National Steinbeck Center Staff

Colleen Bailey, Executive Director

Colleen Bailey joined the National Steinbeck Center in April 2008 as the Director of Community Engagement and Learning and has served the institution as its Executive Director since October 2009. Before working at the Center, Colleen was an arts educator and administrator in schools in Central and Southern California and Colorado. She has won numerous awards, including Who’s Who Among American Teachers (2000) and the National Society of High School Scholars Claes Nobel Educator of Distinction (2007). She has an undergraduate degree from the University of Southern California and a graduate degree from Northwestern University. She is a member of the Rotary Club of Salinas and serves on the boards of the Oldtown Salinas Association and the Rancho San Carlos Education Foundation. Colleen is a proud native and current resident of Salinas.

Deborah Silguero, Curator of Exhibitions & Collections

For more than 30 years, Deborah has served in the museum field as a curator and manager of exhibitions and collections, senior art preparator and conservation technician for a number of museums. She has worked for such notable institutions as the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), where she created key exhibitions, the J. Paul Getty Museum’s Decorative and Antiquities Conservation departments, and in the permanent reinstallation of the Henry E. Huntington Art Galleries & Library in San Marino, to name only a few.

Upon moving to the Central Coast, Deborah served for eight years as manager of collections and exhibition for the Monterey History & Art Association. She brings her wide-ranging expertise of exhibition design, development and conservation to the Center, where she began working in a full-time capacity in 2008. She is also a part time lecturer at California State University, Monterey Bay, teaching museum studies in the Visual & Public Art Department, and she manages the museum studies internship program for the university within the Center. Deborah completed her B.A. in Visual and Public Art and earned an M.A. in Education from CSU Monterey Bay.

Leo Cullum, Chief Development Officer
David Butler, Director of Finance
Marci Bracco, Marketing Consultant
Sandra Silva, Development & Membership Coordinator
Paul Van de Carr, Museum Preparator
Jenny McAdams, Events Coordinator
Jordan Stoddard, Facilities Coordinator
Paula Vershay, Art Class Coordinator
Marie Ziegal, Volunteer Coordinator
Patrick J. Dunn, Museum Store & Guest Services Manager
Reginaldo Gomez, Assistant Store Manager