Meet The Team
Chiara Angelicola, she/her
Founder | Head of School
Chiara Angelicola has an academic background in developmental psychology along with 18 years of working experience in the field of early childhood education as an educator and director. She is a California native, Guatemalan-American and of Italian descent. She is a children's book author and published contributor to various educational magazines including the North American Reggio Emilia Alliance periodical. She is the founder and Head of School of the Silver Lake Center for Creativity (SLCC) which was recently rated by Business Insider as one of the most prestigious preschools in Los Angeles.
In 2016, she was a founding contributor and designer of The Discovery School's first kinder-prep classroom within the walls of the Bay Area Discovery Museum (BADM) in Sausalito, CA. During this time, Chiara worked beside BADM's on-site Center for Childhood Creativity to implement the nation's latest cutting-edge research on STEM, creativity, and collaboration-focused learning experiences.
Angelicola has taught on both U.S. coasts, from the Park Slope neighborhood of Brooklyn, NY to the entrepreneurial city of San Francisco. She continues to seek both quantitative and qualitatively impactful data which supports implementing widespread practicum for the first five years of life emphasizing creativity and problem-solving skills. She is an advocate for supporting equitable and inclusive long-term social-emotional and academic outcomes for children within pluralist communities.
She is interested in contributing to the diverse perspectives and professional lenses within educational leadership, politics, and policies in addition to culling and messaging best practices steeped in the comprehensive development of creativity and problem-solving skills in young children.
Chiara offers consultations for parents, educators, and schools. She is also a musician and enjoys cooking, dancing to Kate Bush, and hiking in the redwood forests of California with her partner and daughter Leona Lulú.
Eunice Rhee, she/her
Assistant Director | Lead Educator
Eunice is Korean-American and raised in Los Angeles. She's been a part of SLCC since 2019. She received her Bachelors in Developmental Psychology from the University of California Santa Cruz in 2018 and then immediately attended Los Angeles Valley College as a Child Development major.
She has always had an interest in working with children ever since working at Kumon Math & Reading Center right after she graduated high school. In her last year in Santa Cruz, she had the opportunity to work at a Coastal Community Preschool. Through this great opportunity, she realized she wanted to pursue becoming a preschool teacher. That's when she decided to take early childhood education classes at LAVC so she could earn her teacher, site supervisor, and director permits. Eunice facilitates our Story Workshops for students enrolled in Extended Day programming.
Shanelle Robino she/her
Educator
Shanelle is Filipino-American, born and raised in the Bay Area. She first began her career as a teacher in 2019 and has experience working with the Reggio Emilia and co-constructivist philosophies. She received her A.A. in Early Childhood Studies with Honors in 2020 and her Child Development Teacher Permit in 2022. She is passionate and committed to developmentally appropriate practices. From joining the SLCC community, she hopes to discover and bring out the best in both her students and self in all domains of development. In her free time she enjoys drawing, sewing, photography, walking, hiking and listening to many different genres of music. She believes childhood is the most important time in one’s life and hopes for all children to grow positively socially, emotionally, physically and cognitively. She also hopes to foster the creativity and imagination of her students while remaining inspired in her own creative outlets.
Maria Rodriguez, she/her
Beautification Schoolkeeper
Maria is our school’s beautification lead, regularly tending to our operational needs and making sure our community goes above and beyond the CDC guidelines to provide the highest quality health and disinfection standards on a daily basis.
Maria is a native Spanish speaker and regularly speaks her native language with our Spanish-speaking learners. Maria will often babysit or nanny for the families of our school community and is a mother of three. She is beloved by all of the SLCC children, staff, and parents.
Marika Zappas, she/her
Occupational Support
Specialist & Substitute
Marika Zappas is our occupational support specialist and substitute teacher. Born in Las Vegas, raised in Los Angeles and educated in Boston and Portland, she graduated with a BA in Anthropology, with a focus on international children's media.
Marika has spent the past 10 years in Brooklyn, NY working as an evaluator for an education research nonprofit, a teacher in programs for infants through tweens, and a children's developmental gym director and regional director.
Upon moving to LA in early 2020, Marika continued to work remotely for the collection of developmental gyms revising the holistic cognitive, socio-emotional and physical development-centered curriculum and advising the staff. She also took time during the pandemic to complete an Early Childhood Education certificate and is currently procuring a Master's in Educational Psychology, with an early childhood concentration.
Marika also works at a pediatric occupational therapy clinic, providing fine, gross and graph-motor tutoring for the young clients. She loves fostering a joy of movement in her students and helping children find strategies to help regulate themselves and their sensory needs. She's also always ready to support scientific curiosity, outdoor learning, and artistic exploration.
Marika loves to hike, dance, play with her dog, Osito, and go to the beach. She is learning to be a better gardener and looks forward to her weekly compost drop-offs. She looks forward to exploring and discovering alongside the vibrant students, teachers, and family community at SLCC on a regular basis.