Promising Equity Practices among Refugees in East Africa

Alexandra Shaphren is a Deployable Child Protection in Emergencies Specialist for Plan International. Shaphren deploys to humanitarian settings to support the Child Protection components of Plan International’s emergency response programs. She has experience conducting multi-sector needs assessments in Child Protection, Education, and Sexual and Gender Based Violence. Her expertise includes analyzing response needs to design projects, providing technical capacity building to emergency response staff, direct implementation, and monitoring and evaluation. She also represents Plan International at global coordination groups and technical forums. Shaphren has worked in displacement and refugee contexts in South Sudan, Rwanda, Nigeria, Uganda, Philippines, and Bangladesh, among others. She comes with experience from the International Rescue Committee, Save the Children, and the American Red Cross, and holds a Master’s in Public Administration at Middlebury Institute of International Studies and a Bachelor of Arts from Lewis and Clark College.

Frank Manfredi is Senior Director of Plan International USA’s Resilience Practice, which encompasses Disaster Risk Management and Governance programming. Frank began his career as a Sponsor Relations Representative before joining Plan’s International Programs Team. He is an 18-year veteran of the organization, including heading its Disaster Management unit and deploying to several Plan emergency responses, including, the 2004–05 Indian Ocean Tsunami; 2006’s Yogyakarta Earthquake; 2007’s Cyclone Sidr in Bangladesh; 2013’s Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines; and 2015’s Nepal Earthquake. Prior to joining Plan, Frank served for two years with the International Rescue Committee’s Joint Voluntary Agency in Thailand, where he worked in refugee processing. He also served as a Franklin Fellow in the State Department’s Office of the Director of U.S. Foreign Assistance from 2008–2009, focusing on the coordination of Humanitarian Assistance as a member of the Global/Functional Unit. Frank holds a Bachelor’s degree in Government from Harvard College and a Master’s degree in Political Science (International Relations and Comparative Politics, with a concentration in Southeast Asia Studies) from Northern Illinois University.