Barbara was instrumental in the early success of SCI's first field project, at Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya. In the early 1990s, the SCI Board of Directors searched for a site to field test its new solar cooker, the "CooKit." In 1994, Barbara and fellow board member Norge Jerome went to Kenya to network and brainstorm with several potential partner agencies. When Lutheran World Federation invited SCI to Kakuma, Barbara visited the camp and prepared for the launch of the project. She was part of the initial team of trainers that spent two months in Kakuma in early 1995. Within weeks, UN representatives from Geneva visited the camp and urged SCI to immediately begin a second project in Dadaab refugee camp, also in Kenya. Later, Barbara traveled to Paris to negotiate a grant from the UN to be