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Eric Benzel
A newbie New Yorker, Eric teaches high school algebra at a new charter school in the Bronx. He is a part of the 2010 cohort of NYC based Math for America, a five year teaching fellowship. Before teaching, he completed a MA in Math Education at Teachers College and a BS in Applied Mathematics at the University of Colorado Boulder. He is passionate about the politics and pedagogy of education and is especially interested in designing authentic math curriculum, improving classroom equity, and engaging student leadership and empathy through curriculum. You can find him tweeting mathy things at @mrbenzel.

Janessa Jordan
Janessa just relocated to Memphis, Tennessee from Boulder, Colorado (a product of the University of Colorado and the Presidents Leadership Class) with the Memphis Teacher Residency. The program equips young people with the tools, skills, and experience in order to be excellent urban educators, all within a Christian context. For her first year, Janessa will be teaching 12th grade English under the supervision of a mentor teacher, all while taking master’s coursework in urban education. At the end of the year, Janessa plans to teach in the Memphis City Schools for three years. Janessa’s past teaching experience includes a year and a half long internship at Mapleton Expeditionary School of the Arts, two summers teaching and one year volunteering with Breakthrough Miami and Breakthrough Kent Denver, respectively, and 9 months tutoring with an low income in-home tutoring company called A-to-Z Tutoring. These experiences helped form her unshakable belief that every student can and desires to learn when given exemplary instruction and attention. Fun fact: Janessa likes to freestyle rap. She is also planning to single-handedly start a recycling revolution in the South.

Garrett Hedman
In the fall of 2010, Garrett will find himself as a Chemistry teacher in the Mississippi Delta after he attends the Teach For America Delta Institute to earn his teaching certification. His past teaching experiences include teaching 4th and 5th grade students at a Community Montessori school on how to become story tellers and teaching college, sophomore students how to problem solve social issues. His curiosity is relentless.  For two years, he has researched how our brain learns/processes information under Dr. Yuko Munakata at the Cognitive Development Center in Boulder,  he is a “story enthusiast” as he has practices as an amateur story teller for all ages, and he is greatly interested in how technology can influence education as he has programmed several educational games and designed several websites. Most importantly, Garrett lives by the belief that everyone has an opportunity to teach another person every day.

Nate Reaven
Throughout the summer and fall, Nate will find himself in two completely different and yet similar teaching environments. Nate will begin his journey teaching summer school to under-resourced middle school students from the Denver Public School system during the summer months. He will also be student teaching at a wildly diverse school in a far wealthier school district, which poses for an interesting juxtaposition of socio-economic classes. Here, he will apply his experience with the summer school to American literature, AP language, and debate in what is sure to be a memorable experience. A product of the University of Colorado at Boulder’s education school and Presidents Leadership Institute, Nate has found a passion for equity amongst students, educational policy locally and nationally, and every Denver sports team. Nate also taught conversational English in Zhengzhou, China, and was an intern for the Public Education and Business Coalition (PEBC).