Talks with Teachers

Kathy Keyes taught English for 36 years—at a rural high school, at an urban university, and at a college preparatory Catholic high school. A graduate of Purdue and Indiana University, Kathy recently stepped out of the teaching profession for a “gap year” in order to reevaluate and process the joys and challenges of teaching. She ... Read more...

This fall, Erik begins his 26th year of teaching, most of them at Ferris High School in Spokane. He loves working with passionate, intelligent, and innovative colleagues who are committed to helping students each day. Erik teaches English 10 and AP English Literature & Composition and has coached soccer, basketball, and track. In addition to ... Read more...

Originally from Greenup, Kentucky – a small town in Appalachia – Brandon now lives in Cincinnati with Angela, his wife, and their 2 sons, Hilton (9) and Dorian (6).  After high school, he attended Ashland Community College as a nursing major before transferring to the University of Kentucky.  He graduated in 2002 with degrees in ... Read more...

Roy F. Smith is the English Department Chair at Round Rock High School and teaches AP English Literature and Dual-Credit English.  Roy is an AP English Literature College Board Consultant. He is also a consultant for the National Math and Science Institute (NMSI). In 2015, he was named Round Rock High School and the Round ... Read more...

Donna Carpenter is committed to lifelong learning and student-centered teaching. She earned her Bachelors from Gettysburg College and her Masters from University of Pennsylvania. Following a successful career in publishing, Donna returned to the classroom at Kingsway High School in Southern New Jersey where she has taught ninth grade English, Film Studies and her greatest ... Read more...

Elizabeth Matheny has taught for Maryland Public Schools for thirteen years. She currently teaches English 9 and AP Language and Composition. When she’s not teaching, she’s usually hiking or exploring independent bookstores with her husband and son. You can find her and what’s happening in her classroom on Twitter @matheeli.

  Megan is an English Teacher and Department Coordinator at Cuyahoga Heights High School. She has been teaching English language arts to high school students near Cleveland, Ohio since 2004, earning her master’s degree from Kent State University in 2007 and achieving National Board Certification in 2013. She has ventured beyond her own classroom to ... Read more...

Dave Stuart Jr. is a husband and dad who teaches high schoolers in a small town. He is animated by a simple belief: all students and teachers should flourish. Every article he write, every lesson he teaches, and book he reads is driven by the certainty that that can, and must, happen. He is the author ... Read more...

Fifteen years ago, Alex Kajitani was a struggling new teacher in one of California’s poorest neighborhoods. He’d left a potentially lucrative career in restaurant management to pursue his teaching dream, and now his inner-city middle school students were unmotivated, unengaged and uninterested in the math he was teaching. Demoralized and desperate, he set out on a journey to turn ... Read more...

Jim Burke is the author of numerous bestselling books, including the English Teacher’s Companion and What’s the Big Idea? The question he’s always tried to answer is “How can we teach our students better?” He seeks these answers daily through his work in his own classroom at Burlingame High School in California where he still teaches after twenty years. ... Read more...

Shanna Peeples: 2015 National Teacher of the Year

David Miller: AP Literature Chief Reader

Chris Bronke

Monica Burns: Class Tech Tips (Episode #85)

Mentor Texts with Allison Marchetti and Rebekah O’Dell