The Field of Hope family continues to grow, as we welcome Olivia Murphy-Sweet to the staff as our Program Manager. In this entirely new position, Olivia will collaborate with our Ugandan staff to implement programs, steward new and existing strategic partnerships, and explore program development opportunities with value-aligned people and organizations to expand the scope and impact of Field of Hope’s work. She will begin her position on June 15, 2022.
Olivia is an Agriculture Extension and Education Bachelor’s graduate of Penn State, and an Agriculture Education Master’s graduate of The University of Idaho. Between her degrees, Olivia gained years of boots-on-the-ground experience in Senegal, where she worked as a PeaceCorps Volunteer, specifically working as a Sustainable Agriculture Specialist. She stayed past her initial commitment to continue working for PeaceCorps as a Gender and Development Volunteer Leader. Most recently, Olivia has been a high school-level agriculture educator.
Olivia is not only extremely experienced in international agricultural development, but her heart and passion power her to this field of work. Olivia said she believes everyone has a right to food. “I truly believe that it is a necessity that every man, woman, and child have access to nutritious and safe food throughout their lifetime,” Olivia said.
This belief is what align Olivia with Field of Hope’s Mission and Values. She furthered this, stating, “It is the mission of Field of Hope to equip people with the right skills to ensure that their communities can grow, be food secure and empowered through agricultural pursuits and leadership development. If I can have a small part in that pursuit, I will be happy knowing that I have done what I can to advance communities further.”
For Olivia, agriculture brings people together and yields hard working people. “International agriculture has allowed me the opportunity to work beside some of the hardest working individuals as we work together to solve crop yield problems, sustainability issues, and create successful harvests for them and their communities. It is the “togetherness” that I feel when working in international agriculture that motivates me to keep working in this field,” Olivia stated.
Field of Hope implements programs in Uganda and India aimed at empowering partners through projects in youth agricultural education, smallholder farmer advancement, and leadership development. Visit www.fieldofhope.org to learn more.
We are thrilled to announce Jacqueline J. Acaa, better known to us as Jackie, is the second recipient of our Field of Hope Scholarship. Jackie has been working with Field of Hope since 2015, when she met our co-founder Mike Hafner. “We become friends at first sight,” Jackie said, when Mike told her about FOH and our efforts to support women through agricultural training. FOH asked Jackie to help us with our women’s group trainings, and she has been an integral part of our success.
