Good News: They met in Sudan, earned Vanderbilt degrees, and now they're going back to help others
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A married couple who met volunteering in Sudan will go back to the civil war-torn African country soon after they spent four years in Nashville earning Vanderbilt University degrees.
Ryan Boyette, a Florida native, said he and his wife, Sudan native Jazira Awad, will return to a remote, mountainous region of Sudan − about eight hours away from the deadly fighting in capital city Khartoum − where the two started a nonprofit in 2015.
The roots of that work happened 20 years ago when Ryan graduated college and applied for a job with U.S. Customs − and then he saw an article about the longtime civil war raging in Sudan in North Africa.
Ryan was especially disturbed by reports that Christians were being persecuted and their churches burned in the majority Muslim country.
A few months later, he was in the remote, mountainous Nuba region of Sudan, working for Christian relief organization Samaritan's Purse. He slept in mud huts with no electricity, learned Arabic, and met and married Jazira. (And yes, for real, Ryan's dad paid Jazira's family a dowry of cows, goats and coffee.)
After Samaritan's Purse shut down its Sudanese operations, Ryan and Jazira started a news service to get the word out worldwide about what devastation in their part of Africa. The couple hosted major news organizations and occasional celebs like George Clooney as part of that effort.
And then, Ryan and Jazira decided to step up education opportunities for the Nuba region. To do that, they decided to get more education themselves. At a friend's suggestion, the two met with faculty at Vanderbilt's Peabody College for education about five years ago.
Jazira is expected to graduate with her undergraduate degree this month. Ryan has earned a Vanderbilt master's degree. And the two will be moving, with their two kids, back to Sudan to live and work full time in Sudan at month's end, Ryan tells me.
It's worth noting that Ryan said none of his staff or students are currently in danger from the fighting in and around Khartoum.
Wahl Grooming donated about $5,000 to Ryan's charity, To Move Mountains, after offering free beard trims this past weekend at the Sevier Park Fest and donated $100 per beard trim.
If you'd like to check out the charity, go to tomovemountains.org
Reach Brad Schmitt with Good News stories at brad@tennessean.com or 615-259-8384 or on Twitter @bradschmitt.
This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Vanderbilt alumni couple is going back to Sudan to help kids there
