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Dr. Mary Helen Immordino-Yang |
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Mary Helen Immordino-Yang, Ed.D., designs and carries out innovative research on the neuroscience of emotion, cognition, language and social interaction, and is especially interested in how these act together to shape brain development through learning. She uses her interdisciplinary background in education and neuroscience to explore the implications of brain and cognitive science research for curriculum and pedagogy. Currently, she holds a joint appointment at the Brain and Creativity Institute and the Rossier School of Education, both at the University of Southern California. At USC, she conducts research investigating the neurology and psychophysiology of social emotions across cultures, including admiration, inspiration, compassion, and others. She lectures nationally and abroad, and conducts intensive collaborative workshops for teachers and school administrators on bringing tools and information from cognitive science and neuroscience to the design of curriculum and teaching practices. Dr. Immordino-Yang earned her doctorate in human development and psychology at the Harvard University Graduate School of Education, Before returning to graduate school, she taught French at an independent high school and seventh grade science at a public junior/senior high school. Her background as a researcher, teacher, and mother has made her especially interested in the connection between learning and emotion. |
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Over the course of forty years, Eric Baylin (BFA, MFA) has taught art to students at every level of education from lower school through college. He currently teaches art and photography in the middle and upper schools at Packer Collegiate Institute in Brooklyn, NY. He has also been active in coordinating professional development programs at Packer and has served as a consultant to other schools and colleges, especially in support of facilitative leadership and the development of collaborative faculty study groups. He helped design the mentor program at Packer and regularly works with new faculty members to support their transition to the school. He is also an exhibiting sculptor and a published writer. |
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David Black (AB, PhD) has been teaching environmental science at the Groton School (Massachusetts) since 1989. After leaving a career in environmental consulting, he moved into teaching and has since worked to develop classes that use a hands-on approach to addressing the complex questions of resource management that will confront students and society with increasing frequency. His students study water quality through extensive field testing, biodiversity through trapping and habitat analysis, and conservation biology through modeling of local population dynamics. David has developed educational programs for teachers at the National Tropical Botanical Garden and the Chicago Botanic Garden and is active in the fields of landscape ecology and habitat management. |
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Krista Collins attended Marist College, where she majored in mathematics and minored in psychology. She then received her Master’s in Applied Combinatorial Mathematics from Northeastern University in 1992. While at Northeastern, Krista taught calculus and linear algebra, as well as mathematics courses to adults returning to college. Currently, she is the mathematics department chair at Lawrence Academy (Massachusetts), where she has taught mathematics for 16 years. She teaches all levels and all grade levels of high school mathematics. In 2005, she was awarded the Departmental Chair for Excellence in Teaching. "I teach math because I truly love mathematics and I enjoy sharing my passion for math with students. I try to show students that math is not an impossible, boring subject, fraught with anxiety. I teach them to see the beauty, accessibility, and necessity of mathematics in their everyday lives." |
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Arthur Karp (BS, ALM) is in his 25th year at Lawrence Academy. He is presently the dean of faculty, teaches AP United States Government and Politics and electives in history. He was one of the founding teachers of the Ninth Grade Program, an innovative interdisciplinary curriculum created to focus on developing the intellectual skills necessary to be a successful learner. Artie chaired the history department and oversaw the shift from the traditional textbook-and-lecture classroom to teaching history using historical documents and a problem-solving orientation in examining historic events. As dean of faculty, he is responsible for mentoring the new faculty and overseeing a professional development and evaluation system for the entire faculty. |
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Laura Moore (AB) chairs the English Department at Lawrence Academy (Massachusetts), where she has taught since 1983 and where she received the Departmental Chair for Excellence in Teaching in 1992. From 1983 until 1992, she served as dorm parent for both boys and girls in dorms of varying sizes. She is the faculty advisor for the school’s literary magazine, as well as the chair of the Intervention Team, a non-disciplinary response to health issues involving drugs and alcohol. She also ran the dance program from 1983 to 1991 and has taught Latin. Laura has had poetry and short fiction published in various literary magazines, including The Long Story and The Clackamus Literary Review. In the fall of 2001, she judged the New Hampshire Poetry Society’s National Poetry Contest, and in 2003, she co-wrote Keeping Time, an original full-length play to commemorate the town of Groton’s first 350 years. Most recently, she has had an article about teaching reading, titled “On The Same Page,” published in Independent School magazine. |
