Daniel Dadoun
Founder and Executive Director
Daniel Dadoun joined the Addiction Education Society (AES) as Executive Director on January 2014. Prior to joining AES, Dadoun served as the Executive Director for the Mid-Peninsula Boys & Girls Club for 17 years in San Mateo and Daly City serving over 1,400 children in three clubhouses with an annual multi-million dollar budget and over 24 staff. The organization has evolved from an after-school program to a year-round learning centers partnering with school district officials, teachers and parents to enhance our members academic success and readiness for high school, college and careers.
Christopher Field
Neuroscience of Addiction Program Director
Christopher Field joined the Addiction Education Society (AES) as a consultant in May of 2019. He currently serves as the Program Director for the Neuroscience of Addiction program. Prior to joining AES, Christopher worked in biotech as a senior research associate in the Biotech Bay focusing on neurodegenerative diseases.
Program Contributors
Karen Li, M.D. 2023 Chuck Johnson Volunteer of the Year recipient
Dr. Karen Li has recently retired as the Director of School Health for Sequoia Healthcare District. In this role she identified health and safety needs, formulated plans and goals, provided vision and leadership to eight local school districts, and collaborated with a wide variety of community partners.
Previously she served as the Wellness Coordinator at Sequoia Union High School District, and spent over 10 years as a private practice pediatrician in San Diego and locally here in San Mateo. Dr. Li earned her BA at UCLA, her MD at UC San Francisco, and completed her pediatrics residency at Children’s Hospital, Oakland.
Katie Finlay
Katie Finlay graduated from Stanford University in Human Biology. She and her husband raised three children in Redwood City, where she taught biology and science at Sequoia High School. After observing her students’ rapt engagement with Dr. Stalcup in person, she used her hands-on science background to create the classroom activities and questions to turn his video and other elements of the Neuroscience of Addiction into an interactive experience for students. She is an active volunteer in the community and at her church.
Justin Yuan
Justin Ping Yuan is a PhD candidate at the Stanford Neurodevelopment, Affect, and Psychopathology (SNAP) Lab in Stanford’s Psychology Department, and a fellow of the National Science Foundation’s (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP). He has contributed to the NoA curriculum and helped develop the program’s data analytic procedures.
Justin’s research focuses on how early life adversity affects adolescent brain and immune function, and how these changes may lead to mental illness in youth. His work has been published in peer-reviewed journals and presented at international conferences. Justin graduated with a B.S. in Physiology and Neuroscience from UC San Diego. Prior to graduate school, he worked at UC San Francisco’s Radiology and Biomedical Imaging Department.
Michelle Remond
(she/her) is a bilingual and bicultural communications professional, born and raised in Mexico City and then relocated to California in 2010. She holds a bachelor’s degree in Communication Studies and a master’s in History. She works as Community Liaison at the Redwood City School District (California) where she serves hundreds of Latinx parents each school year, and shares her expertise in the Latinx mindset with administrators and educators.
Michelle is a National Latinx Psychological Association member, and she recently obtained her Level I Trauma Professional Training Certificate. She also volunteers in her community as a trained grief companion. She is the author of The Latinx Newcomers Interview, a manual for PreK-12 public schools, and the mother of two adults. She lives in Belmont and loves gardening.
Michelle is responsible for translating and converting the curriculum content into student workbooks in Spanish for both Neuroscience of Addiction and “How did this happen to me” programs.
Greg Mansfield
Greg Mansfield, “the voice of AES programs” the owner of GEM Consulting firm in SM county, specializes in all your IT requirements. Greg has been instrumental in supporting AES IT requirements which includes: video editing, videotaping, voice-over recording, network security and cloud conversion. GEM has been working with educational technology since 1996 and was instrumental in the design and installations of most school districts networks in San Mateo county.