MCS Staff

Larry Reed is the incoming director of the Microcredit Summit Campaign.  He has worked for more than 25 years in designing, supporting and leading activities and organizations that empower poor people to transform their lives and their communities.  For most of that time Reed worked with Opportunity International, including five years as their Africa Regional Director and eight years as the first CEO of the Opportunity International Network.

During his time with Opportunity, Larry helped to implement a strategy for developing full-service banks that served the very poor while mobilizing hundreds of millions of dollars in savings deposits and investments.  Under his leadership, Opportunity developed the first microinsurance brokerage, which now serves hundreds of millions of people around the world. 

Reed has taught at the Boulder Institute of Microfinance for 15 years, served as the chair of the SEEP Network, and consulted with industry-wide initiatives like the Smart Campaign for Client Protection and MicroFinance Transparency.

Larry authored the State of the Microcredit Summit Campaign Report 2011 and has contributed to several books on finance and the poor including “The New World of Microfinance” (Rhyne, Otero, et. al., 1996), “Serving with the Poor in Africa” (Yamamori, Myers,  Bediako and Reed, 1996), “Globalization and the Kingdom of God” (Goudzwaard, 2001) and “More Pathways Out of Poverty” (Harris et. al., 2006). 

He is a graduate of Wheaton College and the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

Dr. D.S.K. Rao has been the Asia Organizer of Microcredit Summit Campaign since 2000. Soon after joining the Campaign he played a stellar role in organizing the Regional Microcredit Summit at New Delhi. Since Dr. Rao joined, practitioner membership in Asia has increased from 250 to 2500. Dr. Rao is a certified Trainer on Cashpor House Index (CHI) and Participatory Wealth Ranking (PWR), the two efficient and cost-effective tools of identifying poor. He has conducted trainings in Sri Lanka, Nepal, India, Bangladesh and Indonesia on this subject. He has also conducted trainings in four Asian countries on MCS’s Microfinance and Health Integration project. He is presently implementing a project sanctioned by Johnson and Johnson on mainstreaming integration of three selected MFIs in South India.

Lisa Marie Laegreid is Deputy Director of the Microcredit Summit Campaign. In this role, she oversees the production of the annual State of the Campaign Report; the organization of regional and global summits; the provision of trainings on poverty measurement tools, on integrating health education with microfinance, along with other critical issues.  Lisa also oversees the advocacy and media outreach efforts to help bring the Campaign’s work to the general public.

Lisa has over nine years of experience in international development project management, including with Worldview International Foundation in Sri Lanka, with the Education Development Center, and with The QED Group LLC where she worked on two contracts for USAID’s Microenterprise Development office. Lisa is fluently trilingual in English, Spanish and Norwegian and she holds an MA in Philosophy. 

Sabina Rogers is Communications and Relationships Manager. In this role, she is responsible for the Campaign’s communications with our members and the broader field, for managing and finding new ways to engage and mobilize our Council members, and for providing project management and coordination support for the Microfinance and Health Integration project.

Previously (March 2010 to Dec 2011), Sabina was Program Manager of the State of the Campaign Report, managing the collection of Institutional Action Plans (IAP) and data analysis as well as the Report compilation, publication, and launch process. She supervised the annual call campaign in which Campaign staff target the top 500 microfinance institutions (MFIs) to submit their IAP—through which members report annual data on their client portfolio and outreach to the poorest.

Sabina has 10 years international development experience both in the field and home office. As a Senior Program Associate at the SEEP Network’s Member Services team, she made a direct impact on improving service to and increasing engagement of SEEP’s members and other practitioners through management of member-led working groups and the publications process. Work experience abroad includes leading community development and gender equity advocacy as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Togo and managing sports development and leadership training clinics for youth in Afghanistan with the Afghan Youth Sports Exchange. Sabina is bilingual in English and French and holds an MS in Development Management from the School of International Service at American University and a BA in History with a minor in French from the Johns Hopkins University.

Camille Rivera is the Program Associate for the State of the Campaign Report, aiding the Program Manager with collecting and verifying the Institutional Action Plans (IAPS).

Camille has worked to provide financial resources to women as a project evaluator with Fundo Angela Borba (now ELAS Fundo de Investimento Social), the only women’s fund in Brazil. There, she facilitated a pilot program implementing an evaluation tool for the Women’s Funding Network, which measured the community impact of projects that focused on education, income generation, health, the environment, and information technology. In addition, Camille has worked on international exchange programs at the Academy for Educational Development, developing professional exchange projects for international visitors.  Other experience includes monitoring legislation in Puerto Rico and recruiting partners to create formal professional networks in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Camille speaks English, Spanish, Portuguese, and French.  She holds a BA in International Relations from Brown University and an MA in Latin American and Caribbean Studies from Florida International University.

Jesse Marsden is the Program Manager for the Global Microcredit Summit (GLOMCS).  In this role he is responsible for coordinating all the plenaries and workshops that will be held at the upcoming Summit in Valladolid, Spain from November 14-17, 2011.  The conference will bring together practitioners, advocates, investors, donors, and others to assess progress and challenges to achieving the Summit’s new goals for 2015.

Jesse brings three years of experience in working on major advocacy conferences and other events on issues such as hunger and poverty alleviation, emergency response and U.S. immigration reform.  Graduating with an MA in International Affairs, he focused on peace and conflict resolution and international development at American University’s School of International Service.  His thesis focused on developing entrepreneurship in ecotourism within resource-constricted areas of Central America.  He is also co-author on an article on the path-wise development of new businesses in emerging regions of southern Mexico.

Fabiola Díaz is Events Manager at the Microcredit Summit Campaign (MCS). In this role, she is responsible for the planning, organization and management of the Campaign’s global and regional Summits in close collaboration with the MCS Director and Deputy Director.

Fabiola was part of the organizing team of our 2011 Global Microcredit Summit managing the Spain focused mini-plenary sessions, the training sessions called Day-long Courses, the Associated Sessions organized by delegates, the benefits for our sponsors, as well as the CGAP Photo Exhibitions in Madrid and Valladolid. In 2010, Fabiola was the Scholarship and Associated Sessions Coordinator for the Africa-Middle East Microcredit Summit (AMERMS) held in Nairobi, Kenya. She worked in coordination with our partner organization, the Association of Microfinance Institutions of Kenya (AMFI) to complete logistical and program-related preparations for AMERMS.

Before joining the Campaign, Fabiola gained experience in the international development field through her internships in international organizations and multilateral institutions like the United Nations Millennium Campaign and the Andean Development Corporation. She holds a Bachelors and Masters Degree in Economics and Latin American Studies from the University of Cologne, Germany. Fabiola speaks Spanish, German, and English fluently, and is proficient in Portuguese.

Sue Casey is the Executive Assistant to the Microcredit Summit Campaign.  In this role, she provides administrative and program support to the Deputy Director and the campaign team.  She is also responsible for developing and maintaining systems and operations.

Sue is new to International Development, having spent 8 years in the labor movement and politics.  She most recently worked as a research analyst with Local 32BJ of the Service Employees International Union on the Stand for Security and Justice for Janitors campaigns.  In that position, Sue worked with janitors, security officers and other property service workers to fight for livable wages, meaningful benefits and respect on the job.

A Philadelphia native, Sue holds a BA in History from the University of Pennsylvania and recently returned from studying in Central America.