Leadership
Board Members
Erik Bose is the Executive Director of Albuquerque Charter Academy. He has been working in education since 1993. Mr. Bose started as a High School Soccer Coach as he worked his way through college. He attended UNM and earned his BA in History/Education in 1996 and eventually became licensed as a Special Education teacher. His first teaching job was at Manzano High School from 1996-2000 where he taught Special Education classes and coached the varsity soccer team to a state championship. Mr. Bose then transferred and taught inclusion classes at McKinley Middle School from 2000-2004. While at MMS, he was accepted into the CEAIP program at UNM where he earned his Master’s Degree in Educational Leadership in 2004.
That same year, Mr. Bose was hired at SIATech Charter High School and worked his way up through the classroom, to assistant principal, to principal and now the Executive Director of Albuquerque Charter Academy. He currently holds board positions for the NM Association of Secondary School Administrators, Gordon Bernell Charter High School, NM Coalition of Charter Schools and is the President for the NM Coalition of Educational Leaders. Mr. Bose is proud to make education his profession.
Caryl Thomas has been active in the New Mexico charter movement since 2004. In July of that year, she opened the doors of Cesar Chavez Community School, a charter high school in Albuquerque serving at-risk students. She served as the Director/Principal of the school until her retirement in June 2015. Caryl joined the NMCCS board in 2010 as a school member and continues to serve as an at-large member since retirement. She brings many years of experience working at the local and state levels in support of the charter movement in New Mexico.
Bob Perls moved to New Mexico when he was five years old and raised a family in Albuquerque and Corrales. He attended Albuquerque Public Schools, Pomona College, where he earned a B.A. in Government, and University of Maryland where he earned an M.S. in Healthcare Management with honors. Bob founded an Albuquerque-based medical technology company, Monitech, Inc., at the age of 24, and sold it in 2008 after 25 years of successful operation. He was elected to two terms to the New Mexico House of Representatives representing parts of Sandoval County where he wrote and passed the original NM Charter School Act. He served on the governing board of Taylor Middle School when it was a charter school, served on the NM charter school task force and co-founded the charter school Public Academy for Performing Arts. He became a U.S. Diplomat in January 2010 and served in Germany, Canada, Pakistan and The Gambia. He returned full-time to New Mexico in the spring of 2015 and lives in Corrales with his wife, Joan. Currently he is SVP of Sales and Marketing for Visual Health Solutions, a healthcare IT company.
He speaks German, tries to speak Spanish and is an avid cyclist, skier and martial artist. He is married and has four grown children.
For more than 25 years, Doug has provided a wide range of political, strategic, marketing, branding and communications counsel to executives of Fortune 500 companies; foreign and US elected officials/agencies; small businesses, chambers of commerce and educational institutions; along with a broad collection of non-profit and community-focused organizations. With clients ranging from major utilities and energy producers to trade associations, hospitals, ag tech companies, charter schools, and university defense and security research institutes, Turner leads teams that focus on governmental affairs, stakeholder and consumer engagement, public relations, and corporate and institutional messaging, branding and creative campaigns.
In addition to his current work, Doug is a nationally-known political and strategic consultant and has worked on ballot initiatives and political campaigns throughout the United States, Asia and Europe. Doug was a key political strategist for Governor Gary Johnson’s (R-NM) successful gubernatorial campaigns in 1994 and 1998. He has advised the Democratic Party of Japan on messaging and election strategy, provided press and media guidance during Ukraine’s Orange Revolution, and served as a deputy political director for Steve Forbes’ 2000 bid for President. In 2010 Turner provided U.S. strategic communications guidance to the Office of the Prime Minister of Japan immediately following the Fukushima nuclear disaster and helped guide the licensure of URENCO USA’s uranium enrichment facility in the Southwestern U.S. He has served as Chairman of the New Mexico Judicial Standards Commission, the Albuquerque Development Commission and the New Mexico Business Roundtable. He has also served on the boards of the Foundation for Open Government and the Rio Grande Foundation.
His clients include NATO, the American Petroleum Institute, Borana Nature Conservancy, PNM Resources, DuPont, Excel Energy, Chevron, Trademark East Africa, SunCal Companies, BYD and others. Doug is a former Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs Fellow and CFR Term Member and has written widely on politics and policy. His articles have appeared in Time Magazine, the Financial Times, Foreign Affairs, the Far Eastern Economic Review, the Carnegie Council’s Policy Innovations and Japan’s Daily Yomiuri.
Turner received his B.A. from the American University School of International Studies in Washington, D.C. and his M.A. in International Relations from the Centre Europeen de Recherches Internationales et Strategiques.
John Gallegos is the Vice President of the New Mexico chapter of NAIOP, the commercial real estate development association. Prior to joining NAIOP in 2003, he was the project manager and safety coordinator for National roofing, sand founded and ran a chemical coatings business in Albuquerque for 12 years.
Mr. Gallegos has served on the board of Public Charter Schools of New Mexico since 2010, and previously served on the board of Public Academy for Performing Arts (PAPA), a public charter school in Albuquerque.
Ben Maes has served on the Board of Public Charter Schools of New Mexico since 2016. He provides the board with the perspective of a charter school governing board member, as he has served as the President of the Governing Council of Christine Duncan Heritage Academy since 2014. Mr. Maes specialty is finance. He spent over 30 years in consumer and business financial and credit management and has served as the President of the St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Church finance council. Mr. Maes is an active member of the Albuquerque business community, having served on the New Mexico Hispanic Heritage Committee, Hispano Chamber of Commerce and was the past board director of the Albuquerque West Chamber of Commerce.
Executive Director
Matthew Pahl is the Executive Director of Public Charter Schools of New Mexico. He has focused his career with education transformation in New Mexico since 2005, which began as a first-grade teacher and included positions with the state Legislature and as the Policy Director at the Public Education Department. Matt believes education is the fundamental tool to achieving equity in our country, and is interested in how varied academic programs and organizational structures can help improve public educational experiences for all. He received his B.A. in History from St. John’s University in Minnesota and a Master’s in Public Administration from the University of Southern California.
Director of School Quality and Support
For over 30 years, Kelly has dedicated her career to reaching “At Promise” (also known as “at risk”) students. Her professional experience includes work as a teacher, dean of students, assistant principal, charter school principal/head administrator, PED charter school oversight; an educational consultant and, now, as the Director of School Quality and Support. Kelly was the founding principal of SIATech Charter School in 2004, a dropout recovery school that served students wishing to return to high school. In 2008-09, Kelly was honored by the National Association of Secondary School Principals as the New Mexico Secondary Principal of the Year. She was the first charter school principal in the United States to receive this honor. In September 2011, Kelly took the position as General Manager/Interim Director for the Charter Schools Division at the NM Public Education Department where she served as staff to the Public Education Commission (PEC) and technical support for charter schools chartered by the PEC and for district Authorizers. Kelly also serves as a community volunteer with Mission: Graduate an initiative of United Way of Central New Mexico. Kelly’s passion and commitment to charter schools and the charter school movement is a perfect complement to Matt Pahl’s leadership as they strengthen Public Charter Schools of New Mexico in advocacy and support for the New Mexico charter school movement.
Office Manager
Donna’s career in education started almost 30 years ago as a volunteer in her oldest son’s kindergarten class. She worked for APS before entering the charter school world. She joined the Coalition in July 2015 after spending 11 years at a local charter school as the STARS Coordinator and Executive Assistant. Donna has been married for 38 years and has two sons and 4 grandchildren.
