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Staff & Board

Founders

Abigail Housen, Co-Founding Director
Abigail Housen is co-founder of Visual Understanding in Education and co-author of the VTS Curriculum. Housen has been involved in aesthetic research for 30 years and received her Ed.D from Harvard in 1983. She was professor of Art Education and Director of the Graduate Program at Massachusetts College of Art, and has served as consultant and evaluator to numerous museums and schools. Housen's research into the stages of aesthetic development provided the theoretical foundation for VTS. Her longitudinal research studies on the impact of VTS have shown that, in addition to growth in aesthetic understanding, VTS supports the growth of creative and critical thinking skills, which transfer to other subject areas.
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Philip Yenawine, Co-Founding Director
Philip Yenawine is co founder of Visual Understanding in Education (VUE), a non profit educational research organization that develops and studies ways teaching visual literacy and of using art to teach thinking and communication skills. Director of Education at The Museum of Modern Art from 1983-93, he worked in 1992-94 as consulting curator at the Institute for Contemporary Art, and during the academic year 1993-94, as Visiting Professor of art education at Mass College of Art, both in Boston. Yenawine is the author of How to Look at Modern Art, Key Art Terms for Beginners, and has written six children's books about art.
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Board of Directors

• Harry Lasker, Board Chair
  Cerylion, Inc,; Cambridge, MA

• Melissa Coley, Treasurer
  Brookfield Properties Corporation; New York, NY

• Amy Lieberman, Secretary
  New York, NY

• Jasanna Britton
  New York, NY

• Louise Eastman
  New York, NY

• Jean Kluver
  La Jolla, CA

• Michael Martin
  Michael Martin Gallery Foundation; Dallas, TX

• John Ramsbacher
  Ramsbacher Prokey, LLP; San Francisco, CA

• Barbara B. Young
  Sonoma, CA

• Mimi Wheeler
  Venice, CA

Staff

Oren Slozberg, Executive Director
Oren Slozberg joined VUE as Executive Director in May 2006, bringing more than 20 years of experience in nonprofit leadership and the arts. As the leader of several San Francisco Bay Area agencies over the years, he has formed organizations from their start-up phases, raised more than $5 million and doubled participation in programming. Since 1999, he has been a consultant to nonprofit museums, art organizations, government agencies, and social service institutions in the areas of strategic planning, management development, program development, and fundraising. He has a BA in mass communications and linguistics from UC Berkeley, pursued graduate studies in instructional technologies at San Francisco State University, and is an expert trainer in Visual Thinking Strategies.
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Nick Gardner, Administrative Director
A native of St. Louis, Missouri, Nick Gardner graduated from Webster University with a Bachelor's degree in both Literature and Education. He is currently in the Wagner School of Public Service at New York University, pursuing a graduate degree in Public Policy and Management. His interest in combining progressive education reform and public service drew him to Visual Thinking Strategies, where he has been since 2006.
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Amy Chase Gulden, Regional Director, New York
Amy Chase Gulden joined VUE in the Fall of 2006 as Regional Director for NY where she has launched VTS school & museum programs in New York City, Long Island, New Jersey and Connecticut, and provides professional development in VTS to a broad range of audiences (classroom teachers, art teachers, administrators, arts-education conferences, graduate students). Amy was Director of Studio in a School's Long Term visual-arts residency program for seven years before she began consulting in 2005 on the design and content of its interactive website aligned with the NYC Blueprint for Teaching and Learning in the Visual Arts. As a Senior Researcher at the SchoolWorks Lab., she has been involved in numerous federally-funded arts education studies, and serves as researcher, faculty and facilitator for numerous initiatives of the New York State Council on the Arts. Amy holds masters degrees in Education and English Literature. She is a visual artist and writes a weekly column, The Gallery, devoted to emerging contemporary artists for ApartmentTherapy.com
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Yoon Kang-O'Higgins, Regional Director, Pacific Northwest
Yoon Kang-O'Higgins, joined VTS in 1997 as a college intern. She worked with various VTS projects in NYC in until 2004, and then moved to Seattle to become the NW Regional Director. Yoon studied Art History at Barnard College and University College London as well as Studio Art at the Leith School of Art in Edinburgh, Scotland. Along with her involvement with VTS, Yoon has taught studio art to NYC public school students and has worked as an administrator at various organizations including Parsons School of Design and the Tony Smith Estate.
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Tad Yenawine, Regional Director, Los Angeles
A resident of Los Angeles, Tad Yenawine worked in the film industry until the need for fundamental change on a massive scale outweighed his need to make a living. He hopes that the implementation of VTS across the country will be the difference in shaping the future of America.