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Rob Rand (BA, MA) taught math for 38 years, most of them at Lawrence Academy (Massachusetts). He has taught every level of every course from Algebra 1 through BC Calculus and helped to lead the change to the integrated curriculum currently in use. He also was responsible for developing several upper level term electives for topics such as probability and statistics, matrices, advanced algebra, symmetry and transformations, and graph theory. Many of these became part of the current Math 4 curriculum. After the annual Math and Technology Conference at Phillips Exeter Academy in 1990, he became intrigued by simple computer programs that generated colorful images of fractals, and it occurred to him that the computer made this hot scientific topic accessible to high school math students. From that interest he developed the elective Fractals, Chaos and Dynamics. During his years at Lawrence, Rob also chaired the math department, served as dean of faculty and started the girls’ ice hockey program. |
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Paul Schlotman (BChE, numerous graduate courses in science and education) is part of the original faculty of Souhegan High School, which has emerged as a national model for school innovation and reform. Souhegan High School is a member of the Coalition of Essential Schools and was selected as the outstanding high school in Hew Hampshire in 1994 and as a Redbook Magazine’s "Best School" in 1996. Paul is a Math/Science Fellow of the Coalition of Essential Schools, a Brandwein Fellow, and has worked with the Annenberg Institute of School Reform at Brown University. He has been a workshop leader at the National Science Teachers Association National Convention and at the Coalition of Essential Schools Convention. He organized and started the democratic governing body at Souhegan, which is a 45-person governing council (25 students, 15 staff members and 5 community members). Paul specializes in project-based and inquiry learning and has been a regular lecturer on project- and inquiry-based learning at Hampshire College’s series on School/College Partnerships: Inquiry Based Science and Technology for all Students and Teachers. Paul has been a teacher for 30 years. |
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Amy Selinger earned a B.A. in American Studies with a minor in Women’s Studies from Colby College and went on to earn an M.Ed. in Administration, Planning, and Social Policy from Harvard Graduate School of Education. Amy has taught history in New York, New Jersey and, most recently at Lawrence Academy and Buckingham Browne & Nichols in Massachusetts. Amy has taught everything from AP United States History to the History of India and covered such topics as Ireland, the 1960s in America, the Ancient World and Women’s History. She was involved in the recent overhaul of the BB&N history curriculum that was centered on providing a more global approach to the study of history. Amy created a ninth grade course that focused on world history by answering essential questions with primary sources from several cultures. Currently, she is the co-director of the college counseling office at BB&N. |
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Melinda Tower studied government at Gettysburg College and earned her master’s in Public Policy from American University. Washington, DC, provided the opportunity to explore two of her passions: politics and education. She was an active participant in politics on the Hill and worked part-time at the Norwood School (Maryland). When she was offered a job at her alma mater, Wyoming Seminary (Pennsylvania), she willingly left politics to pursue a career in education on a full-time basis. She served as associate director of admission, director of financial aid, history teacher, academic advisor and dorm parent before she moved west to serve as director of admission for the Annie Wright School (Washington State). While at Annie Wright, Melinda developed and taught a course on Contemporary US History. Most recently, Melinda worked in the history department at Lawrence Academy (Massachusetts), where she taught U.S. History and Honors History, developed a series of history electives and mentored new teachers. She also coached, served as a dorm parent and advised various student activities. In the fall of 2008, Melinda will join the faculty of St. Andrew’s School (Delaware). |
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Meghan Trask teaches all levels of Latin and is the language department chair at Lawrence Academy (Massachusetts). She is a dorm parent and a member of the school’s drug and alcohol intervention team. She received a master’s degree in curriculum and instruction from Boston College and a bachelor’s degree from the University of Dallas in classics with a minor in music. Before teaching at Lawrence Academy, she taught Latin to middle-school students and coached high-school fencing at Rye Country Day (New York). In 2007, she was awarded the Lawrence Academy Departmental Chair for Excellence in Teaching. She will be spending her upcoming summer studying Spanish at Middlebury College. |
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