BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Chichi Armstrong, President
I’ve been volunteering for non-profits since I was 8 years old - raising money for the Red Cross by selling kool-aid and vanilla wafers to the neighborhood. Summer jobs in high school and college had me working for the Red Cross and Save the Children Federation. After college, marriage and having a son, I worked at Xerox Corporation moving from a secretary to a senior financial manager over 17 years. More volunteer work in my 40s and 50s: executive director of an arts organization, community policing organizer in Chicago, president of a large volunteer chorus. My 60s were devoted to becoming the jazz pianist I had wanted to be since age 8: some lessons and then lots of gigs around Chicago and Wisconsin. In 2015 we moved to Austin where I came to learn about the refugee community through Hope and Sesame. I volunteered to run their English conversation get-together which in April 2019 became a standalone not for profit: Ladies Let’s Talk. My main focus is on volunteers: recruiting, orienting, and encouraging Austin women to join in our conversations with immigrant and refugee women.
Laura Erickson, Vice President
I have a background as a civil engineer and start-up entrepreneur in healthcare and education, powering projects that inspire me and make a difference in the lives of people. I began volunteering in refugee resettlement in 2017 after my son participated in the Global Youth Peace Summit, a program run by Austin based Amala Foundation. Until then, I had no idea that there was a huge refugee community in Austin. I started with volunteering at Refugee Services of Texas and in adult ESL classes at iACT. I love working with ESL learners so much that I am now a certified ESL teacher! I joined the board at the Austin nonprofit, Hope and Sesame, and was part of the team that rolled out our Friday meet-ups which became Ladies Let’s Talk. My role at LLT is to recruit our learners and organize our online Zoom sessions.
Gail Goodrich Totten, Board Secretary
When I was two years old, my father got a job with the Panama Canal Company and we moved there from Atlanta, Georgia, where I was born. I ended up living in the former Canal Zone, and then in Panama for a total of 26 years, where both of my children were born. Panama is called the Crossroads of the World, and growing up there, I met people from around the word, and heard not only Spanish, but also Chinese, Hindi, Hebrew, and many varieties of English! After being a classroom teacher for many years, teaching English, Spanish and Reading in secondary schools in Texas and Panama, I went to graduate school at UT-Austin and became a bilingual speech-language pathologist, working mostly in primary schools with Austin ISD. After retiring I started volunteering with ESL programs, and found that I especially love working with pronunciation. Ladies Let’s Talk is an amazing organization, and I am proud to be part of it.
Masooda Yusufzai, Treasurer
I am an Afghan woman who left my homeland as part of the Evacuation in late August, 2021. I came to the United States in September 2021 and then Austin in October. I have an MBA in Finance and worked more than 7 years for US projects in Afghanistan. In January 2022 I started working as a Case Manager with Refugee Services of Texas, a nonprofit organization. I enjoy my role since it’s all about helping new refugees integrate into US society. My role at Ladies Let’s Talk is that of Treasurer, handling monthly expenses and reconciliation of accounts.
Julie van de Zande
My experience as an exchange student in Chile at the age of seventeen gave me the lifelong desire to explore other cultures, both abroad and at home. After careers in the travel & tourism industry and international business, I started volunteering in 2016 with Refugee Services of Texas. Every time I would visit a refugee home, I was offered the most delicious home-cooked meals, shared with love and pride. I partnered with other volunteers and a local church to host community dinners bringing Austinites together with our new neighbors to experience traditional foods of Afghanistan, Syria and Iraq. This led to the formation of the nonprofit, Hope & Sesame, which later started Ladies Let’s Talk so that our refugee friends could meet Austin women and practice their English. I’m currently creating an online community and directory called Appetite for Humanity that showcases organizations around the world that bring together refugees and their new communities through the sharing of food.
Elham Sadat
As a woman who has experienced war during childhood in my home country of Iran as well as my own battles with immigration, I find myself having the honor of helping refugee families who have had to escape circumstances and leave their friends and families, much like my own case growing up. My passion for language in Farsi/Dari has greatly helped my career as a case manager and interpreter for the Austin community. With Ladies Let’s Talk, I work to connect volunteers and learners together to help create a welcoming community for women to share their experiences and thoughts. In Iran, I had worked as a dentist for many years in the nonprofit sector, until my eventual immigration to the United States with my family twelve years ago. I have two daughters, one of whom goes to University of Texas and the other goes to Texas A&M, so there’s a lot of rivalry on which school is the best! In my spare time, I like to garden, sew, and talk to my family overseas.