Board of Trustees

Jessica Potter-Bowers, Board Chair

Jessica (JP) Potter-Bowers has served on the Odyssey Board of Trustees for 4 years and feels honored to be the current Board Chair. She has a Masters in Education, works as the Behavior Specialist at a local charter school, and has a background in both mental health work and environmental education. JP’s work in supporting struggling students and experience with non-profit organizations contributes to her perspective when guiding Odyssey toward the future.

JP’s daughter is in 4th grade at Odyssey and has been a student here since Pre-K. Their family fell in love with the “Odyssey way” because of the school’s commitment to social-emotional learning, focus on student-led conflict resolution and practices centered on whole child development. Most importantly, the care and compassion shown by Odyssey teachers has made their experience unforgettable.

Jenny Kobin, Vice Chair

Jenny is a veteran investor relations executive with 25 years of advising corporate executives and board of directors on investor communications, corporate finance, crisis communications and event management.

Jenny has extensive non-profit volunteer experience having served as a Board director of Hope Haven for children with developmental disabilities, Compass Center for Women and Families, and the National Investor Relations Institute. Jenny loves Odyssey for being a unique place that aligns with her personal values in helping children and adults be their authentic, best selves. Her daughter is a current 7th grader at Odyssey.

Leslie Meyers, Secretary

Leslie is a Naturopathic Doctor and local business owner. She and her wife have owned a naturopathic medical clinic for the past 14 years. She is looking forward to extending such entrepreneurial skills in holistic healing to her time on the board at Odyssey.

Leslie has students in elementary and middle grades. They have been with Odyssey for 8 years, a time in which they have experienced incredible mindfulness and compassion towards wellbeing, growth as humans, and holistic education. Leslie seeks to give back to the school that has done so much for her family.

Maureen Orland, Finance Chair

Maureen Orland has been passionate about Odyssey and involved with supporting the school since her children enrolled in the first and third grades twelve years ago. She has served as the Volunteer Service Coordinator, the chair of the fund raising committee, and a class parent multiple times. Her commitment to education began in college, when she began reflecting on the unique education for which she feels grateful for having received. The elementary school she attended in Pennsylvania, The School in Rose Valley, ignited in her a lifetime love of learning that carried her through her middle and high school years at a Friends (Quaker) school, and on to Brown University, where she received a BA in Education.

Before becoming a parent, Maureen was a Store Director of a Wild Oats Market in Boulder CO. She has owned two businesses, Magic Thyme Kitchen and Bim Beri Bon restaurant. Currently she is working as a billing specialist for an audiologist. She is a student of meditation, and also writes poetry. She values Odyssey for nourishing all the aspects of her children’s development: intellectual, social, emotional and spiritual. She is grateful to be witnessing her children emerging into young adulthood as life-long learners who have a deep understanding of themselves and their interests. She has been serving on the board for four years, and her youngest daughter will be graduating from Odyssey this spring.

Bill Chameides

Bill has served as dean of Duke University’s Nicholas School of the Environment from 2007 to 2014. Prior to that, Bill was a member of the faculty at the Georgia Institute of technology and the chief scientist at the Environmental Defense Fund. An atmospheric chemist focused on elucidating the causes of and remedies for global, regional and urban environmental change, Bill is a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, a fellow of the American Geophysical Union and a recipient of the AGU’s MacElwane Award. He has authored more than 175 peer-reviewed papers and eight books and is listed by ISI Highly Cited as being among “the most highly influential scientists and scholars worldwide.”

His abiding conviction that artists can play a pivotal role in connecting people to the natural world is reflected in many of his writings and in his founding of the Duke LEAF, an Award for Lifetime Environmental Achievement in the Fine Arts given “annually to an artist whose work has lifted the human spirit by conveying our profound spiritual and material connection to the Earth and thereby inspiring others to help forge a more sustainable future for all.” Recipients include Robert Redford, Barbara Kingsolver, Jackson Browne, John Sayles, and Alexander McCall Smith.

Bill left Duke in 2015 and currently resides in Asheville, North Carolina where he is pursuing a long and tightly-held dream of working in the arts. A member of the Odyssey School Board since 2020, Bill is the proud grandfather of Rose, a senior at Odyssey.

Carolina Henao

Carolina has a degree in advertising and marketing from Emerson College. She worked for over a decade in advertising agencies, managing global accounts for brands such as Citibank, United Airlines and Delta Airlines. She shifted her focus to wellness and is a trained yoga and meditation teacher, Reiki I and II practitioner. She has helped launch and develop wellness brands and has served as board member of non-profits that help at risk youth through yoga and trauma informed trainings.

Carolina is passionate about moving forward a new paradigm in education where Mind, Body and Spirit are an integral part of the development of children and not only academics and standardized testing.

Erin Bowman

Erin is the director of a local inpatient substance abuse treatment center. She has been working as an addictions therapist specializing in trauma for more than 15 years. She believes in the importance of treating the whole person without judgment or stigma, which is one of the reasons she was attracted to Odyssey. Erin is passionate about building bridges between different community partners and meeting people where they are.

Erin holds a BA in Communications and Master of Social Work from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Erin’s daughter has been attending Odyssey for 5 years and this is her 2nd year on the board. She is excited about all of the things Odyssey has to offer and wants to help the school grow and the children thrive in a unique learning environment.

[PICTURE FORTHCOMING] Inkwa Ewart

Inkwa is a self-described “Queen of Makeshift”. Mom to three, her youngest is in Odyssey’s first grade. Inkwa, which means “jewel” in Amharic, the official language of Ethiopia, was born in Brooklyn, NY to a family richly steeped in multicultural education, Rastafari, and the values of protesting for social and racial justice. After some years at Brooklyn College Academy, Inkwa moved to Louisburg, NC near Wake Forest and lived on a horse farm for five years. An accomplished fiber artist and crafter, Inkwa has always instilled in her children the merits of wayfinding, invention and hands-on project work. She values how Odyssey School encourages curiosity, individuality and how to make the most out of a smaller educational setting. She’s excited to join Odyssey’s board of trustees in order to help further a commitment to fight “for the comfort of everyone”.

Lauren Milling

Lauren has been on the board for two terms and she continues to want to help support Odyssey because of her belief in the mission, methods, and teachers. She has a masters degree in Research and Developmental Psychology from the University of Texas at Dallas. She’s been a preschool teacher and her research focus has mainly been in caregiver and child relationships. She was a founding member of the Lowcountry Maritime School in Charleston which featured many STEAM projects to foster a love for waterways and conservation. After years in Charleston, she and her family moved to England prior to landing in Asheville.

All four of her children attend Odyssey and she’s excited for the fresh future brought by a new head of school. She also enjoys painting, drawing, weaving, and jewelry metalsmithing.

Randy Provence

While working for years in a small supply chain software company in Irvine, California and while living in Seattle, Randy and his wife began an exhaustive search for a student-centered school for their only child which brought them to Asheville right in the middle of the national health crisis. Now in kindergarten, their son is thriving and the family has firmly situated themselves into the fabric of the school.

A self-described perennial five-year-old, Randy also serves on the board of a case management/healthcare software company in Seattle that works with vulnerable populations.

Janice Kominski

Janice is currently completing her MDiv/Master of Arts in Christian Education dual-degree seminarian at Union Presbyterian Seminary, primarily taking courses on the Charlotte campus.

She received an MS in Counseling from John Hopkins University in 2009. She is also a Candidate in the Presbytery of Western North Carolina under the care of Grace Covenant Presbyterian Church in Asheville and has completed four out of five ordination exams. She and her husband moved their three children from Florida to Asheville five years ago.