By Adriana Ungerleider, ’12, Contributor
For the 2009-2010 school year, the Upper School added two new teachers to its faculty. While the school year has just began, the new math and computer science teacher, Mr. John Carriero, and new technology librarian, Ms. Andrea Owens, have been very impressed by the welcoming CCDS environment, and by the amazing dedication shown by the students.
Carriero, a recent graduate of Haverford College, brings experience working in their computer science department there. While he majored in computer science in college, his favorite classes in high school were “math and physics,” and he is excited to be able to teach one of the two. Carriero has been impressed by the approach to teaching and learning at CCDS and his favorite thing about the school so far is “the community: The faculty, staff and students have been great in making me feel welcomed here.”
Another new teacher in the Upper School, Owens, has 16 years of experience as a teacher at a school in Pennsylvania. She wanted to continue to interact directly with students and other teachers, and decided to take the position of technology librarian at CCDS. Owens loves research—which she considers, “learning to learn,” and has always been “interested in how things worked and connected.” Thus far, she has been very impressed by the warm, welcoming community at this school, as well as the concept of a learning community that CCDS was founded on. Owens was also struck by how involved the students are in every aspect of learning, especially technology. While working at the Help Desk in the past few weeks, she has noticed that that when students come to see her, they not only ask for help, but also actively participate in solving the problem.
In addition to having two new teachers for the 2009-2010 school year, a few teachers are taking on additional classes. Gregory Martin is teaching humanities on top of his responsibilities as Academic Dean, a position he took over from Kelly Hammond this year, and Stephanie Luebbers is teaching a 12th grade English class despite her demanding position of Upper School Head. Dr. Martin said that he was thrilled to be teaching and reading great works of literature again, although he would miss some of the technology and library responsibilities he had last year and Mrs. Luebbers said that she is very excited to be back in the classroom.