Meet Our Staff and Board

Marla comes to Sage with a strong background in natural resources, working with the USFS, and the BLM. She earned her B.A. in Biology at Southern Oregon University, and is certified to teach special education and alternative education. She taught in a charter school in Taos, New Mexico, and at Henley Middle School in Klamath County, before coming to Sage. Her interests are: horses, food, books, gardening, hiking, and kayaking. Marla and her husband live in Klamath Falls. Her husband, Jan, works in the OIT Library as an Access Services Manager. Their daughter and son-in-law live in Portland, as artists, raising Marla’s first grandchild.

”I love how we focus on the outside world for our school curriculum through place-based education.”

Stephanie Vetter earned her Bachelor’s of Science degree in Early Childhood and Elementary Education at Southern Oregon University and Initial I Teaching License in June of 2009. Stephanie taught preschool at Sage last school year and is looking forward to an exciting year teaching the 4th/5th grade. She is continuing her coursework through Southern Oregon University, working toward her Master’s of Education degree. Stephanie is very enthusiastic about teaching children and is determined to provide learning opportunities that are well balanced and valuable for her students. When Stephanie is not working or attending classes online, she enjoys photography, running, reading, hiking, and being outdoors.

“The aim of education should be to teach us rather how to think, than what to think – rather to improve our minds, so as to enable us to think for ourselves, than to load the memory with thoughts of other men.”- Bill Beattie

“Teachers teach more by what they are than by what they say.”
- Unknown

Suk Ching is our very talented and intelligent Sage Beginnings teacher. She grew up in Hong Kong. Her credentials include a BA in Geography, a postgraduate certificate in Education, an MS in Information Technology in Education, and an MA in Elementary Education. She attended the University of Hong Kong and the University of Phoenix in the U.S.A. She spent 10 years teaching geography and Chinese History in a secondary school in Hong Kong. She loves traveling. On one of her trips to America, she met Wayne Vincent from Chiloquin, Oregon. They later got married, and moved to Chiloquin. They now have a lovely baby girl, Miranda. Suk Ching enjoys reading, kayaking, and hiking.

”Education is simply the soul of a society as it passes from one generation to another.”— G.K. Chesterson

Brenda was born in Portland and grew up in Salem, Oregon. She received a Liberal Arts Degree from Eastern Oregon University with a minor in History and Psychology. She earned a Post-Baccalaureate license K-8 through Western Governors University and is currently finishing a Masters in Elementary Education (K-8) through Western Governors University.

I became a teacher to help children know that they can succeed and achieve at whatever their dreams are in life, and to never say, “I can’t”, but always say “I can.” William Butler Yeats a poet once wrote “Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.” As a teacher, I want to light the fire for young children, to show them that learning is fun, and it has its many rewards.

The past ten years, I have worked in the school system as an instructional assistant and a teacher. My experiences range in the regular classroom settings (k-12) to the special education classrooms. This past school year I have had the great opportunity to teach in a dual classroom setting (Kindergarten/First) at Sage Community School. Prior to working at Sage, I taught in South Dakota which I worked at Lower Brule Sioux Reservation School. I have had the great opportunity in working with some extraordinary teachers that have truly inspired me.

“A mind once stretched by a new idea never regains its original dimensions.” Anonymous