Meet the Foundation Board
Liz O’Neil, President
Liz moved to Lexington in 2001 with her family of four children. Drawn by its cooperative nature and sense of community, Liz soon became deeply involved with Community Nursery School in Lexington, first as a parent, then teacher, then as its Director.
Always a regular visitor to Cary Library, Liz spent many hours there during law school, with her daughter Maggie (LHS’20) by her side as they took in the wonderful warmth and quiet of the library. Graduating law school in 2020, Liz is currently a lawyer specializing in the area of trusts and estates.
Liz’s volunteer experience includes serving as President of the Bridge School PTA, sitting on the Lexington Little League Board, and a term on Clarke Middle School Site Council. During law school she took great joy in being a Student Mentor to first year law students. An avid sports fan, Liz coached youth basketball and softball for many years, and still plays pick up whenever she gets the chance.
In her free time, Liz loves to ride her bike or waves when not reading, walking her doodle dog Charlie, or cooking for her family.
Kimberly Hensle Lowrance, Vice-President
Kimberly and her family moved to Lexington in 2011, and Cary Library quickly became their favorite place in town. She credits the library and its dedicated librarians with helping to foster in her children a love of reading and a deep appreciation for books.
Kimberly is a Town Meeting member and a member and past co-chair of the Community Endowment of Lexington. She previously served on the Site-Based Councils for both Bridge Elementary School and Clarke Middle School, on the Board of LexFarm, and as a Girl Scout Troop Leader. Kimberly joined the Cary Library Foundation Board in 2022.
Kimberly’s professional background is in nonprofit management, where she spent more than thirty years working for and volunteering at mission-driven organizations. Her free time is spent reading and traveling.
Susan McLeish, Treasurer
Susan grew up in Lexington and fondly recalls weekly trips to the Children’s Room to get a fresh load of books to take home to read.
Her background is financial; she spent her career in accounting and consulting organizations, first as an auditor and then in various senior operational management roles.
In addition to spending three previous terms on the Foundation Board, Susan’s community involvement has included serving as a town meeting member and has volunteered in various local non-profit organizations.
Susan enjoys travelling; especially hiking trips and spending time on the southern New Jersey shore.
Pratip Banerji
Pratip Banerji has been living in Lexington since 2014. He has been actively involved in the community, coaching baseball, basketball, soccer, and robotics, reflecting his commitment to supporting youth development. Pratip is the father to two children who attend Diamond Middle School and Lexington High School.
Pratip is a passionate reader and believes in the transformative powers of libraries. He continues to be impressed by the Cary Library’s extensive resources and its pivotal role in the community. He is particularly excited about how the library has been evolving as the world has changed, including finding new ways to provide learning and knowledge to the community. As a big ebook user, he appreciates the accessibility and convenience they offer.
Outside of his volunteer work, Pratip enjoys outdoor activities, particularly running, skiing, and hiking. He also loves traveling with his family, exploring new places and cultures whenever possible. He has a background in technology product management, holding a BS and MEng from MIT and an MBA from the Tuck School at Dartmouth.
Louise Barbic
Louise and her family moved to Lexington in 2013, and spent their first day as Lexington residents in Cary Library. Since then, they have spent countless hours at the library enjoying all of the books, media, and programming it has to offer.
Louise graduated from UC Davis and earned her MBA at the Owen School of Management at Vanderbilt. Professionally, she has over 25 years of experience in marketing research and consulting working with global organizations in the biotech, pharmaceutical, and CPG industries. Louise spends every free moment reading and talking about books as well as hiking.
Christine Belin
Christine moved to Lexington in the middle of the polar vortex in the winter of 2013 with her husband and two sons. She has been employed at Sobi since September 2014 and is currently CFO and Head of IT for North America.
Christine has an MBA from the Johnson Graduate School of Management and a BS in Chemical Engineering, both from Cornell University. Professionally, she has over 20 years of experience in the pharmaceutical industry in a variety of finance leadership roles, including roles in Europe.
Christine is a grade parent for her two sons at the Fenn School and spends many weekend on the sideline of lacrosse games, soccer games or doing laundry! She and her family are members of several community organizations including Hancock Church where Christine has served on numerous committees and supported several community organizations, including the Outdoor Church of Cambridge, which ministers to the homeless of Cambridge. Christine and her family love Cary Library and have an annual picture of the boys in front of the American Flag at Cary library every Patriots’ Day!
