CCI Community Immersion Members:
Gerry Wright
Gerry Wright has been involved in conservation and human services for over fifty years, and he serves as an advisor and support for the graduate students of CCI. His fields of study throughout life have varied, and he has degrees in Wildlife Conservation, Forestry and Theology from different universities- University of Maine, Cornell University and Boston University. He has founded several organizations throughout the years, including Community Service Care, Inc., DARE, Inc., Jamaica Pond Project, Massachusetts Council of Human Service Providers, and many more. Furthermore, he’s also traveled and created programs connected with Russia and Ukraine. Wright also has a flair for the arts, writing, producing, directing, and starring in one-man shows about Frederick Law Olmsted’s life. He has also performed as DaVinci and Whitman. In terms of accomplishments, Wright has received many awards, including Robert F. Kennedy Embracing the Legacy Award and The Provider’s Council Lifetime Achievement Award. Furthermore, the Massachusetts’s State Senate called him “the father of community based care,” and he has been on the Today Show describing his work and its successes.
Lynn
Lynn is a PhD student in philosophy, and is interested in non-profit
community-support work. She is particularly interested in the
possibility of offering positive ways that might encourage people from
diverse backgrounds to develop a sense of community.  Lynn grew up in
an ethnically diverse neighborhood in the San Francisco Bay Area. Â Her
grandparents emigrated to California from Japan, and Lynn continued
her family’s pioneer-spirit by living abroad herself for many years
in France. Â She has traveled extensively and learned a lot about
multicultural settings when she worked with colleagues from over 30
different countries at a division of the UN in Paris.
Shanae
Shanae is a St. Louis, MO native, and a graduate student studying information technology. She is interested in web development and data management. Sky Media is her design company, www.skymedia4u.com and she also created the CCI website. Shanae is interested in youth technology services. She believes that education can break cycles of poverty and defeat in urban communities. Shanae grew up in an urban area with racial tension and economic despair and is enjoying the tolerance and opportunities Jamaica Plains and Boston have to offer. Her success has encouraged her family members to pursue Bachelors degrees as well. Her mother even went back to school and finished her Bachelors in Sociology and will be pursuing a Masters in Social Work soon. Shanae has met people from different backgrounds while attending college and finds it interesting how in some ways people are similar. Shanae enjoys having intercultural dialogue and learning new things.
Jeff
Jeff is a Graduate student studying International Affairs and Non Profit Management. He works in the Boston Public Schools through the Massachusetts Promise Fellowship creating advocacy programs for students and student government. He has traveled extensively and has lived in Latin American and Europe. His goal after obtaining his degree is to work with an education initiative in Central America. Currently Jeff is focused on school, work, Turkish class and learning as much as he can about Boston. Through the Community Caring Institute he hopes to work to foster community within the multi-cultural communities of Jamaica Plain.
Crystal
Crystal is a Graduate student in Social Work. She is interested in working with teenagers and fighting substance abuse. Eventually, Crystal would like to open a rehabilitation center for teenagers battling both substance abuse and HIV. Crystal is from Brooklyn, NY. In NY,  she volunteered at New York Presbyterian Hospital in the Special Needs Clinic, working  with adolescents girls that are HIV positive. Crystal looks forward to working with non-profit organizations to help teenagers in the community.
Joseph
Joseph came to Boston a year ago to study journalism. Born in Kansas City, Missouri, Joseph grew up migrating — almost annually — with his family between two disparate homes: rural Missouri and suburban Los Angeles. He graduated high school in Northridge, CA in 2001 and began his college education at the University of California — Santa Barbara.  Joseph transferred to the University of Missouri to finish his undergraduate degree in English. In 2006, he traveled to China to work on an organic farm in China. Afterwards, he investigated medical kickbacks for a law firm in Kansas City. Before coming to Boston, Joseph spent three months traveling across the United States on a motorcycle and later lived as an expatriate in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Alison
Alison is currently getting her Masters in Public Health. During her undergraduate years, she continuously traveled abroad; she visited Tanzania and worked in an HIV/AIDS clinic and also traveled to Equatorial Guinea to do conservation work and volunteered at the Red Cross doing HIV/AIDS work. Her interests are HIV/AIDS, infectious disease, social determinants of health, environmental health, and water safety. Originally from Ohio, Alison has lived now both in Boston and in Philadelphia, and she hopes to work for an international organization involved in health programs. Currently, she works for CCI, helping with program planning and whatever else!
