Leaving a place better than when you came is the ideal received from her mother. In Mendocino County, Ann Kelly was the founding curator of the Grace Hudson Museum in Ukiah, co-published books on local history, started a youth hockey program that served kids for over 10 years, and was a founder and director of La Vida Charter School since 2001. Born in North Dakota, raised in Ohio, Kelly came to California during the “back to the land” movement reliving the experiences of her pioneer ancestors. Family, especially her creative parents have been a great inspiration. Her father, a photo-journalist interviewed such greats at Caesar Chavez and Mother Theresa and covered the great March on Washington where Martin Luther King gave his I Have a Dream speech. Her mother started school programs, battered women shelters, sponsored Viet Nam refugees, and volunteered in the prisons. Events within the educational setting have been important highlights in her life such as taking astronomy in a huge planetarium; being at Sonoma State in the experimental ‘70’s, when there was always some surprise happening in ones path. Then in graduate school at Oberlin, assisting at one of the finest college museums in the country, handling ancient artifacts as well as works by great masters both ancient and modern. Then travelling the country, looking at art and interviewing important artists. Finally being a part of the inventive charter school movement and getting a masters in charter school leadership. At La Vida, Kelly believes that working toward a personalized education embodying freedom is both inspiring and satisfying.
