Partners in Progress
Promoting and advancing sustainable development in rural Haiti
Meet our Staff
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Dr. Richard Gosser - Executive Director |
A founding board member of Partners in Progress, Dr. Richard A. Gosser has provided strong leadership since the organization began in 1999. In 2006 he left his position as associate professor of mathematics at St. Vincent College, Latrobe, PA to become PIP’s first Executive Director. Dr. Gosser studied mathematics and philosophy at St. Vincent College and the University of Durham, England and did graduate studies in theology at the Franciscan University, Steubenville, OH. His master’s and doctoral degrees (in mathematics) are from Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA. In addition to a 30 year career teaching math at St. Vincent College, he has taught mathematics and theology in a university pilot project in San Pedro Sula, Honduras and regularly teaches a seminar on Catholic Social Teaching at the Presentation Ministries Summer Bible Institute at Xavier University in Cincinnati, OH.
In 1994 Dr. Gosser received the St. Vincent College Alumnus of Distinction Award for his humanitarian and justice work in Haiti, Honduras, and the Dominican Republic. Together with his wife, Daneen, a certified psychiatric home health nurse, he has coordinated more than twenty delegations and “reverse mission pilgrimages” to Haiti. He has worked as a translator for Intercultural Nursing health care teams in the Dominican Republic. With help from the Pittsburgh Regional Haiti Solidarity Committee, he has overseen the shipping of more than 12,000 pounds of medicines, medical supplies and school supplies to Haiti since 1993.
Dr. Gosser has been an accredited election observer in seven national elections in Haiti and has trained independent, international Haitian election observers in techniques and standards of election monitoring and is a former board member of the Washington Office on Haiti. He and his wife Daneen are co-founders of the Rich in Mercy Mission Institute, the “faith based” division of Partners in Progress that promotes “global solidarity” through education for justice, by linking people to people and communities to communities, and by providing opportunities and inspiring initiatives to meet the material and spiritual needs of the poorest populations of the Americas.
Dr. Gosser frequently makes presentations on Haiti and on Catholic Social Teaching at churches, schools, civic organizations, and other groups. He and his wife reside in Ligonier, PA where they are active in Holy Trinity Parish as members of the RCIA team and parish folk choir. They are “co-workers” in Presentation Ministries and lay members of the Congregation of the Holy Spirit (Spiritans). They have two children and five grandchildren.
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Becky Newlin - Administrative Assistant |
Becky is a retired teacher, who worked in the teaching field for over forty years. She taught at various grade schools for thirteen years and spent the remaining years teaching religious studies in the area of Catholic social justice at Pittsburgh diocesan high schools. In 2004, Becky, under the inspiration of the Pittsburgh Haiti Solidarity Committee, hosted Sheila Douyon, a Fonkoze employee, who was studying at Duquesne University. In the summer of 2005 Becky went on a reverse mission trip to Haiti with Rich Gosser and returned to Haiti to work in the Fondwa Community as an English teacher at St. Antoine School in 2006-07. She served as a board member of PIP for a short time and was then hired for a part-time position in PIP’s office in Ligonier.
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