For alumna Emma Vallarino, education has always been more than a career path, it’s a lifelong passion shaped by the people, languages, and experiences that began during her years at Silicon Valley International School (INTL). Attending the school from 1994 to 2003 and graduating from the French program, Emma looks back with fondness and gratitude.
Reflecting on her time at INTL, Emma fondly recalls some of the moments that shaped her childhood, including the joy and community spirit of the school’s beloved traditions. In particular, she holds warm memories of INTL’s annual festival, Kermesse, which was a lively community celebration filled with games, international food, and family-friendly activities.
“I loved the Kermesse every year! The work to put on a show was really fun and I loved the food and celebratory feel of it,” she recalls. “I also loved my teachers, ‘Susanville’ from Teacher Susan’s class remains one of my favorite school memories. Denis, my 3rd and 5th Grade teacher, always had his guitar! I feel so lucky we had teachers who were joyful. I loved my friends, we are all still close. Lucky me!”
Those joyful, community-centered experiences helped set the stage for her future in education. After leaving INTL, Emma attended Menlo School, then Stanford University, where she majored in Human Biology. “As an undergraduate, I studied human development through many lenses,” she says. “When I had the opportunity to study child and brain development, I knew I had found my passion.”
That passion led her to Bing Nursery School, Stanford’s renowned child development laboratory. “After taking psychology classes at Bing and working there as a research assistant, I realized I wanted to be an early childhood educator,” she explains. “There’s a magic and joy that’s part of early childhood, and I’ve never become tired of it. Now, as an administrator at Bing, I continue the work to protect and support the magic of childhood and play, which is my passion.”
Emma credits INTL’s multicultural environment for nurturing empathy and perspective-taking, skills central to her teaching philosophy. “Growing up in INTL’s multilingual and multicultural environment, I developed a strong ability to take others’ perspectives,” she shares. “In my first year of teaching, I taught a young girl who only spoke French and was just learning English. I resonated so much with her experience and worked to bridge her learning with my French.”
She continues, “INTL’s environment directly impacted how I approach teaching, to value family language and culture as funds of knowledge, and to honor children as unique and multifaceted.”
Her love of languages also traces back to her INTL experience. “ISTP* opened my life to new languages,” she says. “Having learned Spanish in middle school, I continued through high school and later took up Portuguese in college. It’s a wonderful gift to feel at ease around many different languages and have a drive to learn them.”
That multilingual curiosity served her well while studying abroad in Paris. “My cultural and language experiences at ISTP were invaluable during that time,” she says. “My host family was so impressed that I was truly an American!”
Reflecting on her INTL education, Emma notes, “I believe my experiences gave me a wonderful perspective on life. I felt I had a good sense that the world is wider than my own little world and the Bay Area bubble. I loved learning and taking others’ perspectives, it has really shaped who I have become.”
As she watches her own child grow within the same community that once nurtured her, Emma feels immense gratitude. “I look forward to growing as a parent as my children enter new stages of life,” she says. “I feel so lucky to have INTL be a place for Owen to develop and grow, and to be a resource for me in raising resilient, kind, and globally minded children.”
*INTL was formerly known as International School of the Peninsula (ISTP)