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Corinne Zimmermann, Regional Director, Boston
Corinne Zimmermann joined the VTS team in April 2008. She is a longtime museum educator whose work has focused on building partnerships between museums and schools. She has Masters degrees in both art history (Tufts University) and art education (Harvard University) and is passionate about creating opportunities for students to engage in meaningful ways with works of art.
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Robyn Muscardini, North Bay Regional Coordinator
Robyn was first introduced to VTS in 2006 at California College of the Arts. Soon after, while completing her masters degree in Education, she met Oren Slozberg and suggested they work together to bring VTS to schools in Sonoma County. A graduate of California College of the Arts, she has taught visual arts in both Berkeley and Sonoma public schools. She has worked with Sonoma Valley Museum of Art bringing visual arts to the schools and has served on the Board of Directors of Museum of Children's Art (MOCHA) in Oakland, California.
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Jonathan Feffer, Marketing Director
A recent graduate from Columbia Business School, Jonathan brings extensive experience in managing mission-based organizations. Prior to business school, Jonathan spent 5 years co-founding and managing non-profit organizations. He established and managed People, a not-for-profit organization that empowers disenfranchised communities and enhances self-advocacy capabilities through community development projects. He is a co-founder of the Tel-Aviv LGBTQ community center and a national youth organization in Israel. Jonathan holds an MBA from Columbia Business School with a focus on social entrepreneurship and a B.Sc in Medical Research from Tel-Aviv University.
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Leslie Hendrickson, Program Coordinator
Leslie Hendrickson has a M.S. in journalism from Columbia University, as well as a B.A. from Saint John's College. She has written for Family Circle, Jane, amNewYork, and The New York Sun. Between VTS and freelance writing gigs, Leslie trains for triathlons and is developing the perfect recipe for Fluffernutter cookies.
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Liz Harvey, SF Bay Regional Director
Liz joined VUE in July 2009 after working with San Francisco Bay VTS for two years. Harvey's work in education encompasses work with children, families, and adults, linking communities with museums. Liz spent eleven years bringing schools and university students together in programs at a university art museum. More recently, she managed artists working with youth in San Francisco schools and juvenile hall, and created public art in programs with underserved children in Los Angeles and Long Beach. Since her first teaching job in Koreatown, Los Angeles, Liz has long been drawn to facilitation as a route to equitable and powerful teaching, while centering her educational work around artworks both in and out of the museum, and their resonance for all students of all ages. Liz has coached and taught pre-service and in-service teachers in arts integration, including working with the faculty of East Oakland School of the Arts high school for three years. Liz also ran Artful Weekends, a summertime family art program for the J. Paul Getty Museum; coordinated a school program for the Los Angeles County Art Museum; and served as a gallery educator for adults at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles. She taught courses in art education for California State University, Long Beach preparing elementary teachers to utilize art and museums to explore critical thinking. Her work in sculpture, often preoccupied with feminist history and memory, has been shown since 1993 in galleries, museums, and alternative spaces in California, New York, and Italy. She is a recipient of the California Arts Council Fellowship in Sculpture (1996) and two Los Angeles Cultural Affairs Department Artist in Residence grants. Currently, she collaborating with dancers/choreographers on new work.
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Sarah Lenoue, SF Bay Regional Coordinator
Sarah Lenoue joined the VTS team in July 2009 after working with VTS implementation for two years through SF Bay Visual Thinking Strategies. She is a poet/educator who has been working in arts education for years. Her poetry has been published in Parthenon West Review, Exquisite Corpse, and 14 Hills, among others. Last spring Sarah completed a poetry residency funded by the East Bay Community Foundation with Kindergartener's in Oakland public schools. Her work in the arts includes a decade at the San Francisco Arts Commission, with first WritersCorps, then Cultural Equity Grants, and the Civic Art Collection. Recently she has written grants for StageWrite in SF. Sarah earned her MA in English, Creative Writing from San Francisco State University.
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Lee Houck, Executive Assistant
Lee Houck joined the VTS team in February 2007. His first novel "Yield," was the winner of Project:Queerlit 2008, and is forthcoming from Kensington Books in 2010. His short fiction, essays and poetry have appeared in journals and anthologies including From Boys to Men, Hair, and Ganymede #6. Additionally, he has worked with Jennifer Miller's renowned "Circus AMOK!" for many, many seasons.
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