The Team

Sally Mallam, Founder and Executive Director, has been director of our parent nonprofit, the Institute for the Study of Human Knowledge (ISHK), since 1991, initiating and overseeing ISHK’s publishing imprints, Malor Books and Hoopoe Books, and and in 2002 she helped to form the Share Literacy program.

Denise Nessel, Ph.D., developed the Teacher Guides for the Books for Afghanistan program in collaboration with Afghan educators from Help the Afghan Children (HTAC), AYNI Education International and its partner in the field, Afghanistan American Friendship Foundation (AAFF), and our Director of Teacher Training in Kabul, Palwasha Salam.

Dr. Nessel is Director of Early Education for The ISHK and senior editor of the Hoopoe Books curriculum. She is an associate of the National Urban Alliance for Effective Education, where she focuses on teaching reading and writing as thinking processes in grades K-12.

Dr. Nessel has written several books and classroom resources for teachers and a number of articles that have appeared in professional journals. Her most recent publications include the co-authored Thinking Strategies for Student Achievement (Corwin, 2007) and the co-authored Using the Language Experience Approach with English Language Learners (Corwin, 2008). She is currently collaborating on a theory-into-practice book on comprehension.

Dr. Nessel received her B.A. degree in English from Illinois State University, her M.Ed. degree in Reading from Bowling Green State University in Ohio, and her Ph.D. in Curriculum and Instruction (Reading) from the University of Delaware.

Dr. Farid Bazger is President of Khatiz Organization for Rehabilitation (KOR). He and the KOR staff are our implementing partners in Kabul.

KOR is a non-profit, non-political NGO registered with the government of Afghanistan (Ministry of Economy). KOR started its activities for Afghan Refugees in Pakistan and Afghans in Afghanistan in 1992, publishing books for universities and children.

KOR is a well-known organization in the field of publication as well as in drug and HIV/AIDS awareness, training and treatment.

Palwasha Salam has degrees in Early Childhood Education from Kabul University and the University of Las Vegas, and is our Director of Teacher Education in Kabul. She helped to develop the curriculum and translates our Hoopoe Books and Teacher Guides into both Dari and Pashto.