Berkley Center

Dee (Delia Maria) Smith was born in Bury, Lancashire, England. After qualifying as a high school teacher, she worked for 13 years as an independent lay missioner with the Catholic Church of Kenya. The last seven years of her time in Kenya were spent coordinating a basic education project of 15 schools for first generation school learners with the Semi Nomadic pastoralists of the Pokot tribe in the Kerio Valley. In 1990 she joined the Maryknoll Sisters (a US based international community of religious Catholic sisters) and took her first vows in 1992. After studying Spanish in Cochabamba, Bolivia, she was assigned to Guatemala to coordinate the establishment of a faith-based initiative for the prevention and care of people living with HIV. She has now completed 25 years in HIV care and prevention work in Guatemala, with a hospice care facility and working with local government on advocacy and empowerment of community leaders, sustainable economic initiatives to combat poverty, stigma, and discrimination, and latterly the formation of women and adolescents as community leaders and human rights activists. She studied education, geography, and history at St. Mary’s University, Strawberry Hill, Middlesex.