Anna Pier named La Luz board chair

Anna Pier has been named Chairman of the Board of Directors of La Luz Center, replacing Claudia Mendoza-Carruth who served as Chairman for the past two years.

Pier has been on the board since 2009, and serves on Program, Strategic Planning, and the Noche fundraiser committees.

“I feel privileged to have this opportunity to lead the board of La Luz at this important juncture in our development,” Pier said. “Guided by Ligia Booker’s founding efforts, La Luz has always been committed to addressing the needs of the underserved in the Sonoma Valley. At this moment in time, we at La Luz have the chance to lead the underserved to a different status — to that place where they can participate in shaping a new future for themselves and their families.”

A bilingual teacher and community educator, Pier taught Spanish at St. Francis Solano School and The Young Montessori School. After obtaining a bilingual teaching credential, she taught first grade at Flowery School and was instrumental in founding the dual immersion program. Subsequently she taught at Novato and then Woodland Star Charter School.

Pier served as Director of Educational Programs for the CommonBond Foundation, where she organized summer English and Spanish camps for children, after-school language and homework support programs, and ESL and Spanish classes for adults in Sonoma Valley.

From 2010 –12 she produced a popular weekly Spanish-language interview and news program on KSVY TV, “La Ventana del Valle.” She currently teaches Spanish for adults.

She led the Sonoma Nonprofit Collaborative’s youth advocacy forums and served as their representative to the committee on youth resources. She has been a community representative to DELAC for many years. She is a past advisor and member of the Board of Directors of Nuestra Voz, and a sponsor of Sonoma’s local Ballet Folklórico, Quetzalén.

Pier was born and raised in West Virginia, received a B.A in English from Wellesley College, an M.A. in Italian from Middlebury College, and pursued doctoral studies in Romance Languages at UC Berkeley. She was a teaching associate at Berkeley and she taught at Vassar College.

Anna Pier and her husband Will, a local ecologist, have lived in Sonoma County for the 44 years of their marriage, including the past 23 years in the Valley. They are the parents of six children and three grandchildren. Anna, for a time a professional baker, is a lifelong knitter, amateur calligrapher and gardener, and has a dedicated yoga practice.