Meet Our Board
Laura Aryeh Murawczyk, Chair
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It was at Project Zero that Laura developed her interest in project-based learning with a particular focus on the Reggio Emilia approach to early childhood education. She has since served as an educational advisor with a special focus on child development, and early childhood and elementary education.
Laura currently serves on the Advisory Board of Stanford University's Graduate School of Education, the San Francisco Bay Area Advisory Board of Facing History and Ourselves, and the Advisory Board of Menlowe Ballet.
Patrick Dunkley
Patrick Dunkley is the Deputy Director of Athletics at Stanford University. Mr. Dunkley joined the athletics staff after nearly a decade of serving Stanford as a member of the Office of the General Counsel. Prior to his arrival at Stanford, Mr. Dunkley was a vice president in the legal department at Charles Schwab in San Francisco.
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He spent the first ten years of his legal career as an associate and partner at Pillsbury, Winthrop, Shaw, Pittman LLP. Before he began his legal career, Mr. Dunkley was a certified public accountant for eight years, including several years at a national accounting firm.
Mr. Dunkley graduated with a degree in business administration from San Jose State in 1982 and earned his law degree from Santa Clara in 1990. Mr. Dunkley has a passion for the education and development of children and is on the boards of a charter school and a non-profit organization focused on integrating sports and tutoring.
Mudita Jain
Mudita Jain has spent the past 12 years volunteering for organizations that promote literacy — from 2005 to 2010 in Bangalore, India, and in the Bay Area since then. She has worked as an aide in classrooms, raised funds for the Palo Alto School District by serving as a chair and a director for secondary schools, been on the committee that approves teacher grants, and served as the PTSA representative on the Palo Alto High School site council.
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Mudita has a BS in Mathematics from UC Davis and a Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Arizona at Tucson.
Lauren Koenig
Lauren Gray Koenig, ’81, studied human biology and economics at Stanford. She received an MBA in finance from New York University in 1985. She worked in investment banking in New York for six years and then locally in residential real estate development until 1995. She served on Sacred Heart Schools’ board of trustees for nine years and was the Co-Chair of SHS Capital Campaign.
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Lauren has served on various other committees for Sacred Heart Schools in Atherton. She served on the Graduate School of Education Advisory Board and through this became a tutor and mentor at East Palo Alto Academy for several years. She also served on the Major Gifts Committee for The Stanford Challenge Campaign.
She currently serves on the East Palo Alto Academy Charter Advisory Board, the Stanford Haas Center for Public Service National Advisory Board, the Stanford Parents Advisory Board, and the committee for Part the Cloud, an organization devoted to Alzheimer’s research.
Polly Liu
Polly Liu holds a BA in Economics and Psychology from Stanford University and an MBA from Stanford Business School. Prior to business school, she worked in the corporate finance department at The Walt Disney Company. In 2001, she founded Beau-coup, an e-commerce company in the party supplies space. She is an active community volunteer and has led the community service efforts at Almond Elementary School since 2015.
Marnie Marcin
Marnie Marcin has over twenty years of experience across the public, private and social sectors, from investment banking, principal investment and corporate law, to management and strategy consulting, executive coaching and leadership. She has extensive experience in governance and has served and advised a range of companies and organizations with national, international and local community impact.
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Marnie has a strong penchant for mission-driven organizations and social impact. She is on the Board, Audit, and Equity and Inclusion Committees of the Bryan Cameron Education Foundation, which grants four-year, merit-based scholarships to students. She also serves as a Trustee at Sacred Heart Schools, Atherton, a P-12 independent school, as Board Chair. In prior roles, Marnie developed and led the strategic philanthropy and organizational capacity-building effort at the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, a large-scale philanthropy, and at Omidyar Network, an international, mission-oriented investment firm, she helped pioneer a novel approach to investing for social and financial returns, as lead for enterprise strategy and investments.
Marnie has trained in Diversity and Inclusion work and earned a certificate from Cornell University. She received an AB cum laude from Princeton University and a JD from Stanford Law School.
Angela Nomellini
Angela Nomellini received a BA in English from Stanford University and a JD from UC Berkeley School of Law. Her interest in education began when her eldest son started school, and she became active at both the local school and district levels. Among other activities, she has served as a Local Panel member for Partners in Literacy and as a member of the Hillsborough School District Board of Trustees for seven years, twice as president.
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She was a member of the steering committee for the Stanford Challenge Campaign and the Stanford K-12 Initiative advisory board. She also recently served on the board of Coaching Corps, a non-profit which provides quality athletic experiences for underserved youth.
