Board Members

Gerald Huebner lives in Manitoba, Canada and is a charter member of the GHEC board.Gerald and wife Bev home educated their two now adult children through all fourteen great education years to graduation and now are enjoying four homeschooled grandchildren. Gerald and Bev have spent over 30 years in leadership of home education organizations and Gerald serves as the board chair of HSLDA Canada and the Canadian Centre for Home Education. Gerald worked for over 37 years in senior management of the agriculture department with the provincial government in the province of Manitoba. Gerald and Bev have shared their journey and experience with parents, government officials and others in over 12 countries around the world.

Debra Bell, Ph.D. is the best-selling author of the award-winning Ultimate Guide to Homeschooling, Ultimate Guide to Homeschooling Teens, and the Ultimate Planners for moms, teens, and students. Her articles on homeschooling have been widely published. She has been a keynote or featured speaker at numerous international and national venues for more than twenty years. During her homeschooling years, Debra founded three homeschool co-ops which continue today. A pioneer in online education, today she is executive director and lead teacher for Aim Academy, which provides online college prep and AP® courses for 7th-12th graders both stateside and abroad. Debra holds a bachelor’s of science in communications education, and a master’s degree in English. After homeschooling, she completed a Ph.D. in educational psychology at Temple University in Philadelphia, PA. A former high school and college English teacher, Debra and her husband Kermit home educated their four kids K-12.

Mike is Senior Counsel and Director of Global Outreach serving HSLDA members in the states of Colorado, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, Ohio, and West Virginia. And coordinates support of educational freedom around the world. He is an adjunct professor of government at Patrick Henry College teaching constitutional law.

Mike’s previous experience includes combat service during the first Persian Gulf War as a United States Army cavalry officer, private legal practice, and founding a nationally ranked internet marketing firm. He holds a juris doctorate with honors from the Boston University School of Law as a Paul J. Liacos Scholar and an LLM with merit in Constitutional and Human Rights Law from the London School of Economics. He is a member of six federal and state bars.

Mike is an internationally published writer and frequent speaker on homeschooling, educational freedom, parental rights, and human rights. He has appeared on national media and has written hundreds of articles including in The International Journal of Human Rights, Homeschooling in the 21st Century, International Journal of School Choice and Reform, Homeschooling in New View, Balancing Freedom, Autonomy, and Accountability in Education, Religious Freedom in Education, The International Journal of Religious Freedom, and Homeschooling in America and Europe: A Litmus Test of Democracy.

Alberto Solano is the coordinator of Home Schooling Guadalajara and frequent speaker for El Hogar Educador, a large homeschool association that serves Mexico and Latin America. He is the founder of a high-technology electronic components business called Latinrep, where he has been president for 24 years, through which he also seeks to propel digital design in Mexico. He is formally trained as an industrial engineer and holds a Master’s degree in Manufacturing Process and an MBA, with previous experience in corporations like Motorola, AMD and General Electric. Alberto and his wife Rosy, who holds a Bachelor’s in Administration, speak several languages and have had the privilege of experiencing different cultures. They are homeschooling their five children in this international mindset and worldview.

Edric is an edu-preneur (education entrepreneur), focused on home education, personal finance, and family life. He is President of Homeschool Global, with over 3,100 students across 30 countries. He is also an RFP and former Lead Anchor of the multiawarded ANC show “On the Money”. And finally, he is an active member of CCF where they help coach, mentor, and mount events for families. In 2016, he was nominated for the Ten Outstanding Young Men (TOYM) award. His new ventures include Cacao Farming as a social enterprise, and completing the Harvard Graduate S c h o o l o f E d u c a t i o n ’s C AE L (Certificate of Advanced Education Leadership) Program. He is involved in all this as his passion is to help change the world one family at a time.

Barbara West has been married for 36 years to Bruce West. Bruce’s almost 30 year military career has afforded them opportunities to live around the world in more than a dozen US locales and four overseas assignments – Stuttgart and Garmisch, Germany; Manila, Republic of the Philippines; Bucharest, Romania. Prior to that Barbara lived in the UK for 4 years. In addition to living around the world, they have traveled to 5 of the 7 continents. They have 5 children and have been homeschooling since the late 1980’s. Their oldest is an extremely successful medical sales and marketing district manager for 5 states. Their next is married with 2 children and is a missionary in Turkey. The last three are adopted from the Philippines and are currently being homeschooled. Barbara has worked at local, state, national, and international levels to help parents establish and maintain their right to personally direct the upbringing and education of their children. She has established homeschool organizations, speaks at conferences, and teaches workshops to encourage parents in their homeschool endeavors.