Bill Cole
Bill has lived in Lexington on and off since 1968 and is an alum of Hancock Elementary, Muzzey Jr High and Lexington HS (’81). He is now retired but in his working years he was a social studies teacher and an administrator at Lexington HS for 20 years. He is an avid sports fan and has coached college and high school lacrosse, basketball, and tennis. He has a B.A. in History from UMass Amherst, an MBA from Babson College, and a M. Ed. From Bridgewater State College. Growing up on Belfry Terrace, Bill spent hundreds of hours over the years at Cary Library reading for pleasure, using the microfiche for research, and borrowing vinyl albums then VHS tapes, then DVDs. Bill’s mother, the late Margaret Cole, was a daily fixture at Cary Library for 40 years and it sustained her in many ways. His two sons have attended Estabrook School, Diamond and LHS. In his free time he walks around town daily, assists his wife Ritika with her business, Ritika’s Global Grains, and volunteers as a sports coach.
Wei Ding
Wei and her loving and supportive husband, Ping, chose Lexington to be their home in 2015. Their daughter, Cynthia, graduated from Lexington High School in 2018, while their younger daughter, Angelina, attends Harrington Elementary School.
Wei is a Professor of Computer Science at the University of Massachusetts Boston, and also serves at the National Science Foundation as a Program Manager. Wei’s volunteer experience includes serving as the Executive Committee member and Culture Committee Co-Chair of CAAL, member of the Town Celebrations Committee, Board Member and Outreach Committee Co-Chair of Community Endowment of Lexington, and a mentor for the Computer Science Youth Volunteer Team. Wei also is the editor-in-chief of the Neighbor Gallery of CAAL.
Pamela Fowler
Pamela, a Massachusetts native, graduated from Brown University and Harvard’s Chan School of Public Health. Professionally, she has over 25 years of healthcare technology experience, with her most recent role serving as a Chief Marketing Leader for Aetna/CVS Health.
Her volunteer work includes over 8 years as both a hospital and practice plan Trustee at University of Washington and as an advisory Board Member to the State of Washington’s Health Benefit Exchange/Obamacare. Additionally, she was a Board of Trustee member at Eastside Catholic School. Pamela’s son, Evan, is a Foreign Service Officer currently serving in Jakarta, Indonesia.
Pamela enjoys Pure Barre, Club Pilates, and travel. She is enjoying growing her Lexington roots and supports the Library’s important community mission.
Sandra Galejs
Sandra moved back to Lexington in 1998 after spending her early years here - she now votes at Bowman, in her old grade school gym. She studied computer science at Brown, graduating in 1980 (the year before the IBM PC came out). She spent 37 years working in the software industry, as a developer and manager, including more than 30 years working on font technology. She is happily retired with her husband, Peter Warren, and spends a lot of time in the garden, as well as paying a lot of attention to petty details in her role as treasurer of her neighborhood association.
Other interests include live theater, music, and insight meditation.
Sylvia Han
Sylvia Han is originally from upstate New York, later graduating from Cornell University and Boston University’s Questrom School of Business. Professionally, she has over 25 years of institutional asset and wealth management experience and is now a wealth management advisor at Merrill, supporting families with financial planning and investment advice.
Her non-profit volunteer experience includes board and committee positions with the Korean American Organization of Lexington (KOLex) where she serves as President, and Lexington Education Foundation. Outside of Lexington, she has served as a board member of ATASK and The Boston Club and has recently been nominated to serve on the advisory board of the Boston Lyric Opera.
After her family moved to Lexington over 20 years ago, her two sons attended Bridge, Clark, and LHS before going to college. Sylvia enjoys getting together with family, going to concerts, attending barre class, organizing a book club, and hopefully more travel.
Erin Hartel
rin moved to Lexington in September of 2021 from Brentwood, TN where her family lived for three years. Prior to that, her family lived in Mukilteo, WA just north of Seattle where her girls, Caitlin (13) and Lily (11), were born. Erin has a BA in English Literature from the University of Florida and earned her Master's in Education from Old Dominion University. She is a teacher at heart and spent 12 years teaching middle school English in Maryland, Washington, and Massachusetts.
