ROBERT G. FLANDERS JR. Esq., Chairman
Justice Robert G. Flanders, Jr. was born and grew up on Long Island in North Massapequa, New York and graduated from Chaminade High School in Mineola.  He then attended Brown University and graduated magna cum laude in 1971.  While a law student at Harvard, Justice Flanders played minor league baseball for the Tigers and served as an editor of the Harvard Law Record.

After graduation from law school in 1974, he began his legal career as a litigation associate with the New York firm of Paul, Weiss, Rifkin, Wharton & Garrison.  Returning to Rhode Island in 1975, he joined Rhode Island's oldest and largest firm, Edwards & Angell, where he became a partner and Chairman of the firm's Litigation Department while also serving as assistant executive counsel to the Governor of Rhode Island.  He ran for and was elected to the Town Council of Barrington, where he served for two terms.  He became the town solicitor for Glocester, Rhode Island and general counsel to the Rhode Island Solid Waste Management Corporation.  In 1987, he founded his own business and government litigation firm, Flanders + Medeiros.  In 1996, after serving as special prosecutor for the Judicial Tenure and Discipline Commission and being chosen as one of five finalists by a judicial merit-selection commission, Governor Almond named Justice Flanders to a vacant seat on the five member Rhode Island Supreme Court.  On March 29, 1996, at age 46, Justice Flanders was sworn in as one of the five Justices of the Rhode Island Supreme Court.

In 2004, after eight years of service on the Supreme Court, Justice Flanders resigned to return to private law practice as a partner in the law firm of Hinckley, Allen & Snyder.  He has also served as a “Distinguished Visiting Professor of Law” at the Roger Williams University Law School, where he has taught constitutional law and judicial process courses, and as an Adjunct Assistant Professor of Law and Public Policy at Brown University, where he is teaches courses on constitutional theory and the judicial process. 

Justice Flanders serves as a member of various boards of directors and commissions, including the CARE New England Hospital system, Women & Infants Hospital (vice chair of the board), the Providence Performing Arts Center, the Veteran’s Memorial Auditorium, the Rhode Island Historical Society, Common Cause of Rhode Island, the Brown University Leadership Advisory Council, and the Greater Providence YMCA, where he served as Chairman of the Board for a three-year term that ended on May 29, 2003. 

He and his wife Ann live in East Greenwich, RI and have three adult children and two grandchildren.

PATRICK A. GUIDA, Esq., Vice-Chairman
Patrick A. Guida is an active partner with the Providence law firm of Tillinghast Licht LLP, practicing primarily in the areas of banking and commercial and real estate lending and development. He and his wife live in Barrington, Rhode Island, where each of their children attended the public schools. He received his B.A. from Union College, in Schenectady, New York, and his Juris Doctor degree from Case Western Reserve University, where he served as editor of the Law Review. He was elected to the Barrington School Committee in 1996 and has served as its Chairman since 1998. In 1999 he was elected to the Executive Committee of the Rhode Island Association of School Committees (RIASC) and continues to serve in that capacity. He was first elected as an officer of RIASC in 2000, was elected President in 2002, and re-elected the following year. Mr. Guida was appointed to the Board of Regents in 2001, and elected its Vice-Chair in 2005, and serves as Chairman of its Progressive Support and Intervention Committee. At the national level, Mr. Guida has represented the State of Rhode Island at the National School Board Association (NSBA) National Delegate Assembly since 2000 and has served as the Northeast Region Representative on both the National Nominating Committee and Policies and Resolutions Committee of NSBA.

COLLEEN CALLAHAN, Secretary
A former sixth-grade and special education teacher in Lincoln, Rhode Island, with 21 years of classroom experience, Colleen Callahan has served as the Rhode Island Federation of Teachers and Health Professionals (RIFTHP) Professional Issues Director since 1991. As Director of Professional Issues, Ms. Callahan coordinates the organization’s professional development networks, including its statewide Education Research & Dissemination and Redesigning Schools Networks, and is responsible for direct services to members through coursework and on-site presentations. She assists local union leaders in negotiating for and supporting professional issues and school-improvement initiatives and works regularly with the Rhode Island Department of Education and other state agencies on education policy. Ms. Callahan also represents the RIFTHP as the Co-Director of the Rhode Island Skills Commission, a partnership with the Rhode Island Department of Education and local school districts to support standards-based instruction and assessment leading to a Certificate of Initial Mastery. She is serving her second term as an appointed member of the Rhode Island Board of Regents for Elementary and Secondary Education, where she chairs the Board’s Committee on Academic and Student Programs and recently co-authored the Regents’ High School Regulations.

AMY BERETTA
Amy Beretta is a 1989 graduate of Northeastern University School of Law. In 1997 she formed a law office performing work exclusively for, and employed by, MetLife Auto & Home. Her office is responsible for litigating cases in state and federal courts in Rhode Island and interpreting insurance contract language. She manages and oversees office administration and she acts as an arbitrator in personal injury litigation. Ms. Beretta serves on the Rhode Island Bar Association Ethics Committee, is a board member and Treasurer for the Defense Counsel of Rhode Island, and served on the Rhode Island Supreme Court ADR Task Force. At the local level she has served as a board member, secretary, and treasurer of the Providence Animal Rescue League and, along with her husband, has chaired the Bishop’s Ball for St. Joseph’s Health Services. She lives in East Greenwich with her husband, Richard, and their two children. She was appointed to the Board of Regents in 2005 and chairs the Board’s Appeals Committee.

