My first teacher, Martha Bradberry, in high school, taught me how to teach the Suzuki books, and this supported my first private student of 20 students. During my Bachelor's of Music and Master’s of Music in violin performance at Indiana University, I studied the violin with Kevork Mardirossian, Desiree Ruhstrat, and Joseph Swensen, and studied and practiced violin pedagogy with Mimi Zweig and Dr. Brenda Brenner. I taught as a lead teacher with Dr. Brenner at Fairview Violin Project, one of the first community programs in the country that teaches violin group classes to underserved elementary students as part of their public school curriculum. 

After graduation, I worked with my teacher, the conductor and concert violinist Joseph Swensen, to open up a free violin group class for Kindergarteners at a local elementary school in a program called Habitat4Music. Upon moving to Chicago in 2017, I began to assistant teach at Urban Prairie Waldorf under Miguel Garcia (now a professor at the University of North Texas), and in 2019 became director of the program, in which all students grades 3-8 took orchestra as part of their standard curriculum. In 2020, I began co-directing the program with Kelly Quesada, starting a unique model based on the practice and teaching of collaborative learning.

Through mentorship with Dr. Brenda Brenner (Indiana University), Brendan Finuncue (Chicago Waldorf), Elizabeth English (Waldorf School of DuPage), Danny Clay (composer), Clara Takarabe (CSO, neuroscientist, labor organizer), Miguel Garcia (University of North Texas), we developed a curriculum around game-based play through improvisation, pedagogy focused on the body/mind/sound connection, and notational and literacy skills built through composition and reading. In 2023 we presented this curriculum at the American String Teachers conference in a talk titled “Orchestra for Everyone”. In spring 2024, our classroom and curriculum were studied for a research study by Northwestern University on the development of musical identity in a dissertation published in August 2024.

I have had Suzuki training and certification from Pat D'Ercole (Violin/Viola Book 3) Vera McCoy-Sulentic (Violin/Viola Books 1 and 2), and Waldorf music training with Jason Child. I am organizing string group music in all CPS schools. Please contact me to collaborate in this endeavor, or to inquire about my private studio.