Meet Our Team
Lesha Dalton
Consultant
Lesha is an educational consultant with over 30 years of experience in a variety of settings including early childhood, special education, elementary education, and school leadership. Her first passion in education centered around serving students with emotional and behavioral challenges at an inner-city school and working to move them into general education classrooms with support. She then developed a passion for serving students needing early reading and math interventions to help them close gaps while coaching her colleagues to implement solid instructional practices that would benefit all students. Lesha’s passion for supporting students and teachers led her to earn a master’s degree in Educational Administration which launched her into the roles of assistant principal and principal for over 20 years combined. As an administrator, she developed a niche for mentoring and coaching new administrators.
Lesha is a big fan of ripple effects. As a school leader, she recognized that no one teacher or administrator can change the world, but that with shared priorities, the nurturing of hope, positive relationships, purposeful team building, supportive management of change, and effective communication, the outcomes for staff, students and families can be far-reaching and life-changing. She is eager to help school leaders find ways to focus on continuous improvement, build effective communication systems, articulate clear goals, map out plans for achievement, develop leadership capacity among staff, serve diverse student populations, and strengthen school cultures all through a customized approach.
Feel free to reach out to Lesha at leshadalton111@gmail.com
“I alone cannot change the world, but I can cast a stone across the waters to create many ripples.” Mother Teresa
Tina Reck-Guerra
Consultant
Tina Reck-Guerra is an educational consultant with over 30 years of experience as a teacher and school principal. Most of her career has been as an early childhood educator, serving 10 years teaching in a multi-age classroom, 13 years as an elementary administrator, and 7+ years as the director of an early childhood education center in San Antonio, Texas. All of her administrative experience has been working in low-income schools.
Tina earned her bachelor’s degree from The University of Texas at San Antonio in Elementary and Early Childhood Education. She graduated from Trinity University in 2001 with a master’s degree in School Administration.
She is a passionate educator that believes every child deserves a high-quality education. She has found that building a positive and supportive relationship with a child will motivate and inspire them to take risks and learn anything. This principle also applies to teachers.
She understands the importance of making schools a safe place for students, parents, teachers, and all staff. This is done by building relationships, establishing and maintaining routines and structures, celebrating successes and traditions, and clear and open communication with all stakeholders.
One of her favorite quotes is from Thomas Sergiovanni, her professor at Trinity, "(We need) leadership that is tough enough to demand a great deal from everyone, and leadership that is tender enough to encourage the heart.”
Lizzy Perez
Consultant
Lizzy Perez is a leadership coach and consultant who brings over 28 years of experience in education and people transformation through leadership and coaching. Her specialization is coaching clients by forming authentic relationships and resonance in their daily lives. Lizzy uses her connectedness to facilitate an all-out habitat of consciousness-raising, allowing participants to mirror her in the immersion of learning. Demonstrating the essence of trust-building as a leader's most critical asset becomes evident the minute a client has stepped into one of her coaching sessions or any of Lizzy's facilitations.
As an educator and Ph.D. student at Our Lady of the Lake University, Lizzy connects deeply, thinks divergently, visualizes conceptually, and saturates in theory while helping clients formulate their practice. Lizzy received her coaching training from the Institute of Professional Excellence in Coaching (iPEC) where she also became an Energy Leadership Index Master Practitioner (ELI-MP) within that same program. She was also trained by Dr. Brené Brown to become a Certified Dare to Lead™ Facilitator.
Learn more about Lizzy’s credentials and services here: lizzy-perez.com
John Smith
Consultant
John Smith’s career in professional education spans over three decades in both elementary and secondary schools; 11 years teaching in the classroom, 2 years as a technology coordinator, 5 years as an elementary school assistant principal, 3 years as an elementary school principal, and 12 years as a principal at the secondary level. He began his career serving students at an elementary school campus with a 90% economically disadvantaged population. He quickly discovered that clear honest communication with his peers, students, parents, and administration translated to productive communication. As he grew into his administrative career, it became very clear that campus-wide buy-in and organizational structures were required to ensure safe, two-way productive communication.
John’s 33 years in education have allowed him to acquire the skills to support campuses in creating a clear mission, high expectations, collaboration, and an organizational structure built on a foundation of productive communication.
“A leader is best when people barely know he exists. Not so good when people obey and acclaim him. Worse when they despise him. But of a good leader who talks little when his work is done his aim fulfilled, they will say: ‘We did it ourselves.’”
Lao-tse (c. 565 B.C.), on leadership
Terri Eichholz
Terri Eichholz is an educator with 29 years of classroom experience from K-12. She specializes in Gifted and Talented Education, Maker Education, Ed Tech Integration, and STEAM. She has worked for SAISD and NEISD in San Antonio, Texas, and currently consults, conducts professional development, and writes articles about education. She enjoys engaging all students, including adults, with hands-on, student-centered learning. Terri currently works behind the scenes for JL Hinds Consulting, assisting with video editing, graphic design, and other technological demands.
You can read more by visiting her website, engagetheirminds.com, or get in touch with her by emailing engagetheirminds@gmail.com.