Rotary Club of San Marcos

Luene Corwin has been a Rotarian for 17 years. She was president of the Manchester, Connecticut Rotary Club in 1993-94 and of the San Marcos California Rotary Club in 2003-04. Her commitment to Group Study Exchange began with organizing activities and hosting incoming teams in District 7890. Upon moving in 2000 to District 5340, she continued these activities. She and her husband, Norm, have provided homestays for Incoming District Governors attending the International Assembly. In 2004-05 she served as a Foundation Mentor.

In District 7890, Luene's combined interest in the environment and international understanding, led to work on a Planning Grant in the Talamanca Mountains of Costa Rica. A 3-H (Health, Hunger, Humanity) grant for $387,000 was awarded by Rotary International and she helped raise $15,000 in the District. She has made many trips to Costa Rica to keep the work on track and ensure it has been sustained.

Luene’s professional background is in education. After other teaching experiences, she began teaching Food Service Management in a community college. Finding that the community college mission fit her values, she completed her professional life as a chief academic officer in Connecticut. She is currently President-elect of the Palomar College Foundation. She holds a BA from Whittier College, an MS from Simmons College, and a Ph.D. from Cornell University.

A 3rd generation native of California, she is active on the board of a group of cabin owners in order to maintain a cabin her grandfather built in 1927. She gardens in Vista on a "mini-farm" which had belonged to her husband's parents.

6th Grade Language Arts and Social Studies
Ada Harris Elementary School
Sponsor Club:  Del Mar-Solana Beach Sunrise

Margit was born outside of Philadelphia, PA, but grew up in Stockholm, Sweden in a family of seven children. She moved back to PA with her family at the age of twelve. Her teaching career began in Honolulu, Hawaii, and now she lives in beautiful Leucadia, CA.

She received her Bachelor of Science degree in Special Education from the Pennsylvania State University.

Margit currently teaches Language Arts and Social Studies at Ada Harris Elementary School in Cardiff-by-the-Sea. Previously, she taught a Special Day Class program both in Cardiff and at Jefferson Elementary School in Hawaii. This is her tenth year of teaching.

Aside from teaching elementary students, Margit has taught everything from gymnastics to Sunday school to children. Combining her love of children and her artistic talents, she has a summer business painting nurseries and children’s rooms.

French & Spanish
Torrey Pines High/San Dieguito UHSD
Sponsor Club:  Del Mar

An experienced middle school and high school teacher, Guen Butler currently teaches French and Spanish at Torrey Pines High School in the San Dieguito Union High School District (SDUHSD) near San Diego, California. She also teaches conversational Spanish to adults and is a district mentor to teachers new to the SDUHSD. Guen earned a BA from the University of North Texas in 1996 and spent a year teaching conversational English in Le Havre, France.

Further experiences studying abroad include time in Mexico and participation in a Fulbright-Hays Group Project Abroad in Valparaíso, Chile (2001) through San Diego State University and the San Dieguito Union High School District. Guen is certified by the Paris Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Business French and also holds the EXIGE certification for Business Spanish.

Ms. Butler’s most recent project is the development of a two-semester course, Spanish for Professional Communication, for the high school classroom. This course has been adopted by the SDUHSD and was featured at the California Language Teachers Association conference (2002), the Center for International Business and Education Conference (CIBER) in Chapel Hill North Carolina (2002), as well as at the Pennsylvania Conference for International Education (PaCIE, 2002). Ms. Butler has also presented a workshop entitled "Making Foreign Language Curricula more Hands-On" at the Faculty Development in International Business at Ohio State University in 2003, 2004.

World Lit, American Lit, Speech & Debate
La Costa Canyon High/San Dieguito UHSD
Sponsor Club:  Encinitas La Costa

Krista deBoer was born and raised in the Seattle area. She graduated from the University of Washington with an Honors BA in Speech Communication and English Education in 1995. After traveling for three years, Krista finally returned to school, where she earned her Masters in Education from Antioch University in Seattle. She taught in Seattle for a year before moving to San Diego in search of ocean and sun.

Krista has been teaching Speech & Debate and English at La Costa Canyon High School for the past five years. She dedicates much of her time (and most of her weekends during the school year!) to debate, as she wholeheartedly believes in the confidence and skills the program instills in students. As the debate coach, she has worked with Rotary the last five years to hold the first level of the Four-Way Speech Contest on LCC’s campus, and has coached two students to the contest finals. Her passions are education and travel, and she has recently developed a knack for combining the two -- she has led student educational tours to Costa Rica and Europe, and will be taking students on a volunteer trip to the Philippines to work with street children and orphans this summer.

4th Grade
Chollas Elementary/San Diego
Sponsor Club:  San Diego Downtown Breakfast

Thomas Courtney was born in Loma Linda, CA and has spent the last 13 years living and learning in San Diego. A graduate of UCSD with a BA in Economics, he went on to receive a Multiple Subject Teaching Credential from USD in 1998 and is completing a Masters in Education with an emphasis on Literacy from National University. He is a member of the SDSU –SDCS Mathematics Collaborative, and in 2001 was part of a team of teachers to lobby for the Nell Soto Grant, which reimbursed teachers who made home-visits to parents.

Thomas has lived in South Korea where he taught ESL to students of all age categories. He continues to practice Korean and enjoys learning new languages. He has traveled extensively in Europe, taking a solo trip in 2000. He really enjoyed backpacking throughout Western Europe to visit museums and take in the culture. For the last six years, Thomas has taught fourth grade at Chollas Elementary for San Diego City Schools. He greatly enjoys the interactions with students and teachers alike.

English
Scripps Ranch High/San Diego
Sponsor Club:  TBA

Robert was born in the Philippines and remained there until the age of five, when his military father was reassigned to the United States. He graduated from the University of California, San Diego, with a double major in General (World) Literature and The Classics (Latin and Greek). He received his teaching credential from San Diego State University and holds a master's degree in Educational Administration from National University.

In the San Diego Unified School District, he has taught all levels of English (grades 7-12), but has most recently been working with students enrolled in World Literature (10th grade) and Advanced Placement English (11th and 12th grade). He has also coached various Speech and Debate teams and been the advisor of both the yearbook and the newspaper. In addition to his work as an English teacher, Robert also currently works for the College Board doing annual AP English Literature essay grading and training new AP English Literature teachers.

In his time away from school, Robert can be found having fun and adventure with his wife, Maria, and their three children. They enjoy their house and gardening projects. They have made family trips up the California Coast, to Hawaii, in and around Central Mexico, to Vancouver and Alaska; and to the various islands of the Western Caribbean. Robert has also traveled alone to visit the stomping grounds of some of his favorite authors and a few American icons (John Steinbeck, Ernest Hemingway, Martin Luther King, Jr., F. Scott Fitzgerald and William Faulkner) and plans to continue such "purpose-driven" travel-both alone and with his family. Robert and Maria's most memorable recent trip was to New York City to attend a celebration of his favorite author, Gabriel Garcia Marquez.