Meet ILA's Staff

• Cynthia Cherrey, President
• Shelly Wilsey, Director
• Debra DeRuyver, Membership Services Director
• Jaro Sedlar, Program Manager
• Kathy Del Castillo, Program Manager

Cynthia Cherrey, Ph.D.
President

Dr. Cynthia Cherrey serves as vice president for student affairs at Tulane University, executive director of the International Leadership Association, and a senior fellow at the Academy of Leadership, University of Maryland. She completed her Ph.D. in Communications with a concentration in organizational leadership and management.

Dr. Cherrey has a primary interest in leadership development and has published in a variety of professional journals in the areas of student affairs, organizational culture, and leadership. Dr. Cherrey's most recent publications include "Leadership Education in the Context of the New Millennium"; "Concepts and Connections: the Future of Leadership & Education"; and "Shifting Paradigms and Practices in Student Affairs" (National Association of Student Personnel Administrators Journal). She is also the co-author, with Kathleen Allen, of Systemic Leadership: Enriching the Meaning of Our Work (University Press of America, 2000).

Dr. Cherrey was an invited participant in the W.K. Kellogg Leadership studies project to advance leadership, knowledge, education and practice for the 21st century and the recipient of a J.W. Fulbright Scholarship. She is now a Fellow with the World Business Academy.

Shelly Wilsey
Director
swilsey@ila-net.org
301.405.8564

Shelly Wilsey has over 20 years of experience in organizational development and management. In her current role, Wilsey handles organizational development, strategic planning, financial management, and conference organizing. She also supports the ILA Board and was the editor, with Larraine R. Matusak and Cynthia Cherrey, of the ILA publication Building Leadership Bridges, 2001.

Previously, Wilsey worked at the Academy of Leadership as director of the Community Action School, which she built into a highly successful training program attended by more than 1,000 diverse community leaders. She also ran the Community Action Network, which provided seed money to nine community groups to support local leadership development. Both programs were supported by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation.

Prior to that, Wilsey worked for nine years at the CLEC Canvass Network in a variety of positions, including director of development and client relations, administrative director, and financial manager. Wilsey also helped establish the Washington Area Clinic Defense Task Force, a regional pro-choice organization.

In 1986, Wilsey became the first program coordinator for the United States Student Association’s GROW (Grass Roots Organizing Weekends) project to train student leaders and activists. Before that, she was organizing director of the Student Association of the State University of New York (SASU). She spent her first two years out of college as a regional organizer for SASU, organizing local and statewide campaigns. She began her activist work in 1980 as a field canvasser for NYPIRG.

Wilsey earned her BA in history from SUNY Plattsburgh in 1983 and was one of the first students there to earn a certificate in women’s studies. She was elected to several positions in student government, received the Women’s Studies Academic Excellence Award and was inducted into Omicron Delta Kappa.

Debra DeRuyver
Membership Services Director
ila@ila-net.org

Debra joined the ILA after spending three years as the Electronic Communications Coordinator for the Academy of Leadership, where she developed their web site into a content rich resource on leadership, and a year as the Internet and Information Project Manager for the Kellogg Fellows Leadership Alliance, where she developed an interactive web site and published a quarterly print newsletter, Splash.

Debra is ABD in American Studies from the University of Maryland where she taught one of the first web-based distance education classes on campus, a senior seminar on electronic publications and virtual exhibitions. In 2001, her web site, www.publichistory.org, won the National Council for Public History's graduate student project of the year award. Intellectually, she has also been active in the field of leadership, writing a hypertextual literature review of the field for the Leadership Learning Community, www.leadershiplearning.org and teaching a junior level seminar at Maryland on the topic of online activism and online leadership.

In the past, Debra has been politically active around graduate student labor issues and was co-chair of the American Studies Association's Students Committee from 1997 - 1999. Prior to that she was involved in student government at Cal State University, Fullerton, where she received her Master's in American Studies and The University of Michigan, where she received a B.A. in English Literature (Go Blue!).  Debra loves to travel, read French symbolist poetry, go to the flicks, and play with with her son Jasper.

Her most recent publication, "Digital Junction", appears in the September 2006 issue of American Quarterly.
 

Jaro Sedlar
Program Manager
jsedlar@ila-net.org

Jaromir Sedlar, or Jaro (pronounced “Yaro”) was born in Kosice, Slovakia where he spent his childhood, mostly playing soccer and ball hockey. He received his Bachelor’s degree in Political Science, International Relations and European Studies from Masaryk University in Brno, Czech Republic. He received his Master’s degree in Liberal Studies with an emphasis on Organizational Leadership from Fort Hays State University. His areas of interest in leadership include development of leadership in transforming countries of Central and Eastern Europe, self-development of leaders, and leadership in higher education. He is also interested in the role of mistakes as learning opportunities. Besides his interest in leadership, Jaromir has published several articles and chapters in the textbooks on the Slovak political system. Among his many exciting responsibilities at the ILA, Jaro will be taking the lead on our 2009, 11th annual conference in Prague as well as member recruitment, retention, and involvement.
  

Kathy Del Castillo
Program Manager
ila@ila-net.org

Claudia Katherine Del Castillo (Kathy) was born in Santa Cruz, Bolivia. She received a Bachelor’s degree in Economics from Universidad Autónoma Gabriel René Moreno, Bolivia; in 2000 she joined a group of economics student leaders in a very competitive election for the Economics Student’s Leadership Association, where she spent 2 years as the Treasurer of the Association. She loves to travel and truly enjoys multicultural environments; in 2002 she did one semester as an exchange student holding the CRISCOS scholarship in Arequipa-Peru. Her senior thesis was an Economic Research, “Proposal of a Sustainable Development Program through Tourism Ecological for the Community of Candelaria in the National Area San Matias, Santa Cruz, Bolivia, 2004” which received an special recognition from SERNAP Bolivia (National Services of Protected Areas) and Candelaria Community. She received a Master’s Degree in Economics from Western Illinois University, where she was a member of the Economics Student Association as well as of the Finance Club. She also spent a winter break as a Missionary student at the Guaymí Community in Costa Rica. Prior to joining the ILA she was part of an Internship Program at the Organization of American States (OAS) in Washington, DC where she was the leader of a group of ten interns. Her areas of interest in leadership are the courageous leadership and public leadership for the improvement of life’s quality and the development of the countries, among others.

About ILA : Staff