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Member Profiles
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Zonta came into my life at the perfect time. My daughter, Megan, who studies International Affairs and Political Science at CU-Boulder is extremely involved with CU'S Conference on World Affairs. One hundred speakers from around the world are invited annually to address issues of health care, politics, the arts, education and more. When I attended the Conference last April, I felt as if I had woken up from a deep nap.
While I lived in Chicago, after finishing my freshman year of college at Indiana University in Bloomington, I campaigned for independent political candidates, attended meetings of The Council on Foreign Relations and avidly discussed current events with my broad-minded friends. Of course it was the late 60's and 70's. My friends suffered injuries in Lincoln Park during the Democratic Convention. I went to Washington for one of the last peace marches. I was waiting for my boyfriend to come home from Viet Nam. How could you not feel connected to the world?
I lived in Chicago for twelve years working in national product advertising, hospital public relations and at The Virginia Frank Child Development Center for mentally disturbed pre-schoolers. My experience as an educational therapist in training, took me back to college, this time studying child development, K-8 education and psychology.
Moving to Colorado in the late 70's was an inspiring change. My work at Digital Equipment Corporation introduced me to new business skills and new people. I married one of those people and, after Megan was born, we lived in New England for a while. There, I started an educational daycare program in my home, while finishing, finally, after 22 years, at age 40, my bachelor's degree. Hooray. Those last 30 hours were in business management.
When we returned to Colorado Springs in the mid-80's, Megan entered school and I entered the life of a small business owner. First I developed "The Lifetime Organizer," a family system in a notebook, then taught time management workshops to earn money for marketing my product. During this period, I worked with a few others to start a local chapter of the "National Association of Professional Organizers."
Later, I focused on helping students of all ages learn how to learn. As a consultant for Fountain Valley School of Colorado, I developed and taught a program especially for the needs of their students and teachers. As part of Pikes Peak Community College's Corporate, Workforce and Education Development group, I designed training programs, gave seminars and became the Corporate Training Manager. Working with HP, Memorial Hospital, The Gazette and other companies, gave me insight to our local workforce especially when I worked with adults who hadn't been in school for years and came from diverse backgrounds. I told them the story of my 22-year path to a college degree and motivated them so they could gain confidence for the class series they were being required to take by their companies. Another enjoyable project was volunteering for El Paso County Mental Health by giving seminars to 5thgraders on stress management in many local school districts.
As I went toward full time at School District 11, I began to drop my association with the other organizations, including my consulting business. I am now in my 8th year and work full time with 22 schools in designing and marketing community education classes to bring the public into our facilities, as well as lease out our specialized spaces for events, meetings, sports and entertainment. Various events at the district stirred up my interest in diversity issues and I joined the district team and started a film festival for our Central Office to help them become aware of diversity issues in schools.
After my marriage ended, and my sweet daughter, Megan, bonded with college, I was looking for more for myself to focus on and give service. I stumbled upon Zonta's brochure in the Castle Rock Chamber of Commerce office, and went "hmmmm." I am now very awake and honored to be involved with such professional, self-motivated and caring women.