HEALTHY BEHAVIORS CONFERENCE LEADERSHIP TEAM

2010 HEALTHY BEHAVIORS CONFERENCE LEADERSHIP TEAM

The Leadership Team is critically important to the success of our event. This amazing Team is guided by the National Conference Advisory Board and provides big ideas, new connections, practical strategies and adds credibility to the planning process. This comprehensive Leadership Team represents the diversity of out-of-school time programs and includes representatives serving at all levels of the field. We are a quality conference truly planned by out-of-school time professionals, adding voice and value to the needs of the field.

Sandra Bishop, Director Club TC
Chula Vista Middle School

Jered Cherry, Co-Founder & Program Director
Positive Adventures

Jered Cherry, 28, is currently the Co-Founder and Program Director of Positive Adventures LLC. Specializing in building community, increasing physical fitness and developing positive relationships though adventure team building programs. Positive Adventures has exploded onto the scene in San Diego over the last five years with a focus on after-school enrichment programs, ropes course trainings, outdoor education wilderness retreats, team building and staff development programming. Positive Adventures is currently designing programs for over 75 schools, and 5 of the major districts in San Diego County.

Prior to Positive Adventures Jered’s passion for physical fitness and outdoor adventure has taken him all over the globe supporting and volunteering with a variety experiential/outdoor education programs. Jered truly believes that outdoor adventure programs can change and alter the direction of youth across the country. He is committed to his field and passionate about incorporating his work into the traditional school settings.

When not at work you can find Jered hanging from a cliff, riding a wave, running a river, skiing through powder and enjoying everything the outdoors has to offer. At a young age he discovered that his talents lied in working with kids and he continues to work on the ground level developing young minds across California.

Lindsey Cox, Community Health Program Specialist
Public Health Services, County of San Diego

Lindsey Cox, MS, is a Community Health Program Specialist with the County of San Diego’s Health and Human Services Agency. Through the Communities Putting Prevention to Work program, she manages interventions to improve school wellness, increase safe walking and bicycling to school and reduce health disparities through policy, systems and environmental change. Ms. Cox has been working in the field of public health and urban planning to develop healthy communities for the past nine years, and has previously worked for California Department of Public Health with California Project LEAN (Leaders Encouraging Activity and Nutrition) and the California Center for Physical Activity, the Harvard Prevention Research Center, local government planning departments and the Great Valley Center. Lindsey received her Master of Science in Public Health from the Harvard School of Public Health and Bachelor of Arts in Urban Studies from Stanford University.

Larissa Johnson, Physical Activity and Community Youth Organization Coordinator
Network for a Healthy California - San Diego and Imperial Region

Larissa Johnson is the Physical Activity and Community Youth Organization Coordinator for the Network for a Healthy California - San Diego and Imperial Region. She has worked with the organization for over five years and was recently awarded UCSD's Exemplary Staff of the Year for 2010. As part of the organization, Ms. Johnson has recruited over two hundred after school sites to use the Children's Power Play! Campaign materials and has trained over five hundred after school staff on physical activity and nutrition education games that are relevant for their sites. During the 2009 school year, Ms. Johnson served on California Afterschool Resource Center's Physical Activity and Nutrition training teams and worked to created four online training modules. Ms. Johnson has been a dance and fitness instructor for over fourteen years and currently teaches ZUMBA throughout San Diego.

Christine Lafontant, Recreation Manager
County of San Diego, Parks & Recreation

Christine Lafontant is a Recreation Program Manager for the County of San Diego Department of Parks and Recreation. She is responsible for managing 3 community centers, organizing major special events including health fairs and movies in the park, and coordinating an Outdoor Adventure Program for foster youth. Ms. Lafontant holds a Bachelors degree from Boston College and has over 15 years of experience in the field of recreation and youth programming. She has been a camp counselor, program coordinator of after school and summer programs, and has served as a consultant and trainer for over 300 after school programs in San Diego County.

Ms. Lafontant is a member of the San Diego Childhood Obesity Initiative Leadership Council, the Greater San Diego Recreation and Parks Coalition for Health and Wellness, San Diego Nutrition Network, and the Coalition for Children and Weight. In 2006, Ms Lafontant developed and wrote the Vending Machine Contents Policy that was adopted by the County of San Diego Department of Parks and Recreation and later by the entire County of San Diego.

Ms. Lafontant has presented workshops on a range of health related topics to groups including the California Parks and Recreation Society Annual Conference, CPRS District XII Trainings, and the National Recreation and Parks Association Health and Livability Summit.

