Teachers and Staff

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Teachers
Our teachers are fully qualified early childhood educators and native Spanish speakers. They provide opportunities for the children to develop an understanding of self and others. Our teachers interact with our children with warmth, personal respect, individuality, positive support and responsiveness. They pay close attention to developing each child’s social skills and sustaining his/her intellectual growth, while providing the children with a variety of developmentally appropriate activities. Our teachers ensure that activities are inspired by the children and their own interests.

We offer full benefits to our teachers and we have an outstanding teacher retention rate.

Director
Our director, Franca Cioria, is an experienced early childhood educator with a background in language/bilingual acquisition and early child cognitive development. Franca trained at U.C. Child Study Center and went on to manage and co-direct a local non-profit preschool. In 2002, Franca helped establish a toddler program at Via Nova and in early 2012, Franca returned to Via Nova as the Program Director. Franca served for multiple years as an elected steering committee member of the Alameda County Child Care Planning Council, an agency that acts as a resource for decision makers by formulating best practices, monitoring legislation, and advising policymakers on issues impacting early care and education. Franca is also a mother of two (now adult) children who grew up in the Berkeley Unified School system, where she sat on various boards.