Community Events

Item Description

Don't let your MS/US student miss out on this unique and inspirational gathering of community and business leaders!

On February 10, 2019, at the Palo Alto home of a Nueva parent, 20 students will join a discussion and a catered lunch with community leaders (who also happen to be Nueva moms!) about the state of women in leadership, especially in the Bay Area.

Moms include: Jennifer Carolan, Rowan Chapman, Wayee Chu, Verna Kuo, Trae Vassallo, Marcie Vu.

Marcie Vu is co-Head of Qatalyst's Consumer Technology Group. Marcie has 17 years of investment banking experience at Qatalyst, Morgan Stanley and Salomon Brothers advising internet, mobile, software and telecommunications clients on transactions with an aggregate value in excess of $100 billion. She has advised on IPOs including Alibaba.com, Facebook, Google, Green Dot, LinkedIn, Pandora, Yandex and Zynga. Marcie's extensive M&A experience includes advising Admob on its sale to Google, Amazon on its acquisition of Quidsi, CNET on its sale to CBS, Ebates on its sale to Rakuten, eBay on its acquisitions of Gmarket and Rent.com, Elance on its merger with oDesk, Electronic Arts on its acquisition of JAMDAT Mobile, LinkedIn on its sale to Microsoft, MyFitnessPal on its sale to UnderArmour, OpenTable on its sale to Priceline, Orbitz on its sale to Expedia, and Zappos on its sale to Amazon. Marcie received a B.S. in Economics from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and an M.B.A. from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.

Trae Vassallo is a Co-Founder and Managing Director of Defy, an early stage venture capital firm. She is an engineer, an entrepreneur, and an investor, and her passion is collaborating with the world’s best entrepreneurs. Trae recently co-authored the study "Elephant in the Valley" to help highlight the underlying data around the experiences of women in technology. She was previously a General Partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. Before joining KPCB, Trae was a Co-Founder of Good Technology, a KPCB portfolio company. She holds 13 patents across a broad array of technologies and disciplines. Trae earned a Bachelor’s degree and Master’s degree in mechanical engineering with honors from Stanford University and an M.B.A. from the Stanford Graduate School of Business.  

Verna Kuo is the founder and CEO of VHK Investments, LLC, providing advisory services and investment insight to the private equity real assets LP and GP community. Verna currently serves as the outsourced Real Estate and Natural Resource investment manager for Bowdoin College and Georgetown University. Verna currently serves as a Senior Advisor to the Penzance Real Estate firm, helping them launch their first institutional fund. She was the Director of Real Assets at The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, and prior to that was the Director of Real Estate and Natural Resources at the Stanford Management Company. She currently serves on the Advisory Board for The National Teacher Salary Project. Verna earned her BA degree from Stanford University and her MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business.

Wayee Chu is a General Partner at Reach Capital, a venture fund focused on early stage education technology start-ups. Prior to Reach, Wayee was the co-founder of the NewSchools Seed Fund; a fund focused on early stage education technology companies with potential for a big impact in K-12 education. She was also a former associate partner at NewSchools, where she focused on sourcing and supporting early stage education technology entrepreneurs. She also led the NewSchools EdTech Entrepreneurship Lab, in partnership with Teach For America and the Stanford d. school. She currently serves on the Board of Trustees of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Wayee also supports several Bay Area education non-profits including New Leaders, Bay Area and Beyond12. Wayee graduated from the University of Michigan with a bachelor's degree in Economics and Political Science.

Rowan Chapman is the Head of Johnson & Johnson Innovation, California. Prior she was the Head of Healthcare Investing at GE Ventures, where she led the creation of and sat on the boards of the first three Healthcare “NewCos” incubated and launched from GE Ventures. Rowan also served as Head of Precision Diagnostics at GE Healthcare, where she was responsible for strategy development to integrate lab services, products, data, informatics, software, and content. She spent 11 years as a Partner at Mohr Davidow Ventures, where she drove development of the life science investment strategy and practice area. She holds a Ph.D. and first class honors degree in Biochemistry from Cambridge University, U.K. and was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of California, San Francisco.

Jennifer Carolan started her career as a classroom teacher where she taught for seven years in traditional districts. She moved to Silicon Valley in 2000 to attend Stanford University and was inspired by all of the entrepreneurs working on their ideas. She worked at NewSchools Venture Fund and taught Innovations In Teaching at Stanford University. She co-founded her first fund NewSchools Seed Fund in 2011 and co-founded her second Reach Capital in 2015 and Reach II in 2018. These funds have aggregated more than $167M in capital to back amazing entrepreneurs who are passionate about creating exceptional tools for teachers and engaging curriculum for kids. Jennifer currently sit on the boards of Nearpod, EdSurge, WriteLab, BetterLesson, PeopleGrove and FreshGrade. 

Item Special Note

Limited to 20 MS or US students.