On November 9th, the 2023 Angel Award is to be awarded to Carol Thomsen, Founder and Executive Director of All Five. All Five is an early childhood education (ECE) school located in the Belle Haven area of Menlo Park and serves families of  socioeconomically and ethnoracially diverse backgrounds.

All Five is an early childhood education (ECE) school located in the Belle Haven area of Menlo Park and serves families of  socioeconomically and ethnoracially diverse backgrounds for 10 hours/day and 50 weeks each year. 75% of the families served earn at or near the poverty line and either live in the East Palo Alto and eastern Menlo Park community and/or are experiencing housing insecurity. Carol founded All Five in response to her decades of early childhood teaching in both low- and high-income communities. She is nurturing the students  using the latest research showing that children are inherently curious, and when given the opportunity to direct their own learning, the learning sticks. She has also created a beautiful school environment that has been shown to be important to learning.

All Five is just eight years old, but already its impact is recognized in the community, state, and beyond. The waiting list of children and families, and desire of teachers and community members to visit the school, are examples of All Five’s impact locally.  In response to the community’s ECE scarcity, Carol is boldly leading All Five to serve more children, from originally serving 24 children to 60 children today and expanding to 90 children over the next two years.

Link to Press Release:
The 2023 Angel Award Recipient, Carol Thomsen