Since moving to Lexington, Erin has been heavily involved with volunteering at Fiske Elementary in a variety of capacities. She has also served as the School Liaison for Fiske Elementary as part of the Lexington Education Foundation for the past two years and will be continuing her role at Diamond Middle next year. Finally, Erin volunteers with LexRAP helping refugees and those in need access food and resources. She cares about all people and derives a great deal of joy from serving others. She is an avid reader and loves helping others find new books to love, which is part of the reason she values public libraries so much. Cary Library is an incredible part of the Lexington community, and she is honored to serve on the Board. In her spare time, other than reading, Erin loves to explore the great outdoors and play sports.
Marjan Kamali
Marjan Kamali is the author of The Stationery Shop, a Boston Globe Bestseller and one of NPR’s best books of the year, and Together Tea, a Massachusetts Book award finalist. Her novels have been translated into a dozen languages. Marjan graduated from U.C. Berkeley and has an MBA from Columbia University and an MFA from NYU. Marjan wrote much of both of her novels at a cubicle on the second floor in Cary Library. She teaches writing at Grub Street and lives in Lexington with her family.
Maria Kieslich
Maria grew up in Vermont and attended UVM where she got her degrees in economics and political science. She worked at the International Monetary Fund in Washington DC prior to getting her MBA from the University of Chicago Booth school, which included coursework in Seoul, South Korea. Maria came to Boston, worked in Asian international banking and then for 20 years she held executive positions in fintech, nonprofit and edtech startups. She is currently an expert writer on economics and real estate.
Since 1996, Maria has lived in Lexington with her husband and has one adult daughter who attended Lexington public schools. Her community work includes past appointments to the Lexington Communications Advisory Committee and the Town Center committee, and she was a board member for LexMedia and Health Resources In Action. She is a member of Hancock church and volunteers at the Food Pantry. Occasionally she teaches an LCE course on Time Management for Teens. Her favorite pastimes are biking, being a Patriots season ticket holder, reading, travel and scrapbooking
Dipti Lenhart
Dipti and her husband James (JJ) Lenhart have lived in Lexington since 2013 and have been passionate supporters of Cary Library since their children, Arun (13) and Neena (10), were toddlers exploring the Children’s Room!
Dipti is a radiologist at Lahey Hospital and Medical Center in Burlington and serves as the Section Chief of Abdominal Imaging. She graduated from Harvard University and the New York University School of Medicine. She was a Radiology resident at NYU and then returned to Boston for a fellowship in Abdominal Imaging at Massachusetts General Hospital. Despite plans to return to New York, she and JJ fell in love with the Boston area and decided to stay.
In the community, she helps lead the Big Backyard program at Fiske and volunteers on Green Team.During her time off, Dipti enjoys traveling and spending time in Lexington — cooking, reading, running on the bike path, and visiting Lexington Center restaurants, shops, and, of course, the library!
Melanie Lin
Melanie moved to Lexington in 2007 with her husband and daughter. She has been an active member of the Chinese American Association of Lexington (CAAL) for the past decade. She currently serves CAAL as Vice President, Chair of Civic Engagement Committee and Treasurer of CAAL PAC. She has also been involved in numerous town committees including Town Celebrations Committee, 300th Anniversary Celebrations Committee, Town Manager Search Committee, and most recently the Cary Library Foundation Board.
Professionally, Melanie has over 20 years of experience in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industry. She is currently Senior Director of a leading global biotechnology company that offers end-to-end solutions for biologics discovery, development and manufacturing.
Christine Manavian
Christine and her husband Ara Najarian have called Lexington home since 2004. Their boys Andrew and Wyatt attend the Hastings School. In her prior professional career, Christine was a Buyer for multiple retailers in the Boston area in addition to being in Brand Relations for a retail software company. Volunteering in the Lexington community is very important to Christine. She served as President of LexFUN! from 2017-2019, and is currently VP of Board Development and Planning at Hastings. As a family, they enjoy spending time in the kitchen, playing sports, and travelling.
Christine considers Cary Library as one of the cornerstones of Lexington. She served on the CHiRP! Committee this year, which was a great way to meet many of the wonderful people who do so much for Cary.
Laura Mark
Laura is a dedicated member of the Lexington community, having resided in the town for nearly 15 years and raising two sons who attend Lexington Public Schools. With a passion for education and community engagement, Laura has served as a Lexington Town Meeting Member and is deeply invested in the success of the Cary Library.
With nearly 20 years of experience in the biotech/pharmaceutical industry, Laura brings a wealth of experience managing complex projects to her role on the library board. She currently volunteers as the Vice President of Engagement/Volunteer Partnerships for the Healthcare Businesswomen’s Association (HBA) and is an active member of the Boston College Center for Corporate Citizenship.
