What is a typical day like for you?
As a program director, I collaborate with my colleagues on designing curricula and professional development experiences for educators. Through this work, I partner with scholars and educators to promote interdisciplinary learning that values the professionalism of educators in all types of classrooms.
Tell us about your background and what brought you to Primary Source.
Coming in, I bring a deeply held conviction that all students deserve an education that is inclusive of diverse perspectives and challenges them to cultivate their global and critical consciousness through dynamic and inquiry-based teaching. I consider this to be an act of social justice that can humanize marginalized communities while promoting school cultures that value multiculturalism and pluralism. My interdisciplinary background is in Middle Eastern and Jewish History and Curriculum and Teaching with an emphasis on Social Studies Education. Furthermore, I’ve conducted research that explores the relationship between historical narrative construction, collective identity formation, and the representation of subaltern communities in textbooks and teacher discourse. I am the author of Representing the Middle East and Africa in Social Studies Education: Teacher Discourse and Otherness (February 2018, Routledge), and hold degrees from Quinnipiac University and Brandeis University, as well as a doctorate at Boston University.
What inspires you to do this work?
I’ve traveled throughout Israel and the West Bank and lived in Jordan as a Peace Corps volunteer, so I recognize the importance of the “border crossings” that happen through global learning and the need for schools to help students navigate global interconnectedness in the 21st century.
What do you enjoy doing when you’re not working?
I am an avid traveler and photographer. When I’m home, I also enjoy gardening, cooking, kayaking, and reading at coffeeshops.