Name: Kara Karpel

Title: Regional Director – Region 2

Years w/ Company: 10 years

Years w/in Field: 14 years

Education: Bachelors Degree in Early Childhood Education from San Jose State University

Geographic Location: San Jose, CA

Family info/hobbies: I love spending time as a family with my husband, son, and dog Lia.

Formative Geographic Location (where did you grow up)?
Various cities in the Bay area, mainly San Jose. Two years in Indianapolis, IN.

What do you love most about your job?
I love the people I work with, the children and the feeling that I can affect quality on a larger scale.

If you could meet a famous person (alive or dead), who would you want to meet/why?
Hmm, that's a tough one. I would want to meet Katharine Hepburn. She seemed to be such a strong "personality" and woman during a time when there weren't many strong female role models. I would also want to listen to all the stories she had about Hollywood and the actors in the 1940s like Humphrey Bogart.

Who is your hero/why?
My mother is my hero. She has shown me that a person can persevere and overcome many obstacles in life and at the same time find contentment with what you have and joy in the little things.

What inspires you?
Many things inspire me; the foremost being Nature. A walk or hike outdoors fills me with renewed energy and faith that the universe has a plan; things are exactly the way they should be.

What was your favorite subject in school/why?
English was my favorite subject in school because I loved (and still do) to read. I also enjoyed grammar rules and editing papers, it always felt like a decoding game. A close second was music – played the flute.

What is (or was, growing up) your favorite color crayon?
It's a tie between blue and purple. Think if I had to make a choice it would be blue.