Laura holds a graduate degree from Johns Hopkins School of Public Health and is actively pursuing an MBA at Johns Hopkins, Carey Business School. Her commitment to lifelong learning and professional development is a testament to her dedication to elevating the mission of the Cary Library Foundation. Laura is committed to ensuring that the Cary Library remains a vital resource for the Lexington community.
Suman Murali
Suman and her family have been Lexington residents for the past 13 years. The Cary Library is a cherished place for her family and she take immense pride in the wonderful resources and the creative programming events that the library offers. A member of the Indian Americans of Lexington (IAL) Library Committee, she takes delight in working with the library to bring programming events related to Indian culture to the broader community.
Suman has been a member of the Cary Library Foundation Board since 2019. Professionally, she works for a financial services company as a liaison between client-facing team members and her company’s data and analytics teams. In her spare time, she enjoys reading and writing, loves listening to podcasts, and volunteering locally for causes close to her heart.
Marc Saint Louis
A native of Western Massachusetts, Marc has lived in Lexington with his wife, Carrie, and their two children since 2005. A graduate of the University of Virginia and Boston College Law School, Marc has worked in a variety of areas in the law, public service, and government relations for several civic, private and public entities and organizations.
A member of the Library Foundation Board since 2019, Cary Library has served as a home away from home for his family during their time in Lexington. His volunteer service includes splitting a City Year in Boston and Chicago and an active volunteer with Habitat for Humanity and the Boston Scholars Program. In Lexington, Marc has been active as a Town Meeting member, Co-Chair of the Lexington Democratic Town Committee, Government Committee Chair of the Association of Black Citizens of Lexington (ABCL) and as a volunteer with the Lexington Education Foundation.
Martha Sevigny
Martha is a lifelong Lexington resident, where she lives with her husband Tom and three children. She spent much of her childhood at Cary Library and it was also the home of her very first part-time job. Martha has a background in auditing and accounting, and currently works as a Lexington based realtor. She loves meeting people from all over the world, who want to call Lexington home.
Outside of the Cary Foundation Board, Martha has been an active volunteer in the Lexington Public Schools since 2006. She has also served as a Town Meeting member, Lexington Youth Basketball Board Member, and has coached various youth sports over the years. She loves to travel and find time for getaways to Kennebunkport, ME.
Jaya Vatsyayan
Jaya moved to Lexington in 2011 with her husband and 2 children. She is a member of the Indian Americans of Lexington Library Committee and has participated in various initiatives to raise funds for Cary Library. She believes that the library is the heart and soul of the community. It is the center of information, education, personal and community development. Jaya began her term on the Cary Library Foundation Board in 2019.
Outside of the Board, Jaya is a biotechnology professional who is passionate about clinical and translational science, and about bringing cures to patients. She considers herself fortunate to live and work in the Boston metro area, which is one of the greatest biotechnology hubs in the world. Her prior professional career was as a molecular biologist in India, Taiwan, and University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, PA.
Steve Yang
Steve and his family moved to Lexington in 2021 and were happy to see how welcoming and warm people in Lexington are. One of the very first places they visited was the Cary Library and they immediately fell in love with the place and the people who work there. This is not Steve’s first foray to the East Coast of the U.S., however. He obtained his PhD from MIT in 2004 in the fields of biology and biophysics but has since worked in Singapore and Indonesia as a laboratory head, a management consultant and lately as a managing director of a pharmaceutical group. He is on the board of several companies, mostly in tech and biotechnology. He is establishing a biotech company here in Boston to work on solid tumors.
Steve and his outgoing wife, Lily, are very interested in volunteering their time and energy to help make Lexington a better place for everyone. Steve is currently a member of the Science Café committee and a member of the Woodworkers Guild in LexArt. In his spare time, he enjoys spending time with his 3 children and a very social little dog, plays the piano and tennis and is learning how to build a shed.
Mary Ellen Ringo, Executive Director
Mary Ellen has enjoyed being part of the Lexington community with her three sons for over twenty years. During her time here, she’s served as the co-president of the Lexington Education Foundation, the Bridge School PTA and the Lexington Preschool PTA Association (now LexFUN!). She currently serves on the board of the Community Endowment of Lexington. She also has worked in development for the Gardner Museum, and practiced employment law with Palmer and Dodge LLP. She graduated from Princeton University and Boston College Law School. In her free time, she enjoys reading nonfiction and mysteries, hiking and traveling.