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As Venly’s General Manager, Tom Fellows helped launch the Mary S. Peake Fellowship for more than a decade. In 2007, he began leading an elite programming effort that led to the Peake Fellowship Development Team. Together with Peake, Tom continues to pioneer Venly’s secure, massively scalable, open source commerce and collaboration platform that supports Applied Learning & Teaching among higher ed centers, local chambers of commerce, and Anchor Community businesses.

Tom has driven enterprise strategies from neighborhood shop owners to multinational CEOs and 4-star generals leading the DoD’s supply chain. He is a leader in the open source software movement and engineered the Peake Fellowship cyber-readiness assessment process. Tom holds a BA in Mathematics and Economics from Johns Hopkins University. He has dedicated his career to helping local businesses grow and strengthening each community served for sustainable and inclusive growth.

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As Venly Institute’s Executive Director, Chiderah Okoye helped to launch the Mary S. Peake Fellowship over the last nine years. In her joint role between Venly and the Peake Fellowship, she leads the development of Peake’s approach to applied learning & teaching among local businesses & their industry ecosystems; local chambers of commerce & other trade/professional associations; and higher ed institutions including vo-tech schools & military outplacement centers.

Chiderah builds on her experience as an engineer serving a range of industries for the world’s largest industrial automation company, Rockwell. Nationally, Chiderah leads initiatives on public-private mobilization of cyber-readiness with the Department of Defense. Locally, she served as the longtime President of the National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE) Boston Chapter hosting 11,000 engineers as part of the NSBE annual conference. Chiderah bridged from NSBE to become Founding Chair of the Affinity Leadership Consortium, a first of its kind U.S. effort that aligns local chapters of minority professional organizations. Chiderah was appointed by the governor to serve on the Massachusetts Black Advisory Commission. She was also selected by the World Economic Forum to join the Boston Hub of the Global Shapers. Chiderah serves on the boards of the Black Economic Council of Massachusetts, Resilient Coders, and Bridgewater State University’s Science & Math Council. She holds a BS in Biomedical Engineering from Case Western Reserve University. Her work on economic development, cybersecurity, and national defense strengthens sustainable & inclusive growth locally and globally.

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