Currently, Angela serves on the advisory board of the Stanford Graduate School of Education. She was formerly a trustee of the California chapter of The Nature Conservancy (TNC) and a member of the gift planning committee for the TNC Our World Global Campaign. She is now a member of the TNC North America Advisory Cabinet. She also recently served on the board of Coaching Corps, now merged with Positive Coaching Alliance, a non-profit which provides quality athletic experiences for underserved youth.
Mindy Rogers
Mindy Rogers began her career at Bain & Company. She later joined Wells Fargo Bank, where she held a variety of managerial positions in banking operations including Vice President and District Manager of Northern California check processing, a 24/7 operation with over 300 employees and an $11 million budget.
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After leaving Wells Fargo, she became a consultant to the bank on a range of issues, including merger integration support, cost reduction, operational management, marketing, and new product launches. At Sacred Heart Schools Atherton, Mindy served in numerous volunteer capacities, including eleven years as a member of the Board of Trustees. For four years she chaired the Board, where she led a strategic planning process, worked with the administration to implement numerous key initiatives and launch a $95 million capital campaign, led a search for a new head of school, and worked to improve governance and financial reporting.
Currently, she serves on the boards of CollegeSpring, Coaching Corps, Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital, Lucile Packard Foundation for Children’s Health, Positive Coaching Alliance, Stanford Haas Center for Public Service, Stanford Health Care, and Stanford University. Mindy earned her B.A. in Economics, with Honors and Distinction, and her M.B.A. from Stanford University.
Daniel Schwartz
Daniel Schwartz is Dean of Stanford Graduate School of Education and an expert in human learning and educational technology. There, Schwartz oversees a laboratory whose computer-focused developments in science and math instruction permit original research into fundamental questions of learning.
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He has taught math in rural Kenya, English in south-central Los Angeles, and multiple subjects in Kaltag, Alaska. This diversity of experience informs his work.
Among many honors, Schwartz was named Graduate School of Education Teacher of the Year for 2015. His latest book, The ABCs of How We Learn: 26 Scientifically Proven Approaches, How They Work and When to Use Them, distills learning theories into practical solutions for use at home or in the classroom. NPR noted the book among the “best reads” for 2016.
Denise Smith-Hams
Denise has thirty-five years of HR leadership, management and organizational development experience in six technology companies including Hewlett Packard, 3Com and The Learning Company and biotechnology firms Genentech and Calico Life Sciences. She has demonstrated expertise in creating HR strategies to support innovation and creativity in pre-IPO and global Fortune 500 companies, and in helping companies scale for rapid growth and post merger integration.
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Denise is also a certified mediator and has mediated in Richmond, California Small Claims Court and currently provides mediation services for Community Boards, a nonprofit conflict resolution and restorative justice center founded in San Francisco in 1976.
As a first-generation college student, Denise has experienced the transformational effect higher education can have on one’s life. She and her husband are long-time advocates for equity and access in education. Denise received her BA from University of California, Berkeley, and her MA from Mills College.
Esteban Zuno
Esteban Zuno specializes in developing, coaching, and leading teams of wealth management specialists to deliver financial planning and portfolio management services and products. With nearly 15 years of experience in the banking and finance sector—including five years in management-level roles for U.S. Bancorp—Esteban spearheads innovative and effective personnel development and coaching strategies to drive profitability and enhance success for marketing campaigns and new product launches.
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With bilingual communication skills in Spanish and English, as well as a comprehensive, client-focused approach to financial planning, Esteban also served in progressively responsible roles for Ameriprise Financial Services, Inc. and Chase Investment Services Corp. before commencing his tenure with U.S. Bancorp in 2012.
As the founding member and current volunteer at United Through Education, Esteban has helped thousands of students attain college degrees by providing educational resources for the whole family with a healthy, community-based approach for lifelong learning. Esteban graduated from Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, CA, earning a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration with concentrations in Finance, Entrepreneurship, and Human Resources, as well as an Executive Certificate in Financial Planning.
Laura Aryeh Murawczyk
Laura Aryeh Murawczyk received her BA and MA from Stanford, and an MFA in Poetry from Columbia University. She has worked in education at Harvard Project Zero as a research associate, writer, and translator, and at the lowa Young Writers’ Studio and elsewhere as a teacher and workshop leader. It was at Project Zero that Laura developed her interest in project-based learning with a particular focus on the Reggio Emilia approach to early childhood education. She has since served as an educational advisor with a special focus on child development, and early childhood and elementary education.
Laura currently serves on the Advisory Board of Stanford University's Graduate School of Education, the San Francisco Bay Area Advisory Board of Facing History and Ourselves, and the Advisory Board of Menlowe Ballet.