Ed Ulbricht
President
Ed Ulbricht is a proven project manager with a successful track record in managing complex real estate developments. His portfolio of projects contain a wide variety of developments, new construction, renovations and re-locations. He is a Senior Executive leader skilled in P&L Management, Strategic Planning and Business Development in diverse environments. Ed is known to be a resourceful, innovative leader with ability to build, mentor and motivate teams to optimal performance while reducing risks. During his seven-year tenure at the Amend Group, Ed held several executive level management positions while building a project management organization that achieved extraordinary performance results. His expertise includes program and operational management, process development and implementation. His broad experience also includes executive positions as Senior Vice President of Development, CICI Enterprises and Director of Development, US Physical Therapy, and serving as Professor for the College of Architecture at Texas A&M University. Ed is married and has two sons who graduated from Dallas International School.
Sheila Kelly
Secretary
Sheila Kelly is the Director for the Terry Scholars Program in the Hobson Wildenthal Honors College at UT Dallas, where she has worked since 2013. From 2003-2013, Sheila worked at Dallas International School as the Director of Student Affairs, overseeing all student life outside the classroom. After obtaining a Masters of Public Affairs in 1991 from The University of Texas at Dallas, Sheila worked as Director of Operations for the Federal District Court, Office of the Clerk for almost ten years. She is a graduate of Saint Mary’s College, Notre Dame, where she received a Bachelors in English Literature. Sheila lived in Strasbourg and Angers, France, each for an academic year, and is fluent in French. She volunteered as a paralegal at the Texas/Mexico border for two years before returning to Dallas. Her three children attended DIS from preschool until high school and mastered French, Spanish, Mandarin and Arabic. Sheila also serves on the Board of Directors for Lone Star Circus.
Sabine Bellet-Kerael
Sabine Bellet-Kerael is a French national with a finance background and is Senior Director of Financial Planning and Analysis for Essilor of America. She is a graduate from Neoma Business School in Reims, France and began her finance career there with Rexel Holdings USA, Football Club Nantes Atlantique, Gillette, and Duracell. She moved to Dallas in 2005 and currently serves as an officer on the board of Alliance Francaise as Treasurer. Sabine and her husband have two boys who attended DIS. Sabine represents the first legacy appointment on our board, following in Alain Bellet's, her father's, footsteps in volunteer service to our school.
Paola Tettamanzi Buckley
Paola, a graduate of Georgetown University in History with a minor in English and continued her education at New York University with a Masters in Communication and Journalism. Paola attended the Lycée Français de New York (LFNY), and received her French Baccalaureat from the Academie de Caen. Paola is deeply involved with world-wide curricula and is a life-long learner. She currently serves as the Senior Lecturer and Advisor as well as the Director of the Study-In-France Program at Southern Methodist University (SMU). There, Paola worked with internship programs for French majors and minors designing individualized programs for students who studied Medical French and Fashion French, and managed CCI Diplôme de français professionnel langues examens. Paola has served as a French and Italian interpreter for the US State Department and was assigned to the White House, the Pentagon and other government entities for high level US and foreign officials.
Paola is a gifted public speaker and has served as a board member of the Alliance Française de Dallas since 2017. She has also led numerous capital campaigns and committees for multiple private schools in Dallas. Paola is fluent in four languages and is passionate about that value added proposition for language learners and is working on research with a team of professionals to publish findings.
Lisa Darling
Lisa has over 25 years of educational leadership experience and currently serves as the Head of School for Awty International School in Houston, Texas. Formerly, Lisa served as the President of the United World College in New Mexico and was Head of School at Wilmington Friends School in Delaware for 11 years. Before being appointed Head at Wilmington, she had served in various roles since 1988 including Business Manager, Assistant Head of School for Lower School, and Acting Head of School.
Prior to her time at Wilmington, she worked at Friends’ Central School in suburban Philadelphia, where she worked as both Director of Library Services and Business Manager. She also served as the Director of the H.B. DuPont Library at Pomfret School in Connecticut before moving to Philadelphia. Lisa has held positions on the International Women’s Forum and the National Association of Independent Schools. She holds a bachelor’s degree from George Fox College, a Master of Divinity in Education from Princeton Theological Seminary, and a master’s degree in library science from the State University of New York at Albany.
Jacques A. Weber
Head of School
Jacques joined the Dallas International School community as Head of School after serving twenty years in small and large schools in the United States, India, Saudi Arabia, and Malta. His most recent position before joining DIS in 2023 was Head of School at Austin International School. Prior to this, he served as High School Principal at Verdala International School (Malta), Vice Principal and DP Coordinator at the British International School of Jeddah (Saudi Arabia), and Head of Modern Languages at the American School of Bombay (India). Jacques started his career in education as a French and Spanish teacher at the Awty International School in Houston, Texas, his alma mater. In addition to modern languages, he has taught Social and Cultural Anthropology, Human Rights, and Research & Writing.
Jacques completed his primary education in an overseas French program and his secondary education in an international program, graduating with a Bilingual IB Diploma in English and Spanish. He earned an undergraduate degree in linguistics and anthropology in Canada and a masters degree in educational administration in Texas. He is a certified teacher and administrator in the State of Texas, and he holds an Advanced Certificate in International School Leadership from the Principal’s Training Center; he is also a member of the Academy of International School Heads. Jacques has served as the President of the Board of the Alliance Française d'Austin and on the board of Austin Sister Cities International. He has traveled through over one hundred countries and he maintains a passion for languages and learning new cultures through full language immersion.
Jacques lives by the Nelson Mandela quote,
If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his language, that goes to his heart.
