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 Leapfrog
Consulting
4118 Lyman Road
Oakland, CA 94602
(510) 482-4049 office
(510) 550-4319 fax
info@leapfrogconsulting.org
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Client
List
Testimonials
Associates
 At Leapfrog Consulting, our passion
is to strengthen “the commons.”
Historically, the commons was a central
piece of land or town square for
everyone’s use and enjoyment.
In the early days, they served as public
grazing areas. The commons represents
community and coming together.
Town commons are still popular gathering
places in small towns across the
world. At Leapfrog Consulting, we
believe that a robust and healthy commons
is a key ingredient to a healthy
society.
What are the commons today? They
are our public education and healthcare
systems, our public parks and libraries,
our arts and cultural institutions, our
nonprofit organizations striving
to serve those in need.
Our calling feels especially urgent
at a time of privatization and loss of public
resources. At Leapfrog Consulting,
we constantly ask, “How can we best take
care of the commons?”
We are beginning to see signs of
hope. For example, new technologies created
in the private sector are now being
extended to the public sector in ways never
before imagined. There are hybrid
organizations and coalitions, blending the
best of the public and private sectors.
Nonprofit organizations have become
well organized and have greater impact.
The name Leapfrog expresses our commitment
to leapfrog directly to state-of-
the-art processes that benefit the
public sector. Just as some countries have
“leapfrogged” over wired
telephone technologies (and purchased wireless
mobile phones instead), we are equipped
with best practices in organizational
development, group collaboration,
and transformative learning.
LeapfrogConsulting
was founded in 2001 by Kayla Kirsch. After working for
six years at The Grove Consultants
International as Director of Public Sector
Consulting, she created Leapfrog
Consulting as a “sister” organization - a
flourishing frog pond in the forest
that focuses exclusively on the needs of
public sector leaders, organizations,
and coalitions. She has created a network
of talented organizational consultants
who are ready to support your work.
Kayla
Kirsch, President of LEAPFROG
CONSULTING, has spent over 20 years
working with non-profit organizations,
particularly healthcare, environmental,
and educational groups. She often
works as a process designer and facilitator,
assisting in strategic planning and
communication, collaborative direction-
setting, and staff/board development.
Prior to founding LEAPFROG
CONSULTING, Kayla directed and served
as lead
Public Sector Consultant for THE
GROVE CONSULTANTS INTERNATIONAL for six
years. During this time, she advanced
her skills in graphic facilitation, process
design, and strategic communications.
From 1990-1995, Kayla worked as senior
analyst at FAR WEST LABORATORY
for Educational Research and Development
(now called WESTED). She served
as Associate Project Director for
a state-wide school reform program in the
Commonwealth of Kentucky, and led
a Systemic Reform Initiative dedicated
to sharing “systems tools”
to address large-scale problems facing schools and
districts. Kayla has worked in many
roles in nonprofit organizations, from
Administrative Director of a dance
company, to serving as a grantwriter and
organizational consultant.
Early on in her career, she received
a grant from the Robert Kennedy Memorial
to explore nontraditional elementary
and secondary schools, in which students
played an active role in their education.
Her year-long travels to 25 schools in
10 states of the USA strengthened
her understanding of transformational learning
processes, as well as the challenges
of developing effective organizational
structures and governance systems.
Kayla received a Masters of Science
degree in Organizational Behavior at the
California School of Professional
Psychology. She also has extensive training in
mediation and conflict-resolution
with the Ombudsman Association.
Kayla is also an Oakland-based artist
and musician and the recipient of a
Creative Artist Fellowship from the
City of Oakland.
EDUCATION
Alameda County Office
of Education
Bay Area School Leadership
Center
Cal-State Monterey Bay
California School Leadership
Academy
Contra Costa Office of
Education
Gila River Tribal Community
Health and Education
Communication Consultants
Museum of Children’s
Art
National Indian School
Board Association
Office of Indian Education
Programs (BIA)
Office of Educational
Technology (DOE)
The Bridge School
UC Berkeley Teaching
& Learning Alliance
HEALTH,
ENVIRONMENT, AND COMMUNITY
California Counseling
Institute
California Department
of Health Services
California HealthCare
Foundation
Center for Genome Ethics,
Law, and Policy, Duke University
Coastside Collaborative
for Children, Youth, and Families
David and Lucile Packard
Foundation
Earth Island Institute
East Bay Community Law
Center
The Ford Foundation
Hospice By the Bay
National Breast Cancer
Coalition
National Park Service
Snowmass Institute
The Tides Foundation
U.S. Cochrane Center,
Brown University
"Kayla's
assertive, yet not imposing, style made it possible to bring a room
full
of opinionated lawyers to introspectively assess our effectiveness
as
Trustees,
understand our mission and bring clarity to the vision we have for
our
school."
Teresa
Guerrero-Daley
Vice
Chair
Lincoln
Law School
“Kayla
is an experienced, insightful consultant who consistently brings
enormous
creativity to her engagements.
She is passionate about taking
people
seriously for their innate worth, and drawing out the wisdom of
groups.
She
is very collaborative during both the design and implementation
of
processes,
and is able to improvise with breaking events with all the skill
of
the
talented musician that she is in her personal life. Her ability
to think at both the
systemic and immediate levels during projects makes her an invaluable
consultant
on any complex project.”
David
Sibbet
President
The
Grove Consultants International
“We
want to extend a huge thank you for your workshop at our School-to-
Career Summer Institute It was exactly what we hoped for. You successfully
engaged everyone in the room and helped them see the value of problem-
based learning strategies.”
Sue
Sawyer
Director
Shasta-Tehama-Trinity
School-to-Career
“I loved the drawings!
The entire day of strategic planning was enlightened
and enhanced by Kayla's
artistic and facilitative skills.”
Ron
Chapman, MD, MPH
Chief, Medicine and Public
Health Section
California Department
of Health Services
"Kayla always has
a positive, “can do” attitude in working through the most
harrowing problems and
conflicted agendas. She is able to guide you through
the details to find the
kernel around which opportunities can be found and
solutions begun.
Kayla was able to support
our central staff in a set of emotional and complex
de-structuring plans
for the elimination of our work. Her guidance in planning,
support of staff, and
facilitation of the larger group directly influenced how we
changed our focus from
resentment to productivity in a changing environment."
Karen
Kearney
WestEd
(former Executive Director
of the CA School Leadership Academy)
“I found you to
be very professional, excellent organizers. You charts were
exceptional. We still
have the one up at the district. We were able to organize
our thoughts and make
the day for our staff.”
Linda
Common
Principal
Woodside High School
"Efficient,
professional, creative!"
Vanessa Girard
Community Educator
Gila River Indian Community
“Kayla
has been an incredible gift to the National Breast Cancer Coalition.
She has helped us design
some of our most important strategy meetings--
meetings with very busy
people who have no time to waste, meetings that
help shape where our
organization is going. Her wide range of expertise,
great listening skills,
and ability to bring out the best in everyone has made
her indispensable. Kayla
has really taught me the meaning of collaborative
work-- she never imposes
an agenda but always finds a way to contribute in
very substantive ways.
By working with Leapfrog,
you can breath a sigh of relief because you know
that you have an incredible
wealth of expertise by your side. You also have a
wonderfully kind and
dependable team player who cares deeply about her
work. Her great spirit
is truly contagious.”
Sara Colina
Senior Policy Analyst
National Breast Cancer
Coalition
info@leapfrogconsulting.org
4118
Lyman Road, Oakland, CA 94602
Oakland,
California 94602
510.482.4049
©
2003, Leapfrog Consulting
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