Team Biographies

Dr. Joni Samples
Chief Academic Officer
Dr. Joni Samples is the new Chief Academic Officer of Family Friendly Schools. Dr. Joni comes with an impressive background combining academic credentials with practical service as a lifelong educator. She has served as a superintendent of schools, special education administrator, curriculum and instruction director, CEO for early childhood, coordinator of career and technical programs, and a teacher for regular and special education, as well as university teaching programs.

Dr. Joni is also a popular keynote speaker and trainer in the area of family engagement. She has authored books about parent involvement in the education of their children. Her interest in parent involvement began with her four children-twin sons James and Christopher, and daughters Jennifer and Carolyn. The kids provided her daily learning "ahas" that she translated into a weekly newspaper column. An article about learning fractions came from measuring ingredients to make muffins with Christopher. James' science fair project about rat reproduction resulted in several articles on how to develop a scientific hypothesis and test it out.The popularity of the newspaper column led to Dr. Joni's first book, Taking the Guesswork out of School Success. This book stresses the importance of parent involvement and shows schools and parents how they can help each other improve their child's learning. For more info on Dr. Joni, click here...

Donald J. Converse, MA
Educational Development Director
An instructor and trainer in the education market, Don has been an entrepreneur, public speaker, and teacher. With degrees in marketing, business management and organizational leadership, Don was a Business Instructor at FCC College of San Diego, the Senior Regional Customer Service Director at IKON Office, and the past President of Signature III, Inc. Don is also Co-Chairman of Fundraising for his local Habitat for Humanity.  He has edited several books and authored the white paper - The Customer Service Perspective of the Information Technology Professional.

Now in his role at FFS as Educational Development Director, Don assists schools and districts in choosing the family engagement developmental programs that will maximize the results of their efforts and minimize the learning curve for implementation. A true professional, Don nevertheless sets people at ease with his humor, quick thinking, and eye for ways to achieve improvement in learning.

Karen Hackett-Villalobos
Certified Family Engagement Specialist
In addition to her current responsibilities as an FFS Certified Trainer and Coach, Karen is a Doctoral student at the University of Pacific. She has served as the Tri-County (Sutter, Colusa and Yuba Counties) BTSA Induction Program Director since 2001. In this role, Karen has worked with thousands of teachers delivering research-based professional development through an accredited licensure program. Prior to this position Karen was the Superintendent/Principal at Lake School in Glenn County for three years and has worked at the primary school level teaching since 1995.

Karen also co-authored and was awarded an Improving Teacher Quality Grant that focused on job-embedded professional development for teachers. She is currently working as adjunct faculty for Brandman (Chapman) University instructing future administrators in democratic education and supervision and assessment.

Kathy Krapf
Educational Development Specialist
Kathy Krapf joins FFS with a diverse background and a wealth of experience. With over 15 years in education, Kathy has worked in various capacities ranging from classroom teacher (National Board Certified) to curriculum consultant. Involving parents in her classroom was an integral part of her mission and a contributing factor to the success of her students. As an educator, Kathy was National Board Certified in 1999 and named Teacher of the Year in her county in 2001. Outside of the school system, Kathy has worked in the educational marketplace in professional development, sales, marketing, research, grant writing, and curriculum development.

As a mother of five (ranging in age from high school to diapers!), Kathy has advocated for and experienced family engagement from many vantage points. She is passionate about ensuring that her own children and ALL children are provided with the best opportunities for academic success. Seeing the impact that parents had on her classroom and that her involvement has on the education of her own children, Kathy is excited about joining FFS and helping schools and districts do the same.

Elizabeth Holiday Morgan
Certified Family Engagement Specialist
Elizabeth Holiday Morgan is a Family Friendly Schools' Certified Family Engagement Specialist and a talented and engaging Distance Coach.  

Elizabeth is a Sacramento, California native who not serves as a Family Engagement Trainer and Coach for FFS, but also as an adjunct professor for California’s largest community college district, Los Rios Community Colleges.  She teaches courses in education and sociology where she pulls upon her vast knowledge and experience of the inner-working of our nation's urban schools.  Prior to this, Elizabeth served as a school administrator at St. HOPE Public School 7, a K-8 urban charter elementary school.  She worked regularly with parents and educators to help create empowering solutions to life-impacting problems within children’s lives. 

Elizabeth graduated among the top of her class from Harvard University with a masters in education.  She also holds a bachelor's degree in psychology from Xavier University of Louisiana.

John Jones
Certified Family Engagement Specialist
John Jones is an educational consultant based in Bendigo, Victoria, Australia. John has had an extensive career in education in Victoria spanning more than forty years. In addition to teaching at all year levels in primary schools John has had extensive experience as a principal of primary (elementary) schools and in a range of leadership roles at a school and regional (district) level. He has also had experience at an executive level at the junior secondary (middle school) level. John is currently working with a local Communities for Children consortium on a Schools as Community Hubs strategy and is coordinating as Extended Schools Partnerships pilot program in the Sandhurst (Bendigo) network.

In 2010 John co-led a team that was the recipient of an Educational Excellence Award for their work with school, parent and community partnerships.
John’s other interests include Understanding Poverty (having trained with Dr Ruby Payne), 360 Feedback (360 Facilitated) and Balanced Scorecard.

