Board of Directors

Angela Cassidy, a lifelong resident of Indiana and a proud alumnae of Indiana University, retired after a 33 year career as Vice President and Trust Officer with JPMorgan Chase Bank. Active in her community and church as a volunteer all of her adult life she has served on several not-for-profit boards, including St. Vincent Mercy Hospital Foundation and United Way of Madison County. Angela and her husband of 40 years, Tom, began visiting Borrego Springs in the early 80's and now call Borrego their "home away from home" from January to May. In Borrego, Angela volunteers at the elementary school and at the Borrego Art Institute and belongs to St. Barnabas Episcopal Church. Angela and Tom have two sons and two grandchildren…

I have a bachelor of science degree in teaching the deaf from Northwestern University, a masters degree in counselling from San Diego State University and an EDD in educational leadership from United States International University. I worked with San Diego Unified School District for 30 years as a teacher, counsellor, principal and trainer in the area of race and human relations. With AVID, I worked evaluating programs throughout the world on preparing low income and first time students going to college. I also was on the board and co-directed a K – 12 online school. I've been actively involved with Borrego Springs Unified School District for many years and have been substituting in the classroom K-12 for the past several years. I have been on the BASIC board for 10 years, the last two as president.

Retired educator and community leader with advanced degrees in education and social work.

Retired school teacher; Learning Academy math instructor and Dean of Students.

Bilingual (English/Spanish) lifelong Borrego Springs resident; K–8 educator with 20+ years in BSUSD; M.Ed. in Educational Leadership, SDSU; co-owner of Carlee's Restaurant.

Joann Stang is the Founder of BASIC's Learning Academy and a founding member of BASIC. She chaired the Circle of Art for 9 years, served on the scholarship committee for 18 years and served the organization in a variety of leadership roles. Joann's passion for support of education comes from her belief that education of all is a foundation of our democratic system. She has had leadership and management responsibility as Corporate Director for Human Resources at Solar Turbines, a Caterpillar Company, with international human resources societies and in volunteer organizations in San Diego and Michigan, her summer home…

Joanne S. Ingwall, Ph.D. is currently Emerita Professor of Medicine (Physiology) at Harvard Medical School, having retired from an active research career in cardiac energetics and function in 2012. Since moving back to California in 2006, Joanne has transferred her energy from the academic arena to several volunteer organizations, including the ABDSP Paleontology Society and the ABDSP Botany Society. Joanne's major volunteer activity in Borrego has been as a member of the board of BASIC. She has served as its CFO/treasurer, a member of the scholarship selection committee and associate director of BASIC's Cradle to Graduation C2G program. In the summers, she and her husband Dick are active in several citizen scientist projects in Cape Cod, Massachusetts.

Borrego Springs native, BSHS graduate, and small business owner; immigrated from Mexico; BOD of OLAX; longtime BASIC volunteer.

Trained engineer and founder of nationwide tech and education initiatives; BSUSD web coding mentor.

Retired doctor and community volunteer.

Sharon Goldsmith and her late husband Jerry discovered Borrego Springs while bird watching in 1990. Two days here eventually became four months each year; when not in Borrego, Sharon lives near the Everglades in SW Florida. Sharon holds a PhD in Developmental Psycholinguistics from Graduate Center of the City University of New York where her research focused on the relationship between reading disabilities and language disabilities. Deemed an international expert in Standards, Certification and Accreditation, Sharon currently heads a consulting group that works with schools, colleges, private and governmental organizations worldwide to improve educational systems and achieve compliance with internationally recognized standards of best practice. Trained as a speech language pathologist, Sharon has worked variously as a teacher trainer in NY and MA, and as Director of Special Education for a MA school district; ultimately she became Assistant Commissioner of Education for the Commonwealth where she supervised statewide efforts in development and evaluation of new special education programs before being recruited to work at the (inter)national level as Director of Professional Affairs and Senior Advisor for the American Speech Language Hearing Association in Washington DC.

With 14 years as an administrator in the Borrego Springs Unified School District, Martha Deichler has a passion for the families and children who call our rural desert oasis their home. She currently works as the School Community Liaison to connect our students to the resources that allow them to grow and flourish, most specifically the rich educational opportunities offered by BASIC.