BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Virtues: Empathy, Justice & Diligence
Passion: Helping people, especially through non-profits, to create positive social change.
Marilyn is a professional generalist and change enabler. Her professional experience over 46 years ranges from mathematics educator, benefits coordinator, process reengineering professional, and airline pricing expert to managing complex technology systems.
Marilyn developed technology and data solutions for United Airlines and HSBC. As an HR business specialist, she developed a technology plan for HR that was still guiding development 10 years later. As technology manager for a $20 million data warehousing implementation in the 1980’s, she gathered a cross-functional team with diverse expertise, knowledge, and objectives to develop plans and make unified decisions regarding this shared platform.
During the 1970’s, Marilyn was a co-founder and leader of Flexible Careers, a non-profit that enhanced career opportunities for women. In the 1990’s, she led the growth of Habitat for Humanity in Uptown Chicago, increasing its capability to deliver affordable housing for low-income families.
In 2015, after retiring from HSBC, Marilyn joined The Virtues Project™ because she saw that The Five Strategies offer simple, effective tools for living, while also enabling constructive relationships among families, schools, workplaces, communities and beyond.
Marilyn earned a B.A. in Mathematics from DePauw University and an M.A.T. in Mathematics from the University of Chicago.
Marilyn is also a wife, mother, grandmother and international traveler.
Virtues: Loyalty, Responsibility & Trustworthiness
Shawn Watson has been a facilitator and involved with The Virtues Project for over 30 years and was designated a Master Facilitator by Linda Kavelin Popov in the early days of The Virtues Project.
Shawn is an Architect/Engineer from the Illinois Institute of Technology with a Masters Degree from the University Of Stuttgart. She has teaching credentials in the state of California and Texas, and for 25 years was the owner of the International Early Education Center located in Finland and China. Shawn is also a Toastmaster.
She is married and has six lovely children.
Virtues: Diligence, Discernment and Serenity
Rakesh has been associated with The Virtues ProjectTM since December, 2022. Currently Rakesh is the Board Secretary and is leading the Governance function in VPIA. Born in India and moved to Canada, close friends of Rakesh describe him as a compassionate, spiritual, vivacious, and fun person.
Rakesh has over 14 years of global experience in corporate secretarial, governance, compliance and legal functions and has extensively worked on managing joint ventures, amalgamations, acquisitions & implementation of compliance and digital solutions. He holds a Master’s degree in Commerce (M.Com.) and Law (LL.M.) from the University of Pune, India. Rakesh also holds professional designations such as Associate Company Secretary (ACS) from the Institute of Company Secretaries of India (ICSI) and Associate Chartered Governance Professional (ACG) from the Chartered Governance Institute of Canada (CGIC).
Rakesh believes, as humans, we all have our strengths and weaknesses. With the idea of creating a peaceful community, we should use our individual strengths to uplift the weaker sections of society; only then can we achieve true spiritual growth and empowerment.
Rakesh states that through The Virtues Project, he found an opportunity to contribute to the society at large. He was instantly able to connect with the The Five Strategies of The Virtues Project.
Virtues: Idealism, Compassion & Service
Passion: Making a positive difference in the world by serving The Virtues Project.
Valerie is Virtues Project Master Facilitator and co-owner of Virtues Village, a virtues product and service company. Valerie’s passions include sharing The Virtues Project with others through workshops, training new facilitators and developing virtues products.
Valerie discovered the power of The Virtues Project during her 15 year career serving troubled youth, first as a foster parent where her passion for youth was ignited, followed by establishing four foster/group homes and Brilliant Stars Inc, a non profit to serve the needs of troubled youth. The Virtues Project would now become her mission, as she saw a more powerful way to foster youth by promoting safe and caring families, schools and communities around the world!
Valerie is a mother, grandmother, and caregiver, who is now enjoying family time, friends, travel, gardening and nature walks.
Virtues: Compassion, Accountability, Awe, Assertiveness
Passion: Empowering initiatives that are geared towards creating sustainable positive social change that make the world safer and happier.
Caroline is a business and fund development specialist who is passionate about empowering people-centered change in society. She holds a Diploma in Public Relations and Personnel Administration and has experience working with non-profit and for profit organizations in strategic planning, organizational development, partnership building, operations and imports/export marketing in healthcare supplies.
In 2021, she found the Virtues Project’s The Five Strategies when researching gentle parenting strategies. She immediately was sold on the idea of parenting with virtues and decided to do more research into it. It was an easy decision to volunteer with VPIA when the position was advertised in 2022. She has held the position of Fund Development Chair since April 2022.
Caroline is passionate about empowering and enhancing people-led change agents in society as a solution to societal vices, especially those that impart change without discrimination. She helps community-based organizations plan and implement fund development and sustainability strategies, income generating initiatives and outline participatory social change techniques.
Caroline is a Mom and business owner based in Nairobi, Kenya.
Morae Kim has been a Virtues facilitator since 2009. Born in Germany and raised in a multicultural environment, she developed an open mindset and cultural understanding. Pursuing her passion for drawing, she studied copyright law at Yonsei University and art history at Ewha Womans University.
After being introduced to The Virtues ProjectTM, Morae discovered joy and fulfillment in helping individuals to recognize their inherent worth and inner strength.
Currently, she is actively working alongside her parents to spread The Virtues Project in South Korea
Virtues: Enthusiasm, Purposefulness, Gratitude
Nori is a life learner, always finding new ways to help others connect with their best selves. After graduating in Business Administration at the University of Buenos Aires, she worked for almost 20 years in Multinational companies. During those years she developed expertise in Marketing, Competitive Intelligence, New business Development, Strategic Planning, and was, as Director, member of the Board at Avon cosmetics.
During her years working for Avon cosmetics, she created a new business called “Wellbeing” which was very successful, and it was globalized in many other Countries.
Since that time, she has been passionate about Human Wellbeing.
She has also graduated as life Coach, has an international Certification in coaching by Values, Master in NLP (neuro linguistic program), graduated as Neuro psycho educator specializing in the development of socio-emotional skills, offering trainings and Conferences.
In 2015 she joined The Virtues Project™ where she found her purpose in life. Helping people develop their character strengths became one of her priorities and she found The Five Strategies to be transformational! She then became a Master Facilitator and represents Latin America at the International Advisory Council (IAC). She also participates on the VPIA Board (Representing the IAC).
Nori is also a wife, mother, music lover, international traveler and likes to study many different languages.