About Us
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Joelle is a co-founder of IDEAL. She specializes in operations, program management, conceptual program design, and earned her Ed. D, in Educational Leadership from Mills College. She has over 20 years’ experience in program management in the education industry and began her education career as an ESL teacher. Most recently she served as Programs and Staff Manager for the Integrated Learning department at the Alameda County Office of Education managing operations, grants, and budgets across multiple grant funded projects related to the Integrated Learning Specialist Program. Joelle is integral in providing strategic leadership in developing and maintaining the educational programs, and services of IDEAL.
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Judy is an educator with 34 years of experience as a classroom teacher and school administrator. She has a Bachelor of Science in Radio/Television/Film Production from Long Beach State and a master’s in educational leadership from Cal State East Bay. As an administrator for the Alameda Unified School District, Judy worked as a principal at the elementary, K-8 and middle school levels. Before retiring in 2021, Judy was the founding principal of Maya Lin School. The school was created through the collaborative efforts of teachers, community members and the AUSD Board of Education. The vision of Maya Lin School is to provide students with an art integrated, inquiry learning program to support their academic learning and social development. Judy is currently a Leadership Coach for the Berkeley School of Education in the Principal’s Leadership Institute, Leadership Support Program and 21CSLA. Judy supports and facilitates IDEAL’s leadership initiatives.
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Cammie is an award winning School Site Leader who retired in 2022. For 24 years Cammie led learning communities in the Alameda Unified School District, East Palo Alto and Menlo Park, CA, where she built collaborative leadership communities with teachers and parents and transformed schools from declining enrollment and program improvement status to a California Distinguished School. She has been a part of various district committees including the District's Leadership and Equity teams. Her passion is to provide engaging and culturally centered educational experiences for all students. Cammie was awarded Alameda's Secondary Administrator of the Year and Girls Inc of Alameda Women Who Dare Awardee in 2018. Cammie received her undergraduate degree from Mills College and Masters Degree and Administrative Credential from San Francisco State University. Cammie supports and facilitates IDEAL’s leadership initiatives.
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Mina Mangewala is the Visual and Performing Art Teacher on Special Assignment (VAPA TOSA) in the Hayward Unified School District. Prior to working as a VAPA TOSA, Mina was an elementary classroom teacher for 19 years. Her primary focus as the Visual and Performing Arts TOSA for Hayward Unified is working towards creating more equitable arts opportunities for all of Hayward students. Mina also works with elementary school teachers on ways to more deeply integrate arts into their curriculum. She has passion for all things dance, especially dances and music of the African Diaspora, and brings that into her work as an educator and leader for arts education. Mina is one of the authors of HSUD VAPA Plan. She has been Vice President, Hayward Foundation for the Arts; and currently serves on the boards of Arts Education Alliance of the Bay Area, and is Director and Program Oversight for Cheza Nami. As a dancer she has performed with Brazivedas, Tania Santiago, Susana Pedroso, Cheo Rojas, Ginga Brazil Afro Ala, F.A.L. Haitian, Roseangela Silvestre, and Capoeira Narahari. Mina is IDEAL’s community of practice program designer and co-facilitator.
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Indi is a co-founder of IDEAL. They believe in the power of collaborative creative practice to catalyze communities and foster social change. They have spent the past 15 years working at the intersection of arts, education, and community wellness with non-profit organizations and school districts in Boston, Santa Fe, and the San Francisco Bay Area. Indi is a Creative Education Consultant who currently facilitates professional learning communities of local, national, and international educators and thought leaders focusing on culturally responsive teaching, creative youth development, and educational equity. They have served as a faculty member of Alameda County Office of Education's Integrated Learning Specialist Program and Harvard’s Project Zero Classroom. Indi holds an Ed.M from the Harvard Graduate School of Education where they served as an Artist in Residence at Harvard’s Project Zero. You can learn more about Indi's work at indimccasey.com. Indi designs and facilitators professional learning for IDEAL, and co-facilitates Our Changing Planet.
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Constance is an artist and educator based in Oakland, CA. Constance earned her MA from Brown University in Museum Studies and her MFA-IA from Goddard College. She also holds a Visual Arts Teaching Credential. Constance is the Arts Integration Specialist and Art Studio teacher at Maya Lin Elementary School in Almeda, CA. She loves teaching elementary school art. She shares her students’ love of color and hopes to transmit their spirit and freshness into her work. An interdisciplinary artist whose practice includes painting, collage and sculpture, Constance’s art is rooted in the power and meaning of storytelling, often borrowing from and reimagining natural forms. Constance is the illustrator of Brown: The Many Shades of Love, Black: The Many Wonders of My World and the forthcoming Blue: The Many Feelings I Feel, written by Nancy Johnson James. Available wherever books are sold. Constance co-designs and facilitates leadership initiatives and Our Changing Planet for IDEAL.
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Trena is a co-founder of IDEAL. She has worked for more than 20 years in educational leadership and program development with a focus on arts-centered integrated learning practices and pedagogies in program design and leadership development in both public and non-profit sectors, creating communities of practice that engage creative, liberatory spaces for learning and civic engagement. She was a founding faculty of the award winning Integrated Learning Specialist Program, formerly of Alameda County Office of Education, where she developed principal and teacher leadership initiatives and supported arts-centered integrated learning demonstration sites across the Bay Area. Through IDEAL she continues to design and facilitate professional learning, most recently with an integrative focus on the environment, justice, and creativity.