Our Voice

Meet our Board of Directors

Alfred SamForay - President

Rev. Alfred SamForay was born in the village of Karleh in the southern region of Sierra Leone. He graduated at the top of his class at Bumpe High School and came to the U.S. over forty-five years ago as a college student at Sangamon State University (which later became U of I Springfield). He eventually went on to become the first minority to obtain a Bachelor’s Degree in Agricultural Engineering from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.  Alfred is an Agricultural and Industrial engineer by trade. He is also an ordained minister, and in 1989 he founded Sewa River Mission, a non-profit which later became a service arm of Villages Youth and Family Services.  In 2016, after forty-four years in the United States, he retired back “home” to embark upon his life-long dreamof using large-scale farming to provide food, economic opportunities, and resources to support education and health services for the people Sierra Leone. 

Masah Renwick - CEO

Attorney Masah S. Renwick is Founder and CEO of Villages Youth and Family Services (“Villages”). Motivated by her love for children, Masah founded Villages to do her part to combat childhood hunger, neglect and abuse. As one of The National Black Lawyers—Top 100, Masah received both her Juris Doctorate and Bachelor of Arts from Indiana University– Bloomington. As Founder of The Renwick Firm, a law firm located in the suburbs of Chicago, Illinois, Masah practices exclusively family law, managing cases involving divorce, custody, child support, and parenting time.

Outside of the legal community, Masah is very active in her community, and holds a number of Board memberships for organizations with a focus on women, children, and underserved populations. Masah holds ten, non-profit Board of Directors and/or bar association committee appointments, and was most recently appointed by Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner to the Board of Trustees of Governor’s State University.

LORI WILCOX

Lori Wilcox is currently the Assistant District Governor for Rotary District 6450 (Area P), President of the Chicago Heights Free Public Library Board, Chair of the Rotary District 6450 International Convention Coordinator and is on the Board Nominating Committee. She is also a member of the South Suburban Family Wellness Alliance Coalition, an active member of the International Association of Municipal Clerks (Education Committee), Municipal Clerks of Illinois (Education and Mentor Committee), South and Southwest Suburban Clerk’s Association (Bylaws Committee), PFAW-Young Elected Officials Network, CMAP-Steering Committee for Chicago Heights, a board member, Board Secretary and Board Development Chair of the Childcare Resource and Referral Services and a board member and Open Meetings Officer of Reaching Across Illinois Library System. From 2013-2015 she served as President of the Rotary Club of Chicago Heights.

Lori is a Registered, Certified & Master Municipal Clerk and is pursuing an Ed.D in Leadership.

Dr. Sakira Jackson

Dr. Sakira Jackson, is one of the most highly regarded business and consulting psychologist in Chicago. She has a Doctorate in Business Psychology and business owners to million dollar transformations using proven techniques for strategic business growth, client attraction, revenue Consulting.   In addition, she is the founder and CEO ofBrainpower Consulting and the Masters of Business Academy. Dr. Sakira coaches’ generation, income acceleration and business transformation.
 

Now as author of The Most Important Questions Every CEO Must Answer, Dr. Sakira mentors a select group of high-performing CEOs, entrepreneurs and their teams, helping the accelerate growth, increase leadership abilities and build their own companies based on her patented CEO Mindset process.

Osei David Andrews-Hutchinson

Osei Andrews-Hutchinson is the Director of Technology for the chain of daycare centers (It Takes A Village Early Learning Centers), and an independent school (The Village Leadership Academy), and has been serving as one of the school’s Life Skills instructors, as a World Scholar’s Program Co-Instructor. (a program the school has developed to shape our youth into global leaders, today) and the Technology Instructor. Through his role in the World Scholars Program, Osei has helped chaperone groups of 3rd, 4th and 5th Graders to Bahia, Brazil in 2010, to the Democratic Republic of the Congo in 2011, to the Yucatán Peninsula of Mexico in 2012, to South Africa in 2013,a group of 3rd – 7th Graders to The Dominican Republic in 2014, a group of 2nd – 8th Graders to Panama in May 2015 and most recently led a true "delegation" of 44 students, staff, family members and community partners, including 2 sitting Illinois State Legislators to Cuba in June 2016.  Osei is currently helping to prepare a group of 15 3rd - 8th Graders to go to Ghana in June of 2017.