Helga Schaffrin Huntley first fell in love with Africa as a sophomore at the University of Notre Dame in an African literature class. After she graduated with a B.S. and a major in mathematics in May 1999, she pursued this interest by joining the first Zambia team of the Institute for International Cooperation and Development in Dowagiac, MI. She spent six months living in the bush of southern Zambia and working for Development Aid from People to People, together with Cat Hare. From their experiences with the local children grew the desire to open the doors of educational opportunity to those shut out even from primary schools for a lack of money. Thus, the idea for AKIN -- which was to become Deep Roots Zambia -- was born. Through a summer internship with Unicef in Namibia in 2001, she became aware of Deep Roots and was excited to join forces with a more established organization. Currently, Helga is professionally following her other passion, the study of mathematics and its applications, as a researcher at the College of Marine and Earth Studies of the University of Delaware. Her research encompasses sea ice dynamics, data assimilation methods for paleoclimate reconstruction, and Lagrangian analysis of ocean dynamics.