Board of Directors
James Brescia, Ed.D.
James Brescia is the San Luis Obispo County Superintendent of Schools and a clinical faculty member in the Educational Leadership and Administration Program at Cal Poly. James has served as a teacher, principal, and district superintendent in North County since 1989. Dr. Brescia’s writing and research interests include school leadership, instructional leadership, and organizational problem-solving-based leadership. Dr. Brescia has peer-reviewed research published in national and international journals.
Amy Kardel
Valerie Kraskey
Cory Karpin
Cory Karpin has served as a senior leader and CEO of education, arts and animal welfare organizations for nearly 20 years, taking a short break to lead business development for an early-stage technology company. Since 2015 Cory has been the director of development for Cal Poly’s Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, one of the top undergraduate entrepreneurship programs in the country.
Melissa Abbey
Director of Fiscal Services a the San Luis Obispo County Office of Education.
Michael Specchierla
Dan Weeks
Dan is a serial entrepreneur for software products. After a 25 year career with HP in Engineering Management, he started his first software company, BrightScope, which sold with 70 employees to a private equity firm. Since 2017, Dan has been 100% focused on social entrepreneurship efforts in tech education. He works for a company providing tech boot camps across the US, is the Entrepreneur-In-Residence for Cal Poly’s New Business Incubator, the SLO HotHouse, and teaches Entrepreneurship at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo.
Brian Asher Alhadeff
Artistic Director Brian Asher Alhadeff is an internationally acclaimed opera, ballet, and symphonic, conductor. In the Czech Republic, he was Artistic Director and founder of the Hradec Kralove International Summer Opera Festival that partnered with the Eastern Bohemian Philharmonic and the Czech State Opera and Ballet. In 2010, Alhadeff guest conducted the Albanian National Radio and Television Orchestra in a nationwide broadcast that included the Albanian premiere of American composer Howard Hanson’s Symphony No. 2 The Romantic. In addition to his work with Opera San Luis Obispo, Alhadeff also serves as the Artistic Director & Conductor of the Lompoc Pops Orchestra, the Principal Conductor for Civic Ballet San Luis Obispo, and the State Street Ballet, Santa Barbara.
Ron Yukelson
Ron has more than 30 years of business development, strategic planning, and marketing experience, the last 18 on the Central Coast, primarily in the health care industry. Ron was previously the Chief Strategy Officer for Tenet Health Central Coast and was also Chief Marketing & Strategy Officer at Wilshire Health & Community Services. He has deep roots with the San Luis Obispo and Northern Santa Barbara County business communities, serving on many committees at local chambers of commerce. He is also involved in many local non-profits, serving on the Boards of the SLO County YMCA, The Land Conservancy of San Luis Obispo County and Sierra Vista Regional Medical Center.
Scott Knuckles
Technology leader with over 30 years of experience in technology leadership and management across diverse sectors. Extensive expertise in the enterprise and K-12 markets, with a deep understanding of policies, trends, products, and funding dynamics. Passionate about developing safe mobile learning environments and ensuring learning equality for all learners.
Talia Phillips-Ortega
Talia realizes that both music and education are boundless and has pursued a career sharing her love of music with the community that raised her.