Cherie was employed in commercial, real estate and construction lending at Wells Fargo Bank, in the San Francisco Bay area and as manager of the First Federal Savings and Loan, Scottsdale, Arizona. Before beginning her work in education in 1981. Cherie attended the University of California at Davis and Arizona State University, and received her B.A. in English and minor credits in Business Administration/Finance from Rutgers University in 1981. She began her work in education in the Diocese of Arlington schools in 1984 as an administrator and teacher. In 1990 Cherie received her Masters of Education degree from Marymount University in Arlington, Virginia and was assigned as the founding princpal of St. Andrew the Apostle School in Clifton, Virginia in 1993. While at St. Andrew School she developed the school's long and short-range technology plans, provided a series of half-day technology in-service training sessions for the faculty, developed the technology use agreement for the school, and received Virginia accreditation for the school within four years. In 1998 Cherie became the principal at St. Thomas More Cathedral School in Arlington, Virginia where she is providing technology in-services to the faculty, developing the school's long and short range technology plans, and is pursuing grant opportunities for improving the school's technological hardware, software, and infusion into the curriculum. Cherie was invited to and attended the Ethics in Leadership Conference at Exeter College, Oxford University in April 1997 and received a Fullbright Memorial Fund Grant to travel to Japan to observe and study Japanese education and culture for three weeks in October 1997. She has been a presenter at several educational technology conferences in Virginia and the Washington, D.C. area, and regularly provides in-services to new principal candidates. She has been a grant application committee member for the Department of Education/ Council of American Private Education Blue Ribbon Schools Award, The Washington Post Education Grants, and the Fullbright Memorial Fund Grants. Cherie obtained her Educational Doctorate from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in December 1998 where her research and dissertation focused on the funding and integration of technology into elementary education. She attended the 2nd Annual Colloquium for Information Systems Security Education in June 1998, and has been collecting data about INFOSEC at the K-12 level during the past year.
