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(click team member's photo for larger view) |
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Jose Vilson is a math teacher, coach, and data analyst for a middle school in the Inwood/Washington Heights neighborhood of New York, New York. He is beginning his 5th year as a teacher, having finished the New York City Teaching Fellows program in 2007. He graduated with a bachelor’s degree in computer science from Syracuse University and a master’s degree in mathematics education from the City College of New York. He has worked on creating professional development for his fellow teachers on such topics as working on goals for the classroom and using the ARIS system, a data management system under the NYC Department of Education. He’s spoken at Lincoln Center as part of the NYC Teaching Fellows’ induction ceremonies and writes regularly about education issues mainly at his blog. He is also a committed poet, Web developer, and mentor to new teachers. He can be found at http://thejosevilson.com. |
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Renee Moore has taught English in the Mississippi delta for 20 years. The 2001 Mississippi Teacher of the Year, she is also a Milken Education Award winner and National Board Certified. Renee is a Writing Project Fellow and has received numerous awards and grants, including $30,000 from the Spencer Foundation (Chicago) for her work on teaching standard English to African American students.Actively involved in teacher-research, Renee is also a Writing Project Fellow and has received numerous awards and grants, including $30,000 from the Spencer Foundation (Chicago) for her work on teaching standard English to African American students. She was the first active K–12 educator to serve on the Board of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching (California), and is on the Board of Directors for the National Board of Professional Teaching Standards. She also currently serves on the State Commission on Teacher Licensure. Active for many years in professional development, her writings have been published as chapters in four books and several professional journals. |
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Cindi Rigsbee has recently left her Literacy Coach position in Orange County, North Carolina to work as a Regional Education Facilitator, a “teacher-on-loan” to the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction. She works with a team of teachers in the Educator Recruitment and Development division. A former language arts teacher and reading specialist, Cindi was named North Carolina Teacher of the Year in 2008 and was a finalist for the 2009 National Teacher of the Year.
Cindi is a National Board certified teacher in the area of early adolescence/English language arts who enjoys writing about teaching. She has had several articles published by Teacher Magazine online, including “Grammar Interrupted,” “Tips for New Teachers,” and “What Makes a Principal Great.” In addition, Cindi comments on education issues in her blog, the Dream Teacher, and is currently traveling the country sharing from her book Finding Mrs. Warnecke: The Difference Teachers Make. |
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After 23 years as a science teacher, Susie Highley moved into the media center at Creston Middle School in Indianapolis to take advantage of exciting advances in technology and to see what she could do to help students develop a love for reading. She has received the Golden Apple Award, Lilly Endowment Teacher Creativity Fellowship, GTE GIFT Grant, and Indiana Teacher Technology Fellowship and was her district Teacher of the Year (TOY) in 1999. She is a graduate of the Teacher Leadership Academy (TLA), a unique program sponsored by the Central Indiana Educational Service Center (CIESC) in which teachers from several counties embark upon a specialized 2-year program. TLA incorporates current research and best practices while developing and providing leadership opportunities. She serves on the board of directors for the Indiana Middle Level Educators Association (IMLEA), the Association of Indiana Media Educators (AIME), and her local library board. Susie has also participated as a Teacher Academy Fellow and consultant at Indiana State University and has been a member of the Teacher Leaders Network since its inception. |
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Kilian Betlach is the assistant principal of Elmhurst Community Prep (ECP), a small middle school in Oakland, California. An alumnus of Teach for America, Kilian taught 7th-grade language arts and English language development for 6 years in San Jose, California, experiences that were chronicled in the blog Teaching in the 408 – twice named one of the top education blogs in the country by the Washington Post. He has worked extensively in teacher training and development with the Oakland Teaching Fellows, Alliant International University, and Teach For America. Kilian is the author of This Feels Like A Riot Looks, a punk rock love story, and most recently We Are Almost Always on the Verge, a collection of short stories. |
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Ariel Sacks has been teaching middle school English in New York City public schools for the past 6 years. She currently teaches 7th-grade English at a middle school in Sunset Park, Brooklyn. For the past 3 years she was team leader and English department chair at a public secondary school in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, and she previously taught English to transitional English language learners in a bilingual middle school in East Harlem. Ariel studied progressive pedagogy at Bank Street College of Education and is committed to implementing student-centered methods successfully in high-needs public schools. She has been developing and writing about the Whole Novels Program, a student-centered method of whole class literature studies, which she has presented at Bank Street College and the 2010 National Council of Teachers of English conference. Ariel has also been a panelist at conferences and workshops hosted by AACTE, Ford Foundation, Center for American Progress, and Great Teachers for Great City Schools, where she has discussed issues of teacher preparation and teacher leadership in urban public schools. Her articles have been published in Teacher Magazine, NY Daily News, and Bank Street College’s Occasional Papers Series. She writes regularly about her teaching practice and educational issues at her TLN featured blog, On the Shoulders of Giants. |
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Emily Vickery in an innovator educator who has worked in a wide variety of settings, from teaching in an economically disadvantaged urban high school to serving as a consultant to a state governor. The constant in her work has been a love of teaching, learning, and technology. Emily has served on the Alabama Governor’s Council on Education Technology and represented the state of Alabama on a task force for the U.S. Department of Education.
