Synapse School

Synapse was founded in 2008 by Karen Stone McCown, Dr. Anabel Jensen and Gigi Carunungun. This dynamic team is known worldwide for their expertise in educating gifted learners and their pioneering work in the field of emotional intelligence. Karen Stone McCown founded The Nueva School, an independent school for the gifted, in 1967. Under the leadership of Dr. Anabel Jensen, who served as the Executive Director for fourteen years, Nueva grew into an internationally renowned Blue Ribbon Independent School for the gifted and talented. At Nueva, Karen created the nation’s first emotional intelligence curriculum, Self-Science, a program she and Anabel facilitated for nearly three decades. After experiencing, first-hand, the benefits of social emotional learning (SEL) curriculum in education, Karen and Anabel were compelled to bring this knowledge to businesses and other schools worldwide. They founded their second venture together in 1997, Six Seconds, and grew it into a worldwide firm delivering programs, assessments and training to enable schools and Fortune 500 companies to fully integrate emotional intelligence. Karen and Anabel were dedicated to establishing a school that would redefine education: Synapse School. They teamed up with Gigi Carunungan and created a K-8 independent school dedicated to educating change makers of tomorrow by combining leading edge academic instruction with 6 Seconds Self-Science curriculum. Like many Silicon Valley start-ups, Synapse School began in a Palo Alto garage before finding a larger space to accommodate steady growth. In just six short years, Synapse has grown from 8 to 190 students in mixed-age classes spanning K-8th grade. Since its inception in 1997, one of the core goals has been integrating research-based social-emotional learning methods into schools. Just as Six Seconds equips adult leaders with the awareness and skills to become more effective, the organization is committed to developing the change leaders of tomorrows young people with the skills and mindset to shape the future, and the wisdom to make it one worth creating. So, in 2008, Synapse School was created as a thriving, rigorous, innovative model of education.