Staff

Ms. Kristine Withem earned an Associate Degree in Early Childhood Education and spent five years serving as an Assistant Teacher at the Montessori Community School of Salt Lake City. She holds certificates in the Foundations of Montessori and Montessori Approaches to Special Education. Ms. Kristine worked as a co-teacher at the Appalachian State University Childcare Development Center from 2022 to 2023. Read more

Ms. Madeleine Gau holds a Bachelor of Arts in both Public Relations and Spanish language in 2020 and is passionate about bilingual education. After working in traditional early-childhood education programs, she became interested in Dr. Montessori's methods for early childhood education. Ms. Madeleine is passionate about child development and about learning more about Dr. Montessori's methods for early childhood education. Read more

Ms. Karina Velazquez earned a Bachelor of Science Degree in Early Childhood Education in 2007 from Centro Superior de Pedagogia Mentor Mexicano in Tijuana, Mexico. During her last year of college, she began working as a preschool teacher in a traditional school. In 2010, she had the opportunity to get to know the Montessori philosophy in depth and began working as a Primary school assistant at Kinderhouse Montessori School. Attending a Montessori-prepared environment was when she fell in love with this unique way of learning. At that time, Ms. Karina decided to take the training to become a certified Montessori Guide at the FAMM training center in Buenos Aires, Argentina and earned an Association Montessori Internationale (AMI) Diploma to become an AMI Guide at the Fundacion Argentina Maria Montessori (FAMM) in Buenos Aires, Argentina in 2011 and began working as a Montessori Guide. Read more

Ms. Melissa Vazquez earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Education, Arts and Sciences from San Diego State University in 2017. After completing her Degree, she continued her preparation in the field of Child Development while working in elementary school computer science programs as a coding teacher at ThoughtStem LLC. In early 2020, Ms. Melissa pursued an infant/toddler teacher position at KinderCare Learning Centers where she developed her instructive practices. Read more

Ms. Flor Roshnaye has over three decades of experience in childcare. She helped build childcare programs at the Mission Valley YMCA to work in the food service department for the San Diego Unified School District. She enjoys seeing the growth of all the children she has taken care of over the years. Seeing them go from children to high school and college graduates makes her very happy. Read more

Ms. Olivia Ventimiglia earned a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology from UC Santa Cruz in 2021. She most enjoyed her Child Development and Child Psychology courses and has been enthusiastic to apply what she learned in her courses to her role at La Jolla Montessori School. Read more

Ms. Kalpana Masaram earned her Bachelor of Science Degree in Computer Sciences from MIST Engineering College and a Master of Science Degree in Informational Technology from ASTRA University in India. After graduation, she worked as an Assistant Professor teaching Sophomores and Juniors IT-related coursework at an Indian University. She enjoyed the academic teaching environment and inspired her students engaging them in group discussions. Read more

Ms. Luz De Leon earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Language Teaching in English, Spanish, and French in 2018 at el Universidad Autónoma de Baja California, Mexico. She also earned an AMI Montessori Orientation Certificate for children 3 - 6 years of age in 2020 at el Fundación Argentina Maria Montessori in Argentina, Buenos Aires. Ms. Luz has experience working with children since 2009 and hopes to make a better world by teaching the young ones using the Montessori method. Read more