ANNA CANO-MORALES

Anna Cano Morales earned an undergraduate degree in human development, counseling and family studies from the University of Rhode Island and a minor in Latin American Literature in 1991. In 1998 she received a Master’s of Social Work form Rhode Island College. She has worked as a social worker in the following agencies: Rhode Islanders Sponsoring Education (RISE), SStarbirth, Providence Community Health Centers, Women & Infants Hospital, and in Florida’s Broward County’s Community Health Centers. She is currently employed as the Senior Community Philanthropy Officer at the Rhode Island Foundation. Before coming to the Foundation she served on the board of directors of Gateway Healthcare and Women’s Health and Educations Fund.

Ms. Cano Morales’ interest in children and families led her to volunteer in several community based organizations for many years. She was a volunteer nursery assistant for over four years at Family Aids Center for Treatment and Services (F.A.C.T.S) and she spearheaded the development and implementation of a faith-based after-school program for children with English as a Second Language needs in Central Falls and Pawtucket through Project Bridges (Proyecto Puentes) based at a local faith –based institution. Currently she is the Chairwoman of the Central Falls School Board of Trustees and a Board member of Grant maker's Council of Rhode Island, and represents the Foundation on LISC’s Child Care Facilities Fund committee. Along with her program officer duties she currently leads the Hispanics in Philanthropy funding collaborative and grant making for the Foundation. A native of Central Falls, she now resides in North Providence.

FRANK CAPRIO, ESQ.
Judge Frank Caprio was appointed to the Board of Governors for Higher Education in October 1997 to fill a vacancy and was reappointed in 2002, having previously served on the Board from 1992 to 1995. He was appointed the Chairman of the Governors in January 2003 and reappointed in 2005. As the Chairman of the Governors, he also sits as a member of the Board of Regents for Elementary and Secondary Education. He is currently the Chief Judge of the Municipal Court of Providence and a senior partner in Caprio and Caprio Law Offices. Judge Caprio has a bachelor's degree from Providence College and a LL.B. from Suffolk University. Judge Caprio chairs the Board of Governor’s Facilities Committee and is an ex-officio member of all other Board of Governors committees.

ANGUS DAVIS
In 1999, Angus Davis co-founded Tellme Networks, a Silicon Valley technology
firm that he grew to a profitable business with more than 300 employees and over $100 million in sales. In April 2007, Microsoft made its largest-ever purchase of a private company by acquiring Tellme as a wholly-owned subsidiary.

Today, Angus develops business and technology strategies to guide Tellme's direction across the Microsoft product family. Prior to Tellme, Angus joined Netscape Communications in 1996, bypassing college to become the company's youngest employee. At Netscape, he served in various roles including product manager for the flagship Netscape Navigator Web browser. Angus has addressed numerous industry conferences on technology and business, and he has been a guest lecturer on entrepreneurship at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, Harvard Business School, Berkeley's Haas School of Business, MIT Sloan and Brown University. In 2006, Business Week named him one of the top tech entrepreneurs under 30. He serves on the board of the non-profit Center for Education Reform, in Washington, DC, and as a founder of Best for Kids, a Rhode Island non-profit seeking to improve public education. Angus was appointed by Governor Carcieri to serve on the Rhode Island Board of Regents in June 2007 to replace a vacancy. A native of Bristol, Rhode Island, today Angus lives in Providence.

KARIN FORBES
Karin L. Forbes is the former Vice-Chair of the North Kingstown School Committee. As part of her duties, she was the Chair of the Policy Subcommittee. Mrs. Forbes taught school in East Greenwich from 1968-78. While she was raising her two children, she became involved in her community’s educational efforts. She was involved in North Kingstown’s Technology and Curriculum Committees, and she worked with the North Kingstown High School community to put forward the Annenberg Institute on Secondary School Reform “Breaking Ranks.” At present, she is involved in the Wickford Middle School Advisory Committee and the North Kingstown Rotary Club, where she is a past president. She was appointed to the Board of Regents in 2005. She is currently the Chair of the Board of Regents Education Quality Committee.

BETSY P. SHIMBERG

Since 1990, Betsy Shimberg has worked with social service, education and civil rights non-profit organizations in Boston, New York City, Trenton and Providence, and has been a manager, policy advocate, fundraiser and board member.  Ms Shimberg moved to Rhode Island in 2001 and became involved with several youth-serving organizations.  She is the current Vice-Chair of the Board of Youth in Action, a Providence youth leadership development organization. Ms Shimberg serves on the Board of the Paul Cuffee School, a maritime charter school in Providence.  She is an active volunteer in the East Greenwich schools, currently serving as Co-President of the Frenchtown Elementary School Parent-Teacher Group and as a member of the East Greenwich School’s Public Relations Committee.  Ms Shimberg is the current Secretary of the Board of Temple Sinai, where she also chairs the Membership Committee.  She was appointed to the Rhode Island Board of Regents in 2008.

Ms Shimberg received her Bachelor of Arts in history, magna cum laude, from Wellesley College in 1990.  She is a graduate of Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs, where she earned a Master’s degree in Public Administration in 1997.  A native of Cleveland, Ohio, Ms Shimberg and her husband live in East Greenwich, where their two children attend the public schools.