Bobbi DePorter

Bobbi DePorter is the founder and president of Learning Forum International. Bobbi developed the 8 Keys of Excellence more than 35 years ago as a character education tool for students attending her SuperCamp® summer enrichment programs. She is the author of The 8 Keys of Excellence: Principles to Live By.

Ms. DePorter is an early pioneer in the applications of accelerated learning, which she first applied in her highly successful Burklyn Business School (of which Doria Cordova was a student and eventually continued with the work). She then had the vision to help children realize their personal greatness by teaching these same accelerated learning techniques to them. This inspiration led to the launch of SuperCamp® learning and life skills academic summer camps in 1982.

SuperCamp® has achieved worldwide success with over 80,000 student graduates from the program. The Wall Street Journal reported that SuperCamp® “turns so-so students into academic achievers.” USA TODAY stated that “Schools take a cue from SuperCamp® successes.” Additionally, SuperCamp® was honored in the “Touch America: Showcase of Model Learning Programs,” in Washington, D.C.

Inspired by her success with SuperCamp®, Bobbi established Learning Forum International, a 501(c)(3) non-profit educational corporation based in Oceanside, California. Learning Forum International secures funding from individuals, foundations and corporations to implement learning, life skills and character-building programs in schools and families, in support of 8 Keys of Excellence, and to fund individual student scholarships to SuperCamp®. Ms. DePorter is the founder and president of Quantum Learning Network, which offers training to youth, educators and businesses throughout the U.S. and in over 10 other countries. Bobbi is married to Joe Chapon, her partner in QLN, and has two children, Grant and Dana. She attended the University of Washington and University of Southern California Graduate School of BusinessCME program. Her learning, life skills and character-education programs have impacted more than 20 million young people worldwide.

Bobbi DePorter has written over a dozen books, which have been translated into seven languages, including the following:

Excellence in Teaching & Learning

The Seven Biggest Teen Problems and how to turn them into Strengths

Quantum Learning: Unleashing the Genius in You

Quantum Teaching: Orchestrating Student Success

The 8 Keys of Excellence: Principles to Live By

Quantum Success: 8 Key Catalysts to Shift Your Energy into Dynamic Focus

Quantum Business: Achieving Success Through Quantum Learning

The Quantum Upgrade Series

Ms. DePorter is a 2006 Readers Choice Winner for Fast Company magazine’s “Fast 50” list of leading creative thinkers, and a member of the Transformational Leadership Council.

Dr. Cherie Clark

Dr. Clark is internationally recognized as a leader in her field and an expert in substance abuse treatment. She is co-founder of Social Synergetics™ and has recently retired as the Director of Shock Incarceration and the Willard Drug Treatment Campus (WDTC) for the New York State Department of Correctional Services (NYS DOCS), both programs which she designed and developed. Shock Incarceration is internationally recognized as the leading program of its type in the world. As of reporting in July 2010, NYS DOCS research documents the Shock program contributing more than $1.377 billion in cost savings to the taxpayers of New York State.

In 2001, Dr. Clark earned a Ph.D. in the School of Health and Human Services at Columbia Commonwealth University after obtaining a Master’s Degree in Educational Psychology from the College of St. Rose in Albany, NY. She has studied accelerated learning and transformation technologies for more than 30 years. Her doctoral dissertation,12° Of Freedom: Synergetics and the 12 Steps to Recovery, is considered a ground-breaking work in the field of substance abuse treatment. It includes a comprehensive overview of the model she named Social Synergetics™, offering an innovative, fully integrated model for recovery from addictions and transformation.

She began her tenure in Criminal Justice in 1974, where, within 6 months, she was named Director of Training for the Commission of Corrections, and later promoted to Director of Operations. While at the CDC, Dr. Clark designed and developed the Network Program, the first Total Learning Environment™ (TLE™) in a correctional facility. The Network Program was implemented in 1979, in four correctional facilities, and eventually grew to 31 units in 29 facilitates. One of the Network units still remains in operation, since 1981, at the maximum-security Clinton Correctional Facility, in Clinton, NY.

During this period, Thomas A. Coughlin, then Commissioner of NY DOCS, visited a Network unit at Fishkill Correctional Facility in Fishkill, NY. Commissioner Coughlin was impressed by the positive environment and results he saw at Fishkill. While touring the Network unit in Fishkill, he asked, “Clark, why can’t they (all facilities) all be this way?”

She designed and implemented of the first Street Survival course for Parole Officers.

Dr. Clark created the Shock Incarceration program based on the TLE™  model developed by Dr. Clark for Network and it operated in special facilities, providing a schedule of rigorous physical activity, intensive regimentation, general education, discipline and substance abuse rehabilitation.

As of 2009 more than 40,000 young men and women have graduated from the Shock Incarceration Program and reintegrated successfully into their communities.

In 1990, Dr. Clark was awarded the Governor’s Productivity Award for outstanding contributions to State Government. In 1995, the American Correctional Association acknowledged her for her outstanding contributions to corrections, as “Best in the Business”.

In 2009, Dr. Clark received the Excellence in Leadership Award from the Transformational Leadership Council, of which she is a founding member.

And, on June 6, 2010,the Women’s Prison Association (WPA), the nation’s oldest service and advocacy organization committed to helping women with criminal justice histories, honored Dr. Clark with the Isaac T. Hopper Award for outstanding service to corrections services.

Dr. Clark is the principal author of DOING LIFE!® A Life Skills Program for Recovery from Addictions and SMART CHOICES: A Guide for Making Choices That Work.