Our Council of Advisors
Invited by the Directors of the Santa Fe Leadership Center, “Los Sabios” are educational leaders who serve as advisors and contribute to the discourse on leadership that informs the Center’s professional development opportunities. Each sabio shares expertise and wisdom in order to advance leadership learning and practice. These “sages” are recognized on the Center’s site and publications as members of an international advisory board.
Rick Ackerly
Educational Consultant & Author,
The Genius in Children
Decatur, IL
Rick Ackerly is a nationally recognized educator and speaker, and most recently principal at Children’s Day School, an independent school in San Francisco serving children in preschool through eighth grade.With a master’s in education from Harvard University, Rick has served as principal of three other schools–Notre Dame de Sion in Kansas City, The Cathedral School in New York City and St. Paul’s Episcopal School in Oakland—and has been a consultant to schools, school leaders and parents since 1999. Rick began his career in 1967 teaching high school and middle school mathematics and history, and has devoted the last 36 years to building thriving learning communities. Rick speaks to parent and school groups. He also presents at numerous education conferences around the country including the People of Color Conference, the California Association of Independent Schools, the Coalition of Essential Schools, the Symposium on Students with Learning Disabilities, Progressive Education Network, the National Association of Episcopal Schools, and the Pacific Rim Conference. He has been an active participant in the annual “Call to Action” conference sponsored by the National Association of Independent Schools’ Office on Diversity and Multicultural Education.His articles about education and diversity have appeared in The Independent School, Multicultural Education, Education Week, and the New York Times. His first book, The Genius in Children: Bringing out the Best in Your Child was published in 2010.
Peter Branch
Head Emeritus, Georgetown Day School
Washington DC
Paula Carreiro
Head of School, Beauvoir, The National Cathedral Elementary School
Washington DC
Peter Cheney
Former Executive Director
National Association of Episcopal Schools
Norman Colb
Head of School, Menlo School
Atherton, CA
Norman Colb has served as Menlo’s head of school since 1993. He began his career as a teacher of English in the Brookline (MA) Public Schools, and then as the district’s Director of English and Language Arts. He then served in the Newton (MA) Public Schools as the Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum and Instruction. For the ten years before coming to Menlo, he was the Superintendent of Schools in the Mamaroneck (NY) Public Schools. Norm received a B.A. degree from Brandeis University in 1964 and an M.A.T. degree from Harvard University in 1965. He has served on the boards of several non-profit organizations including the Independent Records Bureau, the California Association of Independent Schools, and the Reader’s Digest Educational Foundation.
Lisa A. H. Darling
President, United World College-USA
Montezuma, NM
Ms. Darling’s career in education began in 1979 at Burr and Burton Seminary. She later held positions at Pomfret School (CT) and Friends’ Central School (PA). She joined Wilmington Friends School (DE) in 1988 as business manager; she also served as assistant head of school for Lower School and acting head of school before becoming head of school in 1995. Ms. Darling became the third president of United World College-USA in July 2005. In addition to school administration, Ms. Darling served on the board of the Community of Bosnia Foundation, whose mission was to bring students out of the Balkans to continue their educations during the war in the former Yugoslavia. Ms. Darling holds an MDivEd degree from Princeton Theological Seminary and an MLS degree from SUNY Albany. Her professional activities include serving as a trustee of Rio Grande School in Santa Fe, and being a member of the Advisory Board of Monte del Sol Charter School in Santa Fe. She also serves as the chair of the Advisory Committee of the Klingenstein Center, Teachers College, Columbia University and is the former treasurer of the National Association of Principals of Schools for Girls.
Philip Deely
Principal Consultant
Philip Sedgwick Deely & Associates
Phil Deely grew up in Stockbridge Massachusetts and for his first eighteen years didn’t wander far from Route 7, attending Berkshire Country Day School and Berkshire School. He grew more adventuresome, crossed the Hudson River to Geneva, New York, enrolled at Hobart College for a BA in European History and, then, continued westward to the University of Chicago for his MA. In the 1970’s and 1980’s Phil was a full time educator; Principal of Emma Willard School Troy, NY, Associate Head and Academic Dean Ethel Walker School Simsbury CT and History department chair Foxcroft School Middleburg, VA. In 1980 he was selected as a Klingenstein Fellow. Phil began teaching at Simon’s Rock Great Barrington MA and lectured at New York University. From 1989-1998 Phil served as an associate director for the Norman Rockwell Museum Stockbridge, MA. He helped the museum reinvigorate and successfully conclude The Campaign for Norman Rockwell to construct the new museum and helped organize the museum’s national tour 1999-2001. For the last twelve years Phil has divided his professional time between serving as a consultant to non-profits and heading independents schools on an interim basis. Phil is an active volunteer: former president of an independent school board, foundation donor advisor, and member of many non-profit boards. Phil is married to Hilary Somers Deely, herself a independent school drama director and actress. Phil and Hilary have two ‘adult children’ and they live in Stockbridge, Massachusetts.
