Steven D. Brewer

is the Director of the Biology Computer Resource Center
at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Brewer holds a PhD in
Science Education, MS in Earth Science, and BS in Biology and Spanish.
In addition, Brewer speaks Esperanto and is a published author of
articles, fiction, and haiku in that language.

Joanna Weinberg-Lawless

first got involved with North Star when she was an undergraduate at Hampshire College, teaching literature and page-to-screen classes as a volunteer. She based her Division III thesis on what she learned about the progressive homeschooling movement. After graduating, she continued on for a time as the organization's first employee, eventually taking on the title of Associate Director. Joanna has taught, advised, and mentored teenagers in a variety of traditional and non-traditional settings, from teaching 9th and 10th grade English in a Brooklyn parochial school to, most recently, working with pregnant and parenting teens in Holyoke. Currently taking time off from work to be with her baby girl, Joanna is delighted to have the opportunity to return and lead a fiction class with North Star's latest group of self-directed learners.

Sam Nordli

is studying philosophy and psychology at Hampshire College. For the past three years he has worked as an assistant in surgery; he continues to be fascinated by the inner workings of the human body.  He also has
interest in the mystic traditions and meditative practices of various world religions. He plays the violin, viola, mandolin, and didgeridoo.

Craig Surette

has a BA in Cultural Anthropology and minors in Classical Civilization and Psychology from Umass Amherst. I also have studied traditional Chinese medicine for 4 years as an intern in an Acupuncturists office, where I eventually managed a low income Asian bodywork clinic and helped train other young interns as practitioner’s assistants. I am now undergoing the process of becoming nationally certified in Shiatsu, with the intent of eventually opening my own low income clinic. This coming semester at North Star, as with every time I teach there, I hope to ask what the kids themselves want to learn and how I may best serve their curiosity and passions.

Mauricio Abascal

is a Umass student teaching Video Production and Photography workshop.

Devin Roark

is an inner-city Atlantan, born in the remote logging village of Glen Arbor, Michigan.  He is dedicated to hands-on skill sharing and problem-solving.  Above all things, Devin is ever-curious.  His range of interests includes: ancient living skills, EcoEconomics, philosophy, (pre)hiStory Telling, improvisation, travel, cooking, food/culture, plants animals minerals, teamwork, 2D"art"drawing->photography, fiber, hand making soft & hard 3D forms with functions, metallurgy, design, languages, and conversation with YOU.

Dara Herman-Zierlein

was born in Brooklyn and raised in Manhattan. She has a BFA from Pratt Institute and a Master of Art Education from Columbia University. She has been living in the Pioneer Valley since 2001, currently working as an Art Educator and as Outreach Art teacher in Whatley and Sunderland Elementary School. Herman-Zierlein creates art programs for adults and children, funded by grants and private donors. Dara is the founder and administrator at the Art Studio.

Herman-Zierlein also exhibits work from her practice as a sculptor and painter and has recently been awarded the Arts EZ Spring Grant from the Northampton Arts Council for curating the art project “Super-Mom Unveiled”.

Dara and her husband, Peter, have opened a new Art Studio in the lower level of North Star.  They will be offering classes to North Star teens and to the community at large.

Peter O. Zierlein

is a German immigrant, artist and illustrator.  His conceptual editorial illustrations appear on a regular basis in many national and international publications such as the New York Times, Boston Globe, Washington Post, Wall Street journal, San Francisco Chronicle, Los Angeles Times, Stern, Spiegel, Berliner Zeitung, Le Monde Diplomatique and many others.

Zierlein also designed numerous T-shirts, book- and CD covers and illustrated various posters for clients such as German carmaker AUDI and ‘Project Courage’, a school network to promote better civic behavior and to stop bullying in high schools through education and cultivation of non-violent conflict solving strategies.  Lately Peter O. Zierlein has produced various series of symmetrical paper cuts around the paradigm of power.
Zierlein has taught at Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, N.Y., Parsons School of Design, NY, NY, and currently teaches at the Art Institute of Boston at Lesley University, conceptual-, business- and technique classes in illustration and foundation courses at the Art Institute of Boston.

Learn more about Peter and see his work at http://peterozierlein.com/

Peter and his wife, Dara, have opened a new Art Studio in the lower level of North Star.  They will be offering classes to North Star teens and to the community at large.

Josh Sugiyama

studies Contemporary Dance Technique and Choreography at Hampshire College and has studied / enjoys working with Photography, Music, Natural Sciences and Mathematics.

Marie McCourt

has been a member parent for two years, and is excited to become a bigger part of the North Star team. Marie has her B.S. in Business and Human Resources, many years of training in Leadership and Youth Brain Architecture, and has worked for 5 years at the Collaborative for Educational Services, co-managing up to 10 after school programs in Western Mass. She had her own computer teaching and repair business for 14 years, and still works part-time for a software company doing tech support work. She also has many years experience in advocacy for diabetes, special education, and education.

