Team
Todd Armstrong
Co-founder and Executive Director
Todd has worked for IBM for 23 years, specializing in software solutions. After mentoring troubled youth for 8 years, he shifted his career to education to train future leaders.
Justin Happ
Director of Finance and Instructor
Born and raised in California, Justin is an assistant teacher of Visual Arts and Design Thinking at Synapse school. In the past he has taught at Connect community charter school in Redwood City, and has individually mentored students of all ages in a variety of academic subjects including math, music and writing. Additionally, Justin is working towards a graduate degree in Economics at San Francisco State University.
Macarena Sosnik-Reitze
Curriculum developer and instructor
Originally from Chile, Macarena is a graphic designer by education and a crafts aficionada by passion. Mother of two kids, Macarena joined EQV because she is fascinated about the potential of leveraging arts and crafts for self expression and understanding your own emotions.
Marg Donnelly
Director of Development
A communications professional with more than 40 years of experience. That experience includes writing for a national magazine, marketing management for high tech companies and proposal management for a major A&E firm. Marg is be responsible for developing grant opportunities and submitting winning proposals
Board
Noa Mendelevitch
Co-founder, Strategy and SEL Advisor
Noa has been teaching visual arts at local schools, including Six Seconds’ Synapse School, and has mentored underserved students after school for five years. Previously, Noa owned a graphic and web design firm for 13 years.
Karen Stone McCown, MA
Strategy and SEL advisor
Karen began her involvement with emotional intelligence when she founded the Nueva School (Hillsborough, California) in 1967. In planning the school she met with educators, political & business leaders and Nobel Laureates to consider the educational needs of our society. She saw that the central foundation of a school should be not simply giving students knowledge, but giving them the opportunity to develop wisdom. She created the nation’s first emotional intelligence curriculum, Self Science, a program she facilitated for nearly 3 decades. Karen is the Chairman of the Board for Six Seconds.
Anabel Jensen
Strategy and SEL Advisor
Anabel Jensen Ph.D. is the Founding President of Six Seconds and Co-Founder of Synapse School. She co-authored SEI-YV assessment and Self-Science: The Emotional Intelligence Curriculum. Jensen is the Education Department Chair at Notre Dame de Namur University.
Leslie Saul Garvin
Strategy Advisor
Leslie Garvin has been a key mobilizer of Silicon Valley companies and their senior management for social impact over the past 20 years. She was instrumental in the early deployment and use of the Internet in local schools and has continued to influence education policy from a variety of positions, including as a Partner in the Silicon Valley Social Venture Fund. She currently directs postgraduate public service fellowship programs at the Haas Center for Public Service at Stanford University and serves on the Board of Governors of the Commonwealth Club of California.