Board of Directors

Lisa Dare

Board President

Lisa Dare is an independent education consultant with over ten years of experience in the education industry. She is currently developing the long-term strategic plan for NAEP and recently advised an international private school organization on moving into the U.S. market. Prior to her work as an independent consultant, she was an Executive Director at the College Board for three years handling strategy and analytics, working on internal programs as well as with districts across the country to strengthen their college readiness infrastructure.

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She also served as the Chief Operating Officer for the Division of Teaching and Learning at the NYC Department of Education, where she managed a $90+M budget, handled human resources for a staff of over 500, coordinated the $80+M summer school program, and was also responsible for implementing multiple district reorganizations. Ms. Dare also cofounded an online tutorial service.

Ms. Dare is a graduate of the Broad Residency in Urban Education. She has her MBA from Harvard Business School and her BS in Economics/Business from the University of California, Los Angeles.

Keith Hickman

Board Member

Keith Hickman is the International Institute for Restorative Practices (IIRP) Executive Director of Collective Impact. In this role, he works with partner organizations, both domestically and globally, to pursue the IIRP mission of positively impacting social health. Keith builds alliances with state education departments and national collaboratives. He served as an advisor to the Maryland Commission on the School-to-Prison Pipeline and Restorative Practices, is a partner scholar on the CASEL Equity Work Group, and is a member of the Research Development and Design Team for the California Safe, Healthy, Responsive Schools Network.

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He has worked with school districts and community-based agencies to develop large-scale programs in the cities of Chicago, Boston, New York, Pittsburgh, Baton Rouge, Los Angeles, San Antonio, Washington, D.C., and Louisville, the Republic of Jamaica, including Kingston, and parishes across Louisiana. He has worked extensively with stakeholder organizations in Detroit, including schools, police, human services, court systems, corrections and neighborhood associations, to support an aligned approach that will positively impact children and families throughout the city.

Keith has served in high-level leadership positions for various K-12 educational organizations including the New York City Department of Education and New Leaders for New Schools. In 2000, he helped found the Youth Justice Project at the Harlem Community Justice Center, one of four community justice centers under the Center of Court Innovation, which inspired other restorative justice programs in the Bronx, mid-town Manhattan and Red Hook, Brooklyn. He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology of Human Development from Antioch College and is currently completing a Master of Science in Restorative Practices at the IIRP Graduate School.

Jim Nelson

Board Treasurer

Jim Nelson was formerly the Executive Director for AVID Center, a nonprofit organization that prepares K–12 students for college and also works with postsecondary institutions to improve persistence and completion rates, as well as prepare teacher candidates for the classroom. Jim has a vast and varied experience in the field of education. Prior to AVID Center, Jim was Superintendent of the Richardson Independent School District in Richardson, Texas (Dallas area). He was the Senior Vice President of State and Federal Relations for Voyager Expanded Learning Systems, and in 2003, at the request of the White House and Department of Defense, Jim traveled to Baghdad, Iraq, as a Senior Advisor to the Iraqi Ministry of Education to assist with the rebuilding of the Iraqi school system. In 1999, Jim was appointed by then-Governor George W. Bush as the Texas Commissioner of Education. While Commissioner, he served simultaneously as Executive Secretary of the State Board of Education.

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Dr. Nelson served as a school board trustee and officer for Ector County ISD in Odessa, Texas, from 1984 through 1995, twice serving as Board President. During that time, he also served as a board member and in several officer positions for the Texas Association of School Boards, including State President in 1993.

Dr. Nelson earned a degree of Bachelor of Business Administration from the University of Texas at Arlington in 1972, and in 1976 earned a Juris Doctorate from the Texas Tech University School of Law. He worked as a practicing attorney for 24 years. He and his wife Karen have three adult sons and three grandsons.

Sho Shigeoka

Board Secretary

Sho Shigeoka recently moved back to the school building and currently serves as Assistant Principal at Southridge High School in Beaverton, Oregon. Prior to her current role, Sho worked in the Beaverton School District (BSD) as the Administrator for Equity and Inclusion from 2014–2019. In that role, she was responsible for the implementation of the vision articulated in the District’s equity policy. Equity has been identified as one of the four “pillars of learning” in the District to ensure the success of all students, regardless of race, ethnicity, socioeconomics, English language proficiency, and other social factors that have been used as excuses not to serve all students. Her duties included professional development on equity leadership, recruitment and retention of staff of color, management of AVID college readiness system, and districtwide policy and program development on culturally relevant practices. Sho began her career in Beaverton as a Westview High School counselor and also served as the Teaching and Learning Equity Coordinator for the district.

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Prior to joining BSD, Sho worked at Oregon State University, the University of Oregon, and Lane Community College in student services, primarily serving historically underserved students. Sho is a mother of an 18-year old college student, who keeps her focused and grounded on equity work each and every day.

Mary Ann Snider

Board Member

Mary Ann Snider is a life-long educator serving in roles within the classroom, school and state levels. Her driving commitments are to equity through high quality assessment and instruction practices. Mary Ann was Rhode Island’s Deputy Commissioner from 2015 to 2019. This role benefited from her previous years within the department of education as an assessment specialist, Director of Assessment and Instruction and Chief of Teaching and Learning.

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Her experience as a special education teacher led to her introducing authentic assessment through performance and portfolio assessments. As the Director of Assessment and Instruction she was instrumental in forming the first multi-state consortium to develop shared academic standards and state testing in language arts, math, and science. She was part of the leadership team that brought $75 million to her state from a successful Race to the Top application. Her last role as deputy was marked by her partnerships with school districts and the state’s general assembly passing legislation that required schools to offer high-quality curriculum with ongoing professional learning for teachers.

Mary Ann is currently working as an educational consultant that includes an ongoing role at Bay View Academy as the Dean of Academics. Mary Ann is using the school’s commitment to social justice to shape its curriculum, culture and instructional practices. She has also consulted for EducationCounsel to develop a toolkit to support states’ ability to have baseline information to plan for post-Covid recovery. She lives in Rhode Island with her husband, Greg and has two adult sons.

Bernice Stafford

Board Member

Bernice Stafford’s career spans more than four decades in the public and private sectors of the education field in the United States and abroad. She has been a classroom teacher, early childhood administrator, college lecturer, corporate executive, company cofounder, and strategic consultant. She is an expert when it comes to aligning business strategies and goals with educator professional learning including expert and peer coaching, education policy, funding, and instructional technology.

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She is a recognized leader in the education field, serving or having served on the boards of national and international organizations, including WestEd, the Center for Interactive Learning and Collaboration (CILC), the Knowledge Alliance, and Software and Information Industry Association (SIIA). In her home state of California, she also served on the Public Schools Accountability Act (PSAA) Committee.

Bernice is a frequent presenter on topics ranging from effective implementation of the school transformation process to using state-of-the-art technology in support of teaching and learning. She is also the coauthor of a chapter in the second edition of the International Handbook on Literacy and Technology. Bernice has a BA in Sociology and an MA in Early Child Development from the University of California, Berkeley.