Christine McKenna, Coordinator
BOOST Collaborative

Christine McKenna grew up in Los Angeles, California where she worked with diverse populations of youth as a sports instructor and camp counselor. She was also involved in community outreach and mentoring projects in the Inner City Housing Projects of Los Angeles, California. Christine moved to San Diego where she continued to work in youth education and development. Prior to joining the BOOST Collaborative, Christine worked for non-profit agencies in San Diego providing direct services and program management to before and after school programs throughout San Diego County at both the elementary and middle school level. Christine earned her Bachelor of Science Degree in Criminal Justice from San Diego State University. She enjoys spending her free time with family and playing softball.

Tia Quinn, Executive Director
BOOST Collaborative

For more than 20 years, Tia Quinn has worked at all levels of programming in the field of after school, supporting out-of school time programs throughout the nation via training, technical assistance, quality assurance, and program development. In addition to serving youth through not-for-profits in Hartford, CT and San Diego, Tia spent the first part of her west coast experience working at an after school program and later as a Program Director, overseeing programming at 65 before and after school programs through Harmonium Children’s Services, one of the largest after school providers in California. Tia also served for 5 years as the Co Lead for Region 9 Technical Assistance Center, After School programs at the San Diego County Office of Education. In this capacity, she supported over 600 after school program sites in San Diego, Orange and Imperial Counties, serving over 50,000 students annually. While in this role Tia managed numerous regional and statewide committees and after school initiatives including the well known After School Math website www.afterschoolmath.org and the After School Content Literacy Project for California in collaboration with the California Department of Education and San Diego State University.

In the regional lead capacity, Tia and her team were the 2005 recipients of the California School Board Association’s Golden Bell Award for Partnerships and Collaboratives as well as the Cities, Counties, and Schools (CCS) Partnership Award 2005. Additionally, Tia is the recipient of the 2001 Director of the Year, awarded by Mentor San Diego; and the California School-Age Consortium’s 2006 Award of Excellence, Program Administrator of the Year. A proud moment was having a research paper, Children of Divorce, A Population At Risk, published in Spectrum, an undergraduate scholarly journal, during undergraduate studies in Psychology and Sociology, University of Hartford. Tia serves on the Board of Directors for Eveoke Dance Theatre in San Diego and supports the pursuit of Eveoke’s mission to cultivate compassionate social action. She also serves on the Board of Directors for the Center for Collaborative Solutions, Sacramento, CA and believes in the CCS mission to help others discover innovative and effective ways to achieve shared goals. Most recently, Tia is a member of the Mission Hills Town Council in San Diego to directly impact the community where she lives.

As an Out-of-School Time Consultant, Tia presents customized workshops and staff development seminars at numerous local, state and national conferences. Tia works closely with school district administrators, CEO’s, non-profit agencies, program directors, supervisors, and line staff to increase student retention, promote academic achievement, and overall student success through quality staff development opportunities. With contracts throughout the U.S., Tia trains on topics such as No Parent Left Behind, Positive Discipline, Professionalism, Creating Community Partnerships, as well as intensive work in the area of Staff and Program Leadership, and assisting programs serving older youth through student surveys and focus groups.

Tia is the Founder and Executive Director of the BOOST (Best of Out-of-School Time) Collaborative, supporting out-of-school time professionals through quality professional development opportunities, program and resource development, building community partnerships, promoting the importance of quality out-of-school time programming, opportunities to share promising practices, and a variety of consulting services. She is the founder of the Annual BOOST (Best of Out-of-School Time) Conference in Palm Springs, California, one of the nation’s largest conferences for after school and out-of-school time professionals, bringing together all levels of key stakeholders to initiate change and inspire quality programming. Tia is passionate about creating positive change for today’s youth as well as the people, communities, and partners supporting them in the out-of-school time hours.

Jim Stephens, Director of Child Development Services
Orange Unified School District

Since 1990, Jim Stephens has been the director of the Child Development Services department with Orange Unified School District, in Orange County. The Child Development Services department includes the 23 School Age Care “SAC” programs, preschools and the child development programs located throughout the district, serving over 1700 children. Jim has been working in the afterschool field since 1978. In addition to undergraduate degrees in Child Development and Business, Jim has a Masters in Education, which has allowed him the opportunity to teach human development courses at Cal State Fullerton and the local community colleges in Orange County. He has been involved with the BOOST Conference for many years and enjoys serving on the Leadership Team. Jim has been married to Barbara since 1993 and they are the extremely proud parents of their daughter Waverly, who was born in 1996, and son Spencer, born in 1999.