Liz Gitonga and her husband Patrice begun homeschooling about 17 years ago, becoming one of the pioneer Kenyan homeschool families. Liz has a great passion for education and describes her homeschooling journey as one that has been pivotal in shaping her views on education. She co-founded one of the first homeschool co-ops for Kenyans and has subsequently founded 2 other co-ops that continue to grow strong. She is a steering committee member of the East Africa Community of Homeschoolers (EACH), an organization that networks homeschoolers in the region. She is also an education consultant, providing training and guidance to homeschoolers, parents, and other educators. Her passion is to use her skill, knowledge and experience to contribute to the attainment of quality education among those living below the poverty line in sub Saharan Africa (who form about 70% of the total population), through initiatives that promote direct parental involvement in education.
Liz holds a Master’s degree in Education Psychology. They are blessed with 3 children, Gloria(20), Josiah(15).

Irina Shamolina is a member of the Board of the Global Home Education Exchange (GHEX), an Advisor on the Development of Home Education of the Chairman of the Patriarchal Commission for the Family, Maternity and Childhood Protection of the Russian Orthodox Church and director of the «Classical Conversations» homeschooling curriculum in Russia, founder of the «Classical Education» publishing house, director of the Russian language course of the Institute for Excellence in writing and the Lost Tools of Writing course.

Karin van Oostrum from Pretoria, South Africa, has been involved in home education for the past 29 years, together with her late husband Leendert van Oostrum. Their three daughters never attended school. Before her marriage Karin obtained a BA degree, as well a BA Honours, and a BA Honours in Applied Linguistics. She worked as a lecturer for a while, as a youth worker, and as a translator and editor. She and her late husband, Leendert van Oostrum, were co-founders of the South African Association for Home Schooling in 1992. In 1998 they co-founded the Pestalozzi Trust, the South African legal defence fund for home and civil education, and have since then managed the Trust together. She accompanied Leendert to the GHEC 2012 and 2016. Since Leendert’s death in October 2016 Karin has been appointed manager of the Trust, and is responsible for the general and financial administration of the Trust. She also handles telephonic and electronic enquiries on various aspects of home schooling, and offers workshops to veterans and newbies on legal and practical aspects of home education.

Alexey Komov is a member of the Boards of the Global Home Education Exchange, of the International Organization for the Family (World Congress of Families) and of the international online petitions platform CitizenGO. He also runs the «Classical Conversations» homeschooling curriculum in Russia, is the president of the «FamilyPolicy.Ru» Advocacy Group, founder of the St.Peter and Fevronia Family and Demography Foundation Foundation, director of the International Department of the Patriarchal Commission for the Family, Maternity and Childhood Protection of the Russian Orthodox Church and an advisor of the State Duma MP of the Russian Federation.

Tim Chen is the founder of Taiwan Homeschool Advocates (THA). Tim and his family have appeared in the media in Taiwan, Hong Kong and China to share their experience of homeschooling multicultural and multilingual children in Taiwan. Under his auspices, homeschool law in Taiwan has expanded from just one line in the Primary and Junior High School Act to two dedicated laws plus comprehensive amendments to 10 other relevant laws. Tim and his Polish wife Dorota have been homeschooling their 18-year-old daughter, Zosia since 2002 and subsequently added their 13-year-old son Jas and 5 year-old daughter Ania to their multilingual and multicultural home school—the Babel School. They have co-authored a book titled My Home is an International School – Raising Global Kids. Tim and his family are frequently invited by government agencies, universities, corporations, churches and parent groups to talk about their homeschooling experience. More information is available on the family’s blog or facebook.

Godfrey Kyazze, through studying the Bible to understand a biblical perspective on education, became convicted to homeschool his children. Through this process, he and his wife have created homeschooling curriculum, previously non-existent in Uganda, to train their children in Christian principles from the African perspective. This new curriculum includes training in African history, economics, math, science and other academic disciplines from a biblical worldview. Godfrey has published a number of papers on Home-education, Curriculum and a Biblical view of life. He is a curriculum writer, trainer and speaker on matters of Biblical worldview, Education, Economics, Family, and Governance, all from a distinctly Christian point of view. After creating these materials, Godfrey learned that many other Christian schools desired to teach from this perspective and use the curriculum. He then characterized his perspective on education as a system which incorporates biblical principles, biblical thinking, and biblical reasoning into training of any kind. Besides creating this curriculum, Godfrey decided