs, achieve self-employment. She has a degree in Business Administration/Management and Masters in Business Administration (MBA)/International Business.

Kaye Ekstrand
Advisory Board Member
Kaye joins Friends of Yimbo having witnessed the power of humanitarian efforts in other organizations she has worked with. Currently the Director for Early Childhood Education Program for Duarte Unified School District in California. With over twenty years in public education Kaye is a firm believer that each child should have the opportunity to learn. She has seen first-hand the power of education with the children she has taught and mentored. In 2008, Kaye helped organize Vejar Elementary students in raising money for children in Ethiopia through ‘Pennies for The Village of Hope’ program. The students were excited to participate again in raising money for students in Kenya through ‘Pennies for Yimbo’!

Kaye has designed the program this year to include student liaisons who work with individual classrooms and meet as a group.
Kaye shares both a passion for education and for individual success with the FOY board and advisory council. She taught English at Japanese schools during her American school summer breaks and has been involved with service projects for internationally focused organizations. Recently her work with the Village of Hope prompted her to connect with Friends of Yimbo and her endeavors have helped solidify FOY as a non-profit organization.

Dr. Cheryl Crippen
Advisory Board Member
Cheryl met Charles and other members of the Odipo family when she was studying as an exchange student at University of Nairobi in 1990. Over the past two decades, she has traveled multiple times to East Africa including visits to the Odipo family home in Yimbo. After completing a graduate degree in international relations with an emphasis on development in Africa, she lived in Kampala, Uganda for a year teaching at Makerere University and consulting with US Agency for International Development. She has traveled extensively to over 40 countries, both for fun and working as a study abroad coordinator for the School of International Studies at University of the Pacific.

Most recently her travels have focused on Australia and the South Pacific as she is completing her PhD in counseling psychology from the University of New England in New South Wales. Her doctoral research focuses on cross-cultural parenting and the processes of cultural adaptation and mutual acculturation in intercultural marriages. She works full-time as a research associate studying the impact of the prenatal environment on fetal and infant development in the Women and Children’s Health and Well-Being Projects at University of California, Irvine, department of Psychiatry and Neuroscience.

Alysia Odipo
Treasurer/Secretary to the Board