Leadership
Karen McCown, M.A., Chairman
Karen is recognized as an educational pioneer who founded the Nueva School in Hillsborough in 1967, where she published Self-Science, her visionary emotional intelligence curriculum. She is dedicated to continuing her legacy with the founding of Synapse which she hopes will become a model for future schools. In planning the school she met with educators, political and 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. Her commitment is reflected by her active involvement on campus. She is the Chairman and Co-Founder of Six Seconds, a non-profit that offers training and materials on emotional intelligence. Karen is a director of the Central Asia Institute, supporting the work described in Three Cups of Tea.
Anabel Jensen, Ph.D.,CEO
Anabel is the CEO of Synapse School and president and co-founder of Six Seconds and former Director of Nueva School. She received her Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley. She majored in child development with a minor in statistics. She is a world-leading expert on how to teach emotional intelligence. Anabel brings 30 years of pioneering experience as an educator, principal, and professor of education and has trained over 10,000 educators, parents, and individuals. Anabel designs training programs and mentors principals so schools develop an effective program and climate for social-emotional learning. Anabel has had significant experiences collaborating with school administrators in the implementation of unique and innovation educational curricula for both public and private schools. She is a full professor at the Notre Dame De Namur University and Department Chair of the College of Education NDNU—Anabel teaches graduate students, who are completing either a master’s degree or a teacher’s credential. Students in her class frequently mention her ability to transform the theoretical into practical, useful strategies for elementary and secondary classrooms. Anabel delivers keynote addresses and workshops that provide inspiration and practical advice for increasing emotional intelligence to schools, organizations, and businesses. She is considered on “hot cognition,” which is defined as the ability to create classroom communities either children and adults engaged and involved. Anabel is coauthor of the Six Seconds Emotional Intelligence Assessment, Assessment of School Climate, the Self-Science Curricula for emotional intelligence, and the EQ for Families program. Her noble goal is to “teach accountability and compassion so that ethical decisions will flood the globe.”
Deborah Havert, Associate Head
Deborah is a seasoned educator who has supported schools, community organizations, and families for over 35 years. After many years as a teacher, Debbie became the Assistant Director of the Lower School at the renown Baldwin School in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. While at The Baldwin School, among many other responsibilities, she co-chaired the school’s accrediting evaluation process. She is the author of English and study skills curricula, and a new book on promoting important conversation within families, schools, and organizations, entitled, Conversing On the Real: Authentic Conversations for Living Plugged In. Deborah is versed and experienced in conflict resolution training based on material from the Harvard Negotiation Project. She was a presenter at the Mayor’s Youth Leadership Conference in Lancaster, PA, and was named Outstanding Young Woman of America in 1986. Debbie has served on numerous boards of trustees for organizations dedicated to education, the arts, and healthcare, and is an artist herself having produced and recorded children’s musicals and songs. For the last decade, Deborah has been a champion for emotional intelligence development as an educator and Master Trainer for Six Seconds, The Emotional Intelligence Network.
Gigi Carunungan, M.Ed., Director of Programs
Gigi is an educator, author, theater practitioner and multimedia producer, with a passion for creating teaching environments that address multiple ways of learning and prepare young learners to become leaders and thinkers. She has named her version of constructionism the Helical Model. In this structure, children learn in a supported and socially-interactive learning structure at five levels: play, explore, connect, imagine, and remember. With a twenty-year artist-teacher experience and as former director of the Central Institute of Theater Arts in Southeast Asia, Gigi connects visual arts, music, dance, and drama as methods for multiple ways of knowing and learning. She was an international exchange instructor at the University of Calgary. Gigi is author of Digital Media for the Classroom: Strategies for 21st Century Learning, which garnered five stars at amazon.com. She taught a professional development program at the Digital Media Academy at Stanford University. Gigi is an Adobe Education leader. She was also a producer of interactive games for young learners, where design and development included children as mentors of the games and a producer of a website by teens and for teens. Gigi has a master’s degree in Curriculum and Instruction with a focus on Gifted/Talented students and a master’s degree in Southeast Asian Studies.
Marsha Rideout, Director of Admissions and SEL Specialist
A career in Education has offered Marsha opportunities to bring her creative spirit and commitment to innovation into the field of human relations. She was an early advocate of effective practices. In fact, as a first year teacher she initiated the elimination of letter grades district-wide throughout the primary years. Marsha has been passionate about the importance of teaching emotional intelligence skills throughout her career. After teaching for several years in public school primary grades, she continued her life’s work at Nueva School as an administrator, middle school advisor, and Self-Science teacher. In 1997, she joined founders Dr. Anabel Jensen and Karen McCown, along with Joshua Freedman, in starting Six Seconds. Marsha is co-author of Self-Science: the Emotional Intelligence Curriculum, as well as the Handle With Care Emotional Intelligence Activity Book and several editions of the Handle With Care Emotional Intelligence Activity Calendar. She continues to incorporate the latest research and practices into the SEL curriculum and admissions procedures. Marsha see’s Synapse as a “family affair” and treasures sharing the school community with prospective students and parents. Connect with Marsha and learn more about admissions here.
Barbara Fatum, Ed.D., Director of Research and Learning Specialist
Barbara is a School Psychologist with 25+ years of experience as a practitioner in public, private, and international schools. With a wide range of experience in assessing children and developing educational programming, Barbara supports teachers at Synapse in differentiating instruction and creating assessment that shapes instruction, resulting in Personal Education Programs for each student. Barbara is also the President of Teach Emotion, a consulting business with schools, parents, individual students, and groups in the San Francisco Bay area, focused on implementing Emotional Intelligence programs. This coming year, Barbara will be consulting with the Gifted Support Center as the Clinical Coordinator, assessing students, presenting workshops, and coaching families in developing EQ competencies and understanding the complexities of Giftedness.
Barbara has taught graduate courses in the Certification and Masters Program in Special Education as a core adjunct faculty member at National University in San Jose, in the Special Education Credential and Masters Program at Notre Dame de Namur University, and in the Marriage and Family Therapy graduate program at the University of San Francisco. She completed her doctorate from the School of Education, Department of Learning and Instruction, at the University of San Francisco in 2008.
Dr. Fatum has been conducting research on the relationship between Emotional Intelligence and Academic Achievement in elementary and middle school-aged children. She has completed Six Seconds Advanced Training, SEI-YV, and SEI Certification training with Six Seconds, where she also serves as a consultant.