Sandra P. Drew
Senior Development Consultant, Marts and Lundy
Sonoma,CA
Sandy joined Marts & Lundy as a senior consultant in 1999. Prior to her consulting work, Sandy served as director of development at Lick-Wilmerding High School in San Francisco. In 1998, she co-founded the California Schools Development Conference specifically to address the need for professional development opportunities for the entire development office team. From 1989 to 1994, Sandy served as the director of development at KQED, San Francisco’s public broadcasting television and radio station. Before moving to the Bay Area in 1989, Sandy lived for twenty years in Denver, Colorado where she served as director of development for several educational and civic organizations. Sandy served on the Marts & Lundy Board of Directors from 2006 through 2007. In addition to her professional activities, Sandy serves as class agent for Mt. Holyoke College and as an advisor to several community-based non-profits.
Richard Kassissieh
Director of Technology, Catlin Gabel School
Portland, OR
Richard Kassissieh is a teacher turned technologist. He believes in good pedagogy, reaching all learners, and building systems to serve schools. Richard taught chemistry at The Taft School (Connecticut), Maru-a-Pula School (Botswana), and Gateway High School (San Francisco). He piloted a Lawrence Hall of Science curriculum that truly scaffolds introductory chemistry concepts and collaborated with SRI International to evaluate a computer-based, collaborative environment for modeling chemical reactions.
Richard has been a technology director and teacher at University High School (San Francisco) and Catlin Gabel School (Portland, Oregon). He has specialized in building professional development models for teachers and implementing open-source website solutions to support teaching, learning, communication, and operations.
Richard has presented at a number of conferences, including the Building Learning Communities and National Charter Schools conferences. He obtained a M.A. degree in curriculum and teacher education from Stanford University and B.A. in biological anthropology from Harvard University. Richard writes online at http://kassblog.com and @kassissieh.
Tony Gerlicz
Director, American School of Warsaw
Warsaw, Poland
Mr. Gerlicz is the current Director of the American School of Warsaw, Poland. Prior to that he was the Founder and Head Learner of the Monte del Sol Charter School in Santa Fe, NM, leading the school from idea to national prominence. He has had 33 years experience as a Head of School, Principal, and classroom teacher in international schools as well as private, public charter and traditional public schools in the US. During his career Tony has focused on leadership that empowers those around him through a conscious focus on organizational learning, blurring traditional job description lines and spirit. He has presented locally and globally on organizational learning, strategic planning, education for meaning and more. Tony is a graduate of Manhattan College BS ’74, Portland State University, MST ’82, Lewis and Clark College ED Admin ’88.
Coreen Hester
Head of School, American School of London
London, England
Greg Papay
Partner, Lake Flato Architects
San Antonio, TX
Mark Silver, PhD
Head of School, Hillbrook School
Los Gatos, CA
David Streight
Executive Director, Council for Spiritual and Ethical Education (CSEE)
David Streight spent three decades teaching and working as a school psychologist in public, Catholic, and private independent schools. Since 2004, he has been executive director of the Center for Spiritual and Ethical Education, a national association for independent schools striving to have the quality of their ethical and spiritual development match the quality of their academic excellence. Streight is also a past co-director of Religious Studies in Secondary Schools, a coalition of teachers in public, private, and Catholic schools working to upgrade the quality of teaching about religions. He has served as the “master teacher” host to the teacher section of the PBS / WNET web site, Religion and Ethics Newsweekly, and as an advisor to WNET (New York) as it developed a new series of world religions for world history teachers. Fluent in four languages, Streight has translated a half-dozen books, primarily on Islam, for academic presses. In 1990 the National Endowment for the Humanities named him one of 50 “teacher-scholars” in the United States. He is a contributing author to Highly Effective Programs: Character Education in Independent Schools (2007), and Good Things to Do: Expert Suggestions for Fostering Goodness in Kids (2009). He is editor of Parenting for Character: Five Experts, Five Practices, and co-editor of Developing Ethical Student Leadership (2011). Streight’s current key interest is in developing leadership in schools to rally around that set of educational practices that, when implemented, simultaneously engender high quality academics and a culture of ethical rigor.
If you would be interested in joining Los Sabios, please send a letter of interest with your resume to info@santafelead.org.
