Francesca Gaspari - the Executive Director of ItaLingua. She was born and raised in Bergamo. She pursued acting for four years and later graduated from the Conservatory of Music in Bergamo. In 1986, she found herself in San Francisco, having arrived on the notes of love and jazz. She has been teaching Italian since 1990 - joining ItaLingua in 1996 where she taught and organized cultural events. She later became the Director in 2001. Besides teaching, she is a Reiki practioner. She also loves music, dancing, hiking, and knitting. Her biggest passion is ItaLingua, its students and teachers!
Lorenza Graziosi - born and raised in Italy. She graduated from "Scuola di Teatro La Scaletta" in Rome. She has been teaching Italian at ItaLingua since 2002. Her students especially appreciate the enthusiastic, creative and fun atmosphere of her classroom. Lorenza's biggest passions are Carlo and Saverio, her two sons.
Nicoletta Gherardi - born and raised in Rome, she graduated with certification in the German and English languages. She worked for nearly 15 years in the Public Relations division of an American company in Rome, while tutoring High School students in both German and English languages and literature. In 2001, she moved to San Francisco and has been teaching Italian language and culture since then - joining ItaLingua in 2003.
Aurora Meneghello - was born and raised in Italy before moving to California. While pursuing her passions for filmmaking and photography, Aurora started to teach Italian and fell in love with it. She taught adults and children of all ages, both in groups and privately after joining ItaLingua in 2004. Now that her professional photography practice is a full time job, she enjoys teaching at Italingua to keep her language and culture alive and to meet all the amazing people who love Italy.
Luisa Ferralis - born and raised in Padova, Italy. Lived also in Munich, Germany and in Paris, France. Earned her Laurea in Economics and Tourism from the University of Venice. She then obtained an MA in Italian from Middlebury College in Vermont and taught for several years Italian at the Pennsylvania State University. She later moved to the Bay Area in 2004, and immediately continued teaching Italian at ItaLingua. She loves teaching, traveling and meeting people from all over the world.
Emanuela Tallo - born and raised in Rome, Italy. Earned her laurea in Political Science from Università "La Sapienza" in Rome. She worked for a private cultural Institute in Rome and tutored until she met her husband and followed him first to the US, then to Budapest, Hungary and back to California where she joined ItaLingua in 2008. When she is not teaching, she likes to knit, crochet, play Legos and run after her handsome 7 years old child.
Gianluca Corinaldesi - born in Ancona (Marche), Gianluca lived in Rome from 2000 and moved to San Francisco in late 2008, when he joined ItaLingua. After graduating in Economics, at the University of Ancona, he earned a second degree in Cinema and Theater at the University of Bologna. He has worked in mainstream theater, film and television, as an assistant director. He has also directed several theater productions, shorts, videos and documentaries, and taught direction and screenwriting in theater and film workshops. Currently he collaborates with the Center for Digital Storytelling of Berkeley.
Luca Facchin - is from Bolzano, Italy. In 2002 he moved to San Francisco to attend San Francisco State University, from where he earned a BA in International Relations and where he tutored students of the Italian department. For eight years he has been working at the Frank V. de Bellis Collection of the California State University, a special research collection of materials which relate to the culture and civilization of Italy from classical antiquity to the present. He started teaching at ItaLingua in 2008. Before moving to San Francisco, Luca has taught Italian classes at different levels in Nottingham, UK. Currently, Luca is working towards a master degree in Public Administration at San Francisco State University.
Vittoria Salmoiraghi - grew up in Busto Arsizio, near Varese. She moved to Milan while attending the Vita-Salute San Raffaele University, where she graduated in Clinical Psychology in 2005. She obtained her Italian license as a psychologist in 2006 and in 2007 moved to San Francisco. She has been tutoring middle school students of all ages and she has been collaborating with the Italingua Institute for the past year. She loves to read all kinds of books and her favorite hobbies are cooking (home made pasta and ravioli in particular) and relaxing doing the Settimana Enigmistica (a famous Italian crossword weekly magazine).
Liliana Cardile - was born in Sicily. She graduated in Glottology and Linguistics at the University of Pisa in 1992. After working in the university as a teacher for several years she moved to Rome to fulfill her wish to become a journalist. She earned a second degree in journalism and has been working as a foreign politics reporter for the last thirteen years with magazines, newspapers and tv. Between 2001 and 2003 she shoot two tv documentaries in Argentina and India. In 2006 she decided to spend a sabbatical year in China to learn Mandarin. In Beijing, she met her husband - an Italian from Veneto. After traveling all around the world to see each other they married in 2009 and moved to Berkeley where she teaches at ItaLingua since 2010. They have a lovely 14 months old son.
