Board of Directors

Joseph Centoni has been a member of the Friends of Fitzgerald Marine Reserve board of directors since 2010.  He has been visiting Fitzgerald Marine Reserve for as long as he can remember.  Joseph was a ‘junior ranger’ at the reserve in elementary school and began volunteering at the reserve when he was in high school.  He is currently a high school science teacher and also enjoys helping train new volunteer naturalists at the reserve.

Tom is a Michigan native.  He grew up there and has degrees in chemical engineering and law from the University of Michigan. After graduating from law school in 1964 Tom emigrated to the San Francisco Bay Area to practice patent law.  A true science nerd, he specialized in chemical and life sciences inventions and was a pioneer in patenting biotechnology inventions—representing biotechnology companies, universities, and venture capitalists.

In 1988 Tom purchased a second home in Montara and soon discovered and fell in love with the Fitzgerald Marine Reserve and became a Friends donor.  As he neared retirement Tom and his wife, Linda, decided to become FFMR volunteers and took Bob Breen’s 2003 training class.  Later that year they both joined the FFMR Board of Directors.  After retiring in 2007 Tom and Linda decided to live full time at their Montara home.  Tom enjoys volunteering at FMR, occasionally writing articles for the FFMR newsletter, and spending time with others in the FFMR family.

Susan Evans has been a naturalist for 14 years.  As a former teacher, she loves reef exploring with school tour groups, educating fellow naturalists with Continuing Ed./Zoom events and encouraging our future naturalists in the training classes.

For over thirty years Roger’s career centered on efforts managing facilities and developing programs in the field of informal environmental education.  Now retired, he has continued to volunteer locally with the goal of providing children with both understanding and engagement with the natural world.  Roger is thankful to have found the work of FFMR to be central to his personal interests and especially enjoys leading tours of younger students at the Reserve.

Jeanette H is a developmental biologist/vision scientist at UCSF.  She was introduced to the Fitzgerald Marine Reserve while chaperoning her daughter’s field trip, took the naturalist training class soon after.  She has been a docent since 2012 and has served on the Board since 2019.  Her area of interest is educational outreach to the FMR.

An Ohio native, Karen earned her Ph.D. in Genetics and Molecular Biology at Rice University in Houston.  She conducted research on the biology of human genetic disease before getting the “teaching bug”, and has been a college professor in Minnesota and California. Her real passion is making science engaging and exciting for the non-specialists, be it children or adults. For 20 years she worked as a Staff Scientist at the Exploratorium in San Francisco, where she trained classroom teachers and staff, presented public programs, consulted on exhibits, and provided scientific oversight of exhibitions and programming.   Karen is an alum of the FFMR naturalist class of 2015, and earned a California Naturalist credential in 2019.  In addition to being a steward for the Marine Reserve, she and her husband Rob enjoy travel, exploring the local coast, hanging out with friends, and playing with their two dogs and two cats.   One of her favorite tide pool animals is the sea urchin – she and Rob met while they were each conducting cell biology research using urchins as a model organism.

Gregg joined FFMR in 2022 and the Board in 2024. His academic and career paths crisscrossed FMR over the decades. There were visits for high school independent study to a master’s in marine ecology involving field trips to various intertidal areas along the San Mateo coast. He managed the state health department’s Marine Biotoxin Monitoring Program for 28 years, creating the first statewide volunteer-based phytoplankton monitoring program for early detection of toxin-producing species. His work provided the opportunity to travel the entire California coast, collecting samples and meeting and training volunteers. The latter instilled a great appreciation for the power of volunteer effort, and he hopes to repay some of that with his involvement in FMR tours, anemone surveys, special events and displays at the visitor center, engaging with fellow volunteer naturalists in learning more about the marine algae in FMR, and other, as yet unknown, fascinations.

Tom Niesen is an emeritus professor of marine biology at San Francisco State University, specializing in the ecology of marine invertebrates. Dr. Niesen is a Fellow of the California Academy of Sciences and has participated in marine research in the Pacific Ocean and the Caribbean and Bering Seas. Tom has been affiliated with the James V. Fitzgerald Marine Reserve for over 25 years, leading field trips, instructing naturalist classes and serving as a Board member since the 1980s.

Ron Olson is currently retired, having worked for San Mateo County for 35 years, 20 of those spent working in the Intensive Care Unit. He completed FMR naturalist training in 2011. What Ron enjoys most about being a volunteer naturalist at FMR is that each experience is unique. In his time at the Reserve, he’s learned to recognize how the plant and animal life in and around our tide pools have adapted to the challenges of their environment.

With a background in biology and a love of the ocean, Elaine found a perfect volunteer niche with FFMR becoming a docent first in 2001 for a few years, then becoming active again in 2017. Elaine enjoys roving on the reef and leading tours.

Scott grew up in New Jersey where he learned to find nature within a BMX bike ride of his house. His family never went to the Jersey Shore (“Oy, the traffic”), but they did make annual pilgrimages to South Carolina. Here, low tides revealed otherworldly tidepools with shells and the occasional sea star or even a seahorse. This was the start of his love of tidepools.

Later, as a young adult living in NYC, he picked up surfing and started spending weekends at local beaches. In 2002, to further this passion and a nascent career in technology, he moved to San Francisco. Shortly thereafter, he stumbled upon FMR and was smitten by its tidepool critters. He’s been an FFMR volunteer naturalist ever since and joined the board as treasurer in 2023.

Scott continues to live in San Francisco with his wife and two boys. When he is not surfing or tidepooling, he builds customer success organizations for startup tech companies..

Cynthia took the FFMR class in 2024 and never looked back! From leading tours to donning a costume for the Fourth of July parade, she brings enthusiasm and a sense of fun to everything she does—including reef surveys and Plankton Palooza events. Although she doesn’t come from a marine science background, she has embraced learning about the fascinating organisms and magical environment of Fitzgerald. In 2025, Cynthia joined the Board of Directors, continuing to share her energy and curiosity with the community.

Jean Replicon is a professor of Biological Sciences at Mission College in Santa Clara.  She earned her doctorate in Molecular Biology from Loyola University, Chicago in 1991 and has been teaching in the California community college system ever since.  Jean specializes in creating engaging, hands-on field experiences for her Marine Biology and Tropical Ecology courses.

Jean regularly takes students on outings to Fitzgerald Marine Reserve.  Beginning in 2017, Jean started supporting the volunteer naturalist training program by teaching one of the docent training classes.  As a Moss Beach resident, Jean is a frequent visitor to the Reserve.  She helps out at the plankton/invertebrate events, reef surveys and participates in field workshops.