Candidate for
Board Member; Mountain View-Whisman School District

I completed my teacher training and master's at Stanford University, and then went on to teach in New York City at an Urban Assembly school that was part of an urban school reform movement funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. It was there I met my wife, who was a fellow New York City teacher. We moved to Mountain View and live in the Shoreline West neighborhood. For five years I taught at Monta Vista High School, where I began collaborating with local companies (Google and Microsoft) to transform classroom instruction.

In 2007, I created a program to prepare students to do nonpartisan policy development and advanced study of the Constitution in DC. In 2010, I was Teacher of the Year at Monta Vista High School for my use of project based learning in teaching economics and government.

In addition to my experience at traditional public schools, I then went on to complete a teacher residency studying innovative teaching methodologies at High Tech High, a charter school in San Diego. My work has allowed me to learn from teachers across the world: from Finland to our own nation's most innovative public district, public charter, and independent schools.

Outside of the classroom, I traveled back to New York City in the summers to study school reform, and I earned my second master's in educational leadership at Columbia University.

I am running to bring the very strongest policies from our best public and private schools, and from around the world to Mountain View. We cannot wait for Sacramento to fix our schools. There is so much we can do locally, here and now.