KOREducators Board of Directors
Dr. David Rule, Chair
President of Rock Creek Campus, Portland Community College
Kathy Finney, Treasurer
CASA for Children, Non-Profit finance professional
John Hancock
President, Junior Achievement of Oregon; Director
John Hancock is the President of Junior Achievement of Oregon and SW Washington. Junior Achievement (JA) is a nonprofit youth organization that works in partnership with schools and businesses to improve student knowledge in the areas of work readiness, entrepreneurship and financial literacy. The organization’s programs are renowned for teaching young people the “economics of life”: business, careers, work-related life skills, personal money management, ethics and leadership. In his role as President, John is responsible for overall leadership of the organization with emphasis on board development, fund development, program operations and strategic visioning. In addition to his work locally, John serves on several JA USA committees and helped to found JA in Tanzania in 1998. John earned his undergraduate degree in Political Science from Whitman College in Walla Walla, WA and his Masters Degree in Public Affairs from Indiana University Purdue University at Indianapolis.
Mike Bode, Parent Representative
Owner, Huser Integrated Technology
George Jones
Manager, Transportation and Utility Assets, Portland General Electric
Benjamin C. Edtl
Managing Member, Ben Edtl Consulting
Lorna Fast Buffalo Horse, Ex-Officio Board Representative
LÊP High School Director and Principal
Lorna Fast Buffalo Horse has been the Director and Principal of LEP High School since 2007. Before coming to LEP High, Lorna co-founded and was Principal of Spanish English International School (SEIS). Her 23-year career in education has included teaching and administrative work at grades K-12, adult education, and teacher education, including work as a District Coordinator of ESL, Bilingual, Migrant, and Indian Education, Director of a high school Multicultural Center, Title VII Coordinator, VISTA Volunteer, and Adjunct Professor in the graduate Teacher Education programs at Lewis and Clark College and Portland State University. She has taught classes at Portland Community College, Mt. Hood Community College, and Northwest Indian College. She holds a Master’s in Teaching from Willamette University and has completed additional course work in Educational Administration. She and her husband, Sam, have three sons and live in Portland.
Laurie Thurston, Ex-Officio Staff Representative
LEP High Humanities Teacher
Laurie Thurston taught English Language Arts within a Rochester, New York program for disengaged high school students that she developed and directed. In addition to her 17 years in the classroom, she spent two years as an Instructional Leadership Coach for the Oregon Small School Initiative, working to sustain the development of small schools across the state. She’s presented at several conferences sharing best practices and strategies for reaching the reluctant reader and writer, including the New York State Alternative Network Association, the National Council for Teacher Educators, the Oregon Association of Teacher Educators and the National Association for Multicultural Education. She penned a regular column regarding teaching in the Alternative Network Journal, as well as several other published articles about teaching and writing including her most recent an essay in Lewis & Clark’s Democracy & Education. In addition to teaching Humanities and Language Arts at LEP Charter School in Portland, she’s been an adjunct for the MAT program at Marylhurst University since 2008 teaching pre-service teachers about writing and literacy across content areas.
The Board seeks involvement from other parents who are interested in serving LÊP High School in this way. Please feel free to come to the next Board meeting! Also, if you know of community members who might make great Board members, please contact Lorna Fast Buffalo Horse at 503.254.2537, or lorna.fbh@lephigh.org. We are always looking to broaden and diversify our base of support. Thanks!
Board Minutes: