#32: Students Helping Honduras Staff Highlight, Amanda Fennell (Chief Operating Officer)

The Shin Fujiyama Podcast | Social Entrepreneurship | Nonprofit Organizations | International Development Aid | NGOs

Today's guest is the person who I spend the most time with (even more than my mom) over the phone/email during any given week. She is also one of my best friends. In this episode, Amanda Fennell talks about getting adopted from an orphanage in Colombia, childhood in America, how she dealt with her "ugly duckling" years, the tragic loss that devastated her family, her first (tumultuous) exposure to leadership where she was called "awful", favorite books, what she REALLY thinks of me as her boss, what was going through her mind during her first trip to Honduras, how she raised $125,000 while in college, why she quit a high-paying "dream job" to help SHH, what it's really like having a location-independent work arrangement, her newest side-hustle, and more. As COO of an organization with an annual budget of almost $1 million and network of 5,000+ volunteers, Amanda does it all: answering phone calls & emails, updating our website & social media, coordinating the efforts of 100+ chapters, securing new partnerships, and more. She was the co-founder of the Students Helping Honduras chapter at Towson University, leading the efforts to raise a record-breaking $125,000 in four years while a student. She also served as Student Director her senior year, organizing the efforts of the then 50+ chapters of the organization nationwide. Check out her newest side-hustle known as Bear Street Collective, a succulent arrangement business! www.bearstcollective.com Show Links Dan Pallotta: The Way We Think About Charity is Dead Wrong talk | TED Talks

The Blue Sweater: Bridging the Gap Between Rich and Poor in an Interconnected World by Jacqueline Novogratz

Toxic Charity: How Churches and Charities Hurt Those They Help, And How to Reverse It by Robert D. Lupton

When Helping Hurts: How to Alleviate Poverty Without Hurting the Poor . . . and Yourself by Steve Corbett, Brian Fikkert, John Perkins

Show Notes

Amanda Fennell was adopted from an orphanage in Bogota, Colombia in 1990

It was around the time of guerrilla warfare, and the orphanage had bomb nets over them, and military was everywhere

Amanda Fennell grew up in New York

Amanda wants to adopt one day

She wants to visit Colombia, her birthplace, but is unsure of when and the circumstances of her situation, and facing her fears

Amanda feels a tremendous amount of gratitude for her situation

Amanda's sister, Lauren, was adopted from the same orphanage four years before Amanda was adopted

Lauren was Amanda's very first friend

She doesn't remember when she found out or realized she was adopted

Lauren was killed by a drunk driver when Amanda was a senior in high school

Amanda has a tattoo of Lauren's fingerprint together with her own fingerprint to format a heart shape

She was bullied a lot in middle school because she was outcasted as a "church kid"

Her "ugly duckling phase" lasted a while, especially since she went into college with braces

I use the word antifragile to describe Amanda Fennell

She has always been resilient and "overly" optimistic

Amanda thrives on stress and a sense of urgency

Amanda decided to attend Towson University in Baltimore, Maryland because of their strong nursing program

She wanted to be a pediatrician back then

Because of the loss of her sister, Amanda almost didn't attend college

Instead of wallowing in sadness, Amanda enrolled at Towson

In a strange way, going to college allowed Amanda to "run away" from her trauma

She wanted nothing to do with the medical field due to the loss of her sister, so Amanda majored in Family Studies and Community Development

She searched for student clubs to join.

Joining Invisible Children club was intimidating for Amanda because it was for the "cool" crowd

She then joined Circle-K service club

She ran for President as a freshman!

Amanda met two of her best friends, Kari Adlington and Jessa Coulter, during freshman year

The Circle-K initiatives were too small and low-key for Amanda, who wanted to do more

Amanda (along with Keri and Jessa) and I met at a Circle-K Convention where I gave a keynote speech

Amanda thinks that I am quirky!!! LOL

When Amanda wanted her Circle-K club to get involved with SHH, she was labeled “awful” and as the “worst President”

Leaving Circle-K to start Students Helping Honduras on campus caused rifts in friendships and personal hate against Amanda

Honduras was Amanda’s first trip outside of the US

She didn’t realize the SHH service trip would have so much of an educational component to it

Amanda met and talked to the families in Villa Soleada when the project had just started

SHH introduced Amanda to concepts like the ethics behind development aid

She helped build the Villa Soleada Education Center, which was the prototype project that later turned into the Villa Soleada Bilingual School

Eduardo “Chilo,” a small boy from the village spoke to the group to thank them for providing the education

The Education Center would provide Chilo his first books and computers ever

Amanda is careful about over-romanticizing development aid and volunteering

“I was so idealistic and naive.”

It was difficult to convince the Towson administration to let the chapter go down to Honduras, then considered the most dangerous nation outside of war zones

Dr. Santiago Solis helped as a faculty advisor and mentor to Amanda

The Towson Chapter raised $13,000 during their first year

They then returned to Honduras with 33 student volunteers

The following year they raised $30,000

During Amanda’s senior year, the chapter raised $53,000

In four years, the Towson Chapter had raised about $125,000 for Students Helping Honduras

Jessa Coulter was the co-President of the chapter alongside Amanda

They didn’t have much of a hierarchy

The chapter members became best friends

Some members spent more time on SHH than on school work

They organized 3-4 events every week

Each semester they did one massive event, like a benefit concert

Having compassionate, empathetic leadership is key

Fundraising was fun despite the sense of urgency

A lot of other chapters envied Towson and Amanda’s success

Leadership Week has fostered competition while building friendships between SHH chapters

Amanda became a community director for March of Dimes after graduation

She posted photos from Honduras all over her desk area at March of Dimes

Amanda was always interested in international maternal and prenatal health

I reached out to Amanda for help, as SHH was under so much stress due to lack of staff members and security threats in Honduras

Amanda saved up for a year working at March of Dimes and quit there to work for SHH on a shoestring salary as the Chief Operating Officer (COO)

Amanda feels really lonely while working out of her laptop in New York

At around 11:30pm one night—I was on the brink of shutting down SHH because of all the turmoil in Honduras and its consequences—I called Amanda to ask her for help and to join SHH

Amanda and I consult each other on everything just naturally, going all in together

Humility is something Amanda and I value in staff members

I needed someone to support me

Amanda doesn’t like being placed on a pedestal

Amanda is as loyal as it gets

At Towson, Amanda had a sense of community and personal success

It’s hard for Amanda to not have that sense of community as she works alone in New York

Amanda’s boyfriend Chris is supportive of her, always

Amanda’s best friends are mostly from SHH, though many of them are far away

Amanda is a social butterfly so it’s hard to work alone for her

“The work day is never over."

She’s learned to pace herself, delegate, avoid burnout

SHH could use some help with grant writing, social media, chapter recruitment

People are much more motivated when they can work face to face, instead of remotely and isolated

There is no reason to constantly second guessing herself as the COO of SHH with all the trust that I have in Amanda

Amanda has to remind herself that there is value in what she does for SHH

Amanda and Chris have started a succulent arrangement business on the side, BEAR STREET COLLECTIVE

The succulent business allows Amanda to interact with other people, something she missed doing

www.bearstcollective.com

Jessa Coulter and Amanda Fennell are like the Yin and the Yang together

Amanda Fennell drinks a lot of coffee!

Amana is a night owl, working late into the night

She likes being “zesty” with life : )

The person Amanda Fennell was most grateful for that week was her boyfriend Chris

They recently visited Denver, Colorado together