From 1997 to 2003, Emily served as a private educational consultant focusing on technology. Her clients included the governor of the State of Colorado, the Education Commission of the States, and Apple, Inc. In 2003, she accepted a fellowship with the award-winning Teaching Tolerance project of the Southern Poverty Law Center.
From 2004 to 2009, Emily served as a technology instructor and the director of 21st-century learning for a private academy in Alabama. In 2009, she accepted the position of 21st-century learning specialist at an innovative parochial school in Florida. There, she supports teachers in curriculum, instruction, assessment, learning management, and the use of digital tools. |
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John M. Holland is an artist, a teacher, a writer, and an innovator. He has dedicated his career to serving the neediest and youngest school children of Richmond, Virginia. After 12 years as a preschool teacher of 3- and 4-year-olds from Richmond’s toughest neighborhoods, John recently left the classroom to take a position as Early Head Start/Head Start Program child development specialist for Richmond Public Schools, supporting the teachers who serve those children. John is one of a handful of male National Board–certified pre-Kindergarten teachers in the country. He was the lead blogger for the Pew Charitable trust blog Inside Pre-K from 2008–2010 and currently writes about pre-K issues on his blog Emergent Learner. John is a member of the Teacher Leaders Network and the Center for Teacher Leadership at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) where he is the moderator for the Virginia Forum, an online community of accomplished teachers. John is pursuing a Ph.D. in educational leadership at VCU where he has served as a National Board coach, mentor, workshop presenter, and university student teaching supervisor. He is president of VCU’s Educational Leadership Doctoral Association and was recognized in 2009 as one of Richmond’s Top 40 Under 40 by Style Weekly. John's teacherpreneur company is rightSTART Solutions LLC. His passions include educational policy, teacher leadership, creativity, and 21st-century learning. |
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Carrie J. Kamm is a mentor-resident coach for the Academy for Urban School Leadership’s (AUSL) Urban Teacher Residency (UTR) program at National Teachers Academy, a Chicago Public School. Carrie began her career in Chicago teaching 4th and 5th grades at R. N. Dett Elementary School for 4 years and then became a 4th-grade mentor-teacher at the Chicago Academy Elementary School, an AUSL resident teacher training academy, for 5 years. During that time, she earned her National Board–certification as a middle childhood generalist and mentored several cohorts of teachers going through the NBC process. She earned her Ed.D. in curriculum and instruction from Loyola University Chicago in May 2007. In her current role as mentor-resident coach she coordinates her site’s resident teachers, provides coaching and support to mentor- and resident teachers, and provides professional development to the teachers in the AUSL schools network. |
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Shannon C’de Baca is a 31-year teaching veteran (K–12 science) who moved from face-to-face teaching to teaching online years ago. She developed a lab intensive chemistry course for Iowa students who did not have an available chemistry teacher. She has worked with seven states and two national organizations in the development of science standards and teacher professional development. Shannon’s teaching has been recognized with honors from the Milken Family Foundation, National Science Teachers Association (NSTA), the Iowa Department of Education, Sertoma, and PBS.
She hosted the Annenberg television series, “The Missing Link in Mathematics.” She has also worked with the PBS series NOVA and served as a consultant for the National Education and the Economy, the Council of Chief State School Officers, the National Education Association, the NSTA, the U.S. Mint and the U.S. Department of State. Shannon currently serves as one of two citizen ambassadors to Bahrain. She has worked as a designer and a facilitator for the Iowa statewide “Every Learner Inquires” initiative and guided development of the science component of the Iowa Core Curriculum. Shannon continues to pursue her passion for equitable access to exceptional online courses for all students through work with the Iowa Technology Task Force and Iowa Learning Online. Her essay on teaching online appeared at Teacher Magazine online. |
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After teaching more than a dozen different language arts and social science courses in two Alabama school systems, Jennifer Barnett recently assumed the role of school-based technology integration specialist in rural Talladega County at Winterboro School. A veteran teacher of nearly 20 years, she was selected as Alabama’s District III Teacher of the Year in 2001 and received the Marbury Technology Innovation Award, Alabama’s most prestigious award recognizing technology innovation by a classroom teacher, in 2008. Leading a project-based learning initiative on global warming, Jennifer’s team was selected to attend Microsoft’s Innovative Teachers Forum in 2007. She designed and continues to lead a 21st-century learning initiative for her school system, implementing a protocol for integrating 21st-century skills with content standards. Her work with the highly effective Alabama Best Practices Center and presence on the Web has afforded Jennifer the opportunity to work with teachers on technology integration throughout the world. Jennifer is a member of the Teacher Leaders Network. |
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Laurie Wasserman has been a special education teacher for the past 29 years working with students of all ages, many of whom have had a wide variety of learning and health disabilities. Teaching middle schoolers and sharing stories from the classroom are her passions. She currently teaches 6th-grade middle schoolers at The Andrews Middle School, in Medford, Massachusetts. Laurie mentors new teachers in her school district and has also mentored new teachers through a partnership with The Center for Teaching Quality and the University of Connecticut. She has written articles for Teacher Magazine and educationworld.com, and written book reviews for Teacher Leaders Network. This National Board–certified teacher is also part of the National Writing Project and the Teacher Leaders Network. |
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Introducing the TeacherSolutions 2030 Team 
