For the past 27 years, I have taught children ages two through twenty-two. My own education guided me to see myself as the center of the classroom, the lead, the "one in charge". When I graduated from Duke University in 1994, I had no idea I would spend the next five years unraveling much that I had learned. Through painstaking research and mentoring from others, I came to see children as powerful, competent and citizens with rights. I spent several years as a public high school teacher, a community college teacher and a high school tutor. I then transitioned to teaching early childhood, where I found my passion. In 2016, I started the Wildflower School, a Reggio Emilia-inspired forest school on my 34-acre farm and began bringing to life the vision that had been building in my mind for years. Today, I am Director of that school and farm operator. I am obsessed with helping society shift its image of children from one of dependence and ignorance to one of power and competence.
