I grew up in Minneapolis and began playing music professionally there at 16. Longing for a ‘larger pond’ I attended University of the Arts in Philadelphia where I earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Music Performance and minored in Music Composition. After spending a number of years as a full-time professional musician, I began working at a residential school for children with Autism. This is where I really caught the “teaching bug.” While there, I completed graduate work in Applied Behavior Analysis through the University of Massachusetts and began working in Preparatory Boarding Schools. I became a Dean of Students at schools in Philadelphia (where I earned my Masters of Educational Leadership from Immaculata University), Northwest Georgia, and Pittsburgh before landing at McLean School. Through working at boarding schools, I developed a passion for teaching the ‘soft’ skills that are learned outside of the textbook. The opportunity to come to McLean presented itself in the 2014-2015 school year, and I haven’t looked back. I love McLean, because its size allows me to cultivate personal, powerful connections with each student in the Upper School. In my spare time, I continue to write and play music, often playing shows in the Philadelphia area/New Jersey shore in the summer and composing musical scores for films. Ultimately, though, I am wholly motivated by the meaningful relationships I have developed with my students and working as a team with my colleagues and I consider both groups as honorary family.