Former (Alumni) Board Members
Listed below in alphabetical order are former members of the board of directors for VALHEN.
-
Benavides, Sindy (Student Representative) has served as the Democratic National Committee Director for Community Outreach and Voting since summer 2009. Prior to that, she held joint appointments as Latino Liaison to Virginia’s Governor Timothy Kaine and Director of Appointments for the Secretary of the Commonwealth. As Latino Liaison, she worked closely with Latino leaders and organizations serving the Latino community throughout the Commonwealth of Virginia
-
Campo, Carlos (Treasurer) is the 8th President of Regent University in Virginia Beach. He was elected to that position on October 28, 2010, after serving as the Chief Academic Officer and Vice President of Academic Affairs since 2008. Dr. Campo's career progression includes more than 20 years in education. After teaching English at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV) for ten years, he joined the College of Southern Nevada (CSN) in 1998 as an English professor. Dr. Campo advanced to dean of arts and letters in 2005, then to director of academic partnerships, and finally to interim vice president of academic affairs before accepting his current position with Regent. In 2007, Dr. Campo was recognized as Outstanding Educator by the Clark County (Nevada) Commission, Educator of the Year by the Las Vegas Latin Chamber of Commerce and was given the Champion of Education Award by the National Latin Business Association. In 1993, the UNLV Foundation honored his dissertation, Friendship in Arthur Miller, as the Dissertation of the Year. Dr. Campo is an active member of the Arthur Miller Society; he hosted their 11th annual conference in Las Vegas in 2006. He was a founding Board member of VALHEN, serving as Treasurer during his tenure with the organization.
-
Cortijo-Doval, Elin (Community Representative) is an Assistant Professor in Management at the Reginald F. Lewis School of Business at Virginia State University in Petersburg. She is a national and international consultant in the areas of education, behavior intervention, transition, leadership, empowerment, and advocacy for people with disabilities and their families and an expert on Self-Determination, Transition, Universal Design, Person-Centered Practices and Autism. She has coauthored chapters in two text books: “The Good Behavior Game” in Offentlichen Schulen Anwendungsmöglichkeiten und Chancen (Hillenbrand, C. & Pütz, K. Hrsg.2008) and “Applications for youth with autism spectrum disorders” in Life beyond the classroom: Transition strategies for young people with disabilities (P. Wehman,Ed., 4th edition, 2006).She has served on the Virginia Latino Advisory Board and is a member of the Virginia Autism Council. Dr. Cortijo-Doval holds a doctorate in Special Education and Disability Policy and a Masters of Education from the School of Education at Virginia Commonwealth University. She also holds a mediation certification from the Center for Mediation Key Bridge Foundation, Washington, D.C., and is a graduate from the Leadership Metro Richmond and Partners in Policy Program of Virginia.
-
Doval, Christopher N. (Board Member) is an Assistant Professor at Virginia State University’s School of Business, where he has developed the undergraduate curriculum focusing on areas of ethics, legal studies and intellectual property as they pertain to digital and business environments. His research interests include patent and market research on inventions of university professors, and the civil and property rights of people with disabilities. Prior to joining VSU, Mr. Doval worked at Syracuse University’s Office of Transfer and Industrial Development, the Burton Blatt Institute
-
Mejia, Judy (Secretary) is the Associate Director of Civic Engagement and Social Justice at Eugene Lang College New School for Liberal Arts in New York City, responsible for implementing sponsored initiatives that promote community-engaged scholarship and teaching among faculty and students while involving and benefiting communities. Prior to that, she was the Program Manager for the Richmond Families Initiative at the Bonner Center for Civic Engagement of the University of Richmond. <br><br> She earned a B.A. with honors in Communication with minors in Latin American Studies and Business Management from George Mason University, Fairfax Campus. She also holds an M.A. from Columbia University’s Graduate School of Education, Teachers College, in Education Policy. A Richmond native, Mejia worked for five years in education policy and research for the New York State Education Department and for the New York City Council Education Committee. In New York, she managed university-community partnerships in the Bronx and Harlem for both the City University of New York’s Lehman College and Columbia University’s Teachers College.
-
Pacheco, Aida (Board Member) works for the Virginia Community College System, Workforce Development Services, providing strategic leadership and policy direction as staff to the Virginia Workforce Council. She has extensive experience in program development and management, technical assistance and consultation, networking and building collaborative partnerships, and community organizing and planning.
-
Rosa-Casanova, Sylvia (Treasurer) is the Compliance Manager for the private and Out-of-State- Postsecondary Education unit of the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia (SCHEV). She earned a B.A. with honors in English from Mercy College and a M.A. in Writing from Manhattanville College. A native of New York, she was director of the Higher Education Opportunity Program (HEOP) at Manhattanville College- a program serving economically disadvantaged and academically underprepared students. Prior to relocating to Virginia in 2007, she held the position of Research Compliance Manager at Columbia University. A published author, her children’s book Mama Provi and the Pot of Rice, a Reading Rainbow selection published in 1997, relates the story of a Puerto Rican grandmother and the multi-ethnic feast she collects on the way to visit her granddaughter. She was also a contributor to Chicken Soup for the Latino Soul.