|
About Us
Staff
 |
Melissa Kelley
Melissa L. Kelley is the chief executive officer responsible for providing overall leadership of the Colorado Parent & Child Foundation and its programs, ensuring consistent achievement of the organization’s mission, implementation of its policies, goals and objectives, and management of its financial and administrative position. Ms. Kelley began her tenure as the Executive Director in January 2004. Since then, she has grown the organization’s reach, quintupling the number of families served by expanding programming from six to thirty-seven sites statewide and incrementally increasing the capacity of the organization to respond effectively to the needs of program sites by aligning and improving core processes and implementing strategic opportunities to optimize delivery of organizational services. She has diversified the organization’s grant sources and quadrupled its budget, streamlined administrative processes, and developed key collaborations thus increasing the organization’s viability, sustainability, and position within the early childhood and family support systems statewide. Ms. Kelley serves as the Chairwoman of the Colorado Home Visitation Coalition, representing early childhood home visiting efforts at multiple state level tables, including the Colorado Early Childhood Partners, the Colorado Early Childhood Summit, and the Office of Professional Development. She was recently appointed by the State Board of Education to the newly legislated State Advisory Committee on Parent Involvement in Education. She is also on the Institutional Review Board for The Partnership for Families and Children and on the National Board of Trustees for the Little Rock, AR based HIPPY USA. Ms. Kelley recently completed a three-year term on the governing board of the Colorado Association for the Education of Young Children and was a Class of 2007 PLAN Fellow with the National Women’s Law Center. In June 2010, she will begin serving a three year term on the Board of Directors of the St. Louis, MO based National Center for Parents as Teachers. Prior to her leadership of CPCF, Ms. Kelley served in the national service arena working both as a consultant with individual state service commissions across the U.S. and as a staff member overseeing Colorado’s AmeriCorps programs for the Governor’s Commission on National and Community Service under both Governor’s Romer and Owens. She holds a Master of Divinity degree from Princeton Seminary and a Bachelor of Arts in History, Philosophy and Religion from Mary Baldwin College. She is an active member of the Rotary Club of Denver. She and her husband live in Lookout Mountain.
|
 |
Erica Severson
Erica Severson provides programmatic and training leadership of the Colorado Parent & Child Foundation's two primary program initiatives: HIPPY and PAT. Erica brings a decade of national and community service experience to her work with CPCF. Erica began her non-profit career in Chicago in 1999 as an AmeriCorps Member with the Integrated Arts/Integrating Education Program, then as an AmeriCorps Leader and Program Manager with Project YES AmeriCorps, Internship Coordinator for the Associated Colleges of the Midwest Chicago Arts Program, and Program & Training Officer for the OneStar Foundation, Texas' National Service Commission. She is a certified aha! Process Bridges out of Poverty Trainer & Getting Ahead Facilitator and is on the Leadership Faculty for the Hands On Network. Erica holds a B.A. in Art and Theatre from Cornell College in Mount Vernon, IA and is an active leader within the Colorado Chapter of AmeriCorps Alums.
|
 |
Sara Marquez
Sara Marquez provides overall accounting, financial management, and fiscal monitoring of program sites for the Colorado Parent & Child Foundation. She has 37 years in financial management experience with government and non-profit organizations. Previous to her work with CPCF, Sara served as the Associate Director of the Rocky Mountain Chapter of the ALS Association. From 1979 to 1999, she oversaw financial grant reporting for both the Department of Labor and Employment and the Department of Local Affairs. Sara has been active in the administration of HIPPY programming in Colorado since its inception. She has also consulted with AmeriCorps programs throughout the state of Colorado for the Governor's Commission on Community Service. Sara is active in her parish at Holy Cross Catholic Church in Thornton and maintains the church library. She is a Colorado native with strong ties to the San Luis Valley.
|
| Consultants | |
 | Katherine
Bair Katherine Bair has worked in the Early Childhood field since 1990.
She has been involved in early intervention through a family center
setting, special education, and early childhood mental health. Her
education began with nursing, followed by a Bachelors and Masters
degree in Social Work from Colorado State University. Later she
received a certificate in Early Childhood Mental Health from the
Harris Infant Mental Health Program out of the Department of Psychiatry
from the University of Colorado Health Science Center. She has been
a Parents as Teachers trainer since 1995, and also is involved in
a variety of other prevention initiatives, including the Devereaux
Early Childhood Assessment and the Circle of Security. |
 | Debbie
Butkus Debbie Butkus has worked in the field or education for 27 years.
She has a BA in Early Childhood/Elementary Education and a MA in
Curriculum and Instruction. Debbie has taught kindergarten and second
grade and since 1991 has worked in the field of Family Literacy.
Currently she is the Coordinator for the Colorado Family Literacy
Training Center and is a trainer for the National Center for Family
Literacy. Debbie has been involved with Parents as Teachers as a
parent educator and/or a program supervisor since 1996, and as a
Parents as Teachers trainer since 2007. |
 | Ricki
Feist Ricki Feist has been a part of the Parents as Teachers program
since 1994. She began working as a parent educator for Rocky Mountain
Parents as Teachers, and in 2003 became the Executive Director.
Ricki is a Colorado native, married to a Colorado native. She received
her B.S. Degree from CSU in speech therapy and holds a Master's
Degree from the University of Northern Colorado in special education
and elementary education. Prior to becoming a parent educator, Ricki
taught for 26 years. She began the program for the hearing impaired
for Littleton Public Schools and also taught preschool, kindergarten
and second grade at Colorado Academy. She became a Parents as Teachers
trainer in 2002. She is the mother of two grown sons and a proud
grandparent of a grandson. |
 | Peggy
Herrera Peggy Herrera is a national trainer for both the HIPPY and Parents as Teachers programs. She was a HIPPY Coordinator for 13 years and PAT Coordinator for 6 years, overseeing one of Colorado's first HIPPY/PAT collaborations in Alamosa, CO. She served on the CPCF Board of Directors for several years. Prior to her work with HIPPY and PAT, she coordinated a Head Start home-based program for 10 years and was a Special Education Resource teacher in addition to teaching kindergarten and 2nd grade. Peggy is bilingual and holds a B.A. in Elementary Education and a M. A. in Special Education. Peggy is also a certified True Colors Trainer and is a prolific artist with her own studio www.pasatiempostudio.com. |
 | Ozella
Martinez Ozella Martinez grew up in San Luis, the oldest town in Colorado.
An educator by profession, she received her B.A. in Special Education
from the University of Northern Colorado. Ms. Martinez taught in
the field of special education for twelve years. She worked as an
assistant coordinator for the Alamosa School District's HIPPY and
Parents as Teachers programs for six years and as the coordinator
of these same programs for two years. Ms. Martinez is an active
community volunteer who has served on the boards of Catholic Diocese
of Pueblo, the Human Development Commission, the Valley Community
Fund, the Colorado Parents as Teachers Advisory Board, and Adobe
de Oro-Concilio de Artes (a rural non-profit arts council). She
currently lives in Grand Junction. |