John has travelled to the USA on a number of occasions as a teacher and as a consultant. He has visited a range of schools that are following the FFS model and trained with Dr Joni Samples in May and October 2010 to become an accredited Family Engagement Specialist. He is currently working with schools on a pilot project in Bendigo to deliver the Family Friendly Schools model within an Australian context.

In addition to his educational experience John is a past president of his local (Eaglehawk) Rotary Club, a life member of the Apex Club of Stawell and a climate change ambassador for The Climate Project.
John has a Masters in Education from the University of Melbourne and a Bachelor of Arts  (Psychology/ Political Studies) in addition to his teaching qualifications.

Dr. Christine Rowe
Funding Advisor

Dr. Christine Rowe offers you over 20 years' success supporting public and non-profit agencies to better serve their clients through an integrated approach to planning and organizational development, needs assessment, grant procurement, program design and evaluation. Dr Rowe has served as a resource development consultant, coach and evaluator with hundreds of clients including K-12 districts and IHEs (colleges and universities), non-profits, social services and educational programs. As an educator, her students have ranged from multilingual families with preschoolers through K-14 and adult students. As a program administrator, she has expertise with English learners, Bilingual Education, Family Literacy and Migrant Family Liaison programs.

Christine will work with you to help secure grant funding to transform your vision into a successfully implemented project. We begin by assessing your chances of getting the grant and meeting its requirements. With your decision to move forward, we identify key partners, target population and best practice models. We will develop a clear timeline to ensure that your grant proposal is competently completed and delivered. We will design an evaluation that can be used for multiple purposes as part of the day-to-day management of a program to support your quest to do the best job possible. For more info visit: Los Padres Consulting.com.

Monique Martineau
FFS Distance Coach
Monique brings to FFS, expertise in well-being and stress management as an educator and coach. She has been a corporate wellness coach since 2005 and a stress management coach since 2001. Working with best-selling author and mind-body physician Deepak Chopra in 1994 instigated her role as an educator….unless you count teaching windsurfing and sailing in the mid-80s as stress relief for university students in San Diego!

A Zen teacher drew Monique to the San Francisco Bay Area in 2001 for ongoing intensive studies. She has infused his and best-selling author Eckhart Tolle’s wisdom into her work. Twenty years in personal and professional development is rounded out with eight years in healthcare, 15 years in business development, and a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration.

Keynote and workshop clients include Cisco, NASA, American Society for Training and Development, San Diego Chamber of Commerce, and One World Children’s Fund. Coaching clients include large organizations (who prefer anonymity), Heald College, and individuals from Cisco, HP, Intuit, as well as small business owners and entrepreneurs.

A Cisco program committee member said, “Monique was the best of our (12) keynotes this year.” A business owner from another talk described her as “…masterfully navigating…empowering participants to make wise informed choices.”

Beverly Staley, MS
Certified Family Engagement Specialist & Distance Coach
Beverly’s background includes counseling, coaching and mentoring in such challenging settings as Los Angeles Unified School District, Family Service of Long Beach, Straight Talk, Inc., and Women Helping Women, Costa Mesa, CA. She has produced, created, and presented workshops on Talent Discovery, Self Esteem, Visioning®, and Life Coaching. These dynamic life-changing events combine psychology, expressive arts and coaching principles and empower participants to discover and clarify their visions, passions and goals for success in life as well as business.

Beverly holds a Bachelors Degree in Psychology from California State University, Long Beach, a Master’s Degree from California State University, Dominguez Hills in relationship counseling, a Coaching/Mentoring Certificate from Cal State Long Beach and is a graduate of Guiding Mindful Change in San Diego. She is also a certified instructor of Creative Journal Expressive Arts, has a part-time life-coaching practice in Orange County, CA, is a distance coach for Family Friendly Schools and currently completing a trainer internship with Family Friendly Schools.

Sherlene Berkel
Educational Development Specialist
Sherlene Berkel is an educational consultant based in
St. Eustatius in the Dutch Caribbean.

We are very fortunate to live in times when we enjoy greater career and business opportunities than ever before. I built a wonderful career in the Oil Inspection Industry in the field of Quality Assurance and Customer Relations, where I was able to exercise and develop exceptional leadership, management and organizational skills which resulted in my being appointed as Quality Representative of the organization. As much as I loved the work that I did, deep inside I knew something was missing. It was while serving as Project Coordinator for a Youth Apprenticeship Program for 16 – 24 year old school dropouts in my spare time I discovered my true passion which literally changed my life: I love helping people realize their highest potential and improve their quality of life.

After this discovery, my decision to leave the corporate world and start a new career came naturally. Looking back, I realize this was all a part of God’s Master Plan for my life, as I was able to smoothly transition into a career in Education. I was blessed with the opportunity to serve as a Teacher and subsequently Principal of a Home School Institution for Grades 1 through 12, owned and operated by an International Oil Terminal. While working at the Home School Institution, the Oil Terminal developed an Adult Literacy Program to promote their employees’ personal & professional development. I was honored to assist in the implementation, coordination, and management of that program and serve as a facilitator as well. This was not only an invaluable experience for me, but an affirmation of my passion for Educating, Motivating and Inspiring people to be the best that they can be. I have now transitioned into the most gratifying career of my life as a Life Coach. I am building a rewarding business doing what I truly love: Serving & Supporting people, both young and old, in creating lives they never thought possible.

As a member of the FFS team, Joan keeps us all on track, manages accounts receivables, payables, payroll, and assists in conference logistics.