Melanie Dana

taught for 10 years at an alternative high school in the Boston area before moving to Western Massachusetts nine years ago. She has been homeschooling her two children for the past six years. Her favorite courses to teach are math, science, woodshop and anything with a cross-curricular focus. She has an Ed.M. in Teaching and Curriculum from the Harvard Graduate School of Education.

Andrew Pasquale

is a local homeschooling parent and web developer.  He returns to North Star this year to share his skills in Ruby programming.


Alex Van Leer

is a passionate advocate of mutual aid, and supportive communities. Alex studies US history, education, health and dance at Hampshire College. Currently 3 semesters away from graduating, Alex has begun the process to go to nursing school afterward. Whether it is wild-crafted herbs for a sick friend, or facilitating a workshop on consent, Alex loves learning accessible and viable ways to create supportive networks.

Read Predmore, Ph.D

is a physicist with over 30 years experience in the development and implementation of low-noise microwave and millimeter wave receiver and radiometer systems.  This year Read returns to North Star to share his interest in our world's current environmental opportunities and challenges.

Learn more about Read and his consulting work on his website: www.predmoreassociates.com

Adam Pepi

is a North Star alum! and current Forestry major at Umass Amherst.  This semester he will be at North Star on Tuesdays and Thursdays working with individual students on biology and chemistry. 

Lena Beckenstein

is studying playwriting and reproductive rights for teenagers at Hampshire College.  Last year on her gap year, she worked at a non-profit creative writing workshop and, much to her surprise, discovered that she loves
working with youth.  Lena is interested in cross-country traveling, theater as a form of activism, and writing of all kinds.

Rachel Adams

has a BA in Anthropology and Spanish from U Mass Amherst. She has been writing poetry for many years, and has recently been directing literary readings at Rao's Cafe in Amherst. She intends on perusing a career involved with education surrounding the topics of literature, language and culture. A lover of people, music and dancing, she is fascinated by the human condition and all forms of expression.

Eric Connolly

is a senior at Umass studying history.  This semester he is teaching Ancient Civ at North Star on Fridays.

Nia Steiner

is a North Star alumna and co-director of our theater program.  She spends Tuesdays at North Star mentoring teens and teaching theater.

Oliver Spiro

is majoring in Mathematics and Chinese at Umass's Commonwealth College honors program.  He is a North Star alum and we are thrilled to have him back, now as a math tutor. You can read Oliver's Liberated Learner's article from 2008 HERE.

Cassie Mills

works with dance, performance art, and video at Hampshire College. She enjoys using elements of dance composition and playing with improvisational scoring to build and enrich the creative process. She is very interested in the evolution and history of dance on camera, and is happy to talk and critique dance any day.

Zachary Ryan Novak

earned his A.A. in English literature and secondary education at Springfield Technical Community College before transfering to Hampshire College, where he currently studies creative writing, filmmaking, and educational philosophy.  He is a poet and performing artist whose work has been widely published since he was was sixteen years old.  In 2007, he co-founded The Starving Artists Guild, an artists collective/publishing house dedicated to promoting the work of young and emerging writers and artists, releasing his first two chapbooks through the Guild the next year.  In 2009 he collaborated with author Nick Wedlake to write, produce, and perform a spoken word/dramatic adaptation of Wedlake's novel Eat the Pretty Ones.  He later appeared performing selections from this in a documentary about Wedlake, which was a finalist at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival.  Zach teaches Deconstructing Drama at North Star and is hoping to also teach poetry workshops in the near future.  Above all, his classes strive to explore the creative process as a catalyst for personal growth and education in individuals.                    

Gabriel Connolly

is a 4th year Umass Amherst student on my way to a double degree in Resource Economics and History. I spent my childhood travelling around Eastern Europe with my parents working on humanitarian projects. When I was 10 years old I moved to Massachusetts and entered the public school system. My academic interests include analyzing the political-economic framework for creating a more just and sustainable society worldwide.

Felix Lufkin

is a Hampshire College graduate and local outdoor educator.  Felix's wide interests include permaculture and all manner of DIY skills.  He teaches Ancient Living Skills at North Star on Friday mornings.

Jesse Shotland

is a North Star alum and professional photographer assisting with the Images class on Friday afternoons.

Megan Lieff

is currently a junior at UMass Amherst studying Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies & Statistics.  Prior to coming to the Valley last fall, she was living in DC, where she spent many years teaching all over the District, and got involved in repro justice activism.  At North Star she is happily combining her love of feminism and math, teaching "Sex-Positive Sex Ed" and giving tutorials in math and social science research."

Adriana Piantedosi

is a North Star alum who offers voice lessons for members on Thursdays. She focuses on strong vocal technique and using one's own authentic sound in order to sustain healthy singing for life.

Rebecca Shaughnessy

is in her last semester at UMass, studying Comparative Literature and Linguistics, and is excited to be tutoring French here at North Star. Outside of the classroom, you can find her curled up on the couch with a cat and a cup of tea. She enjoys sunlight, taking time, and seeing ordinary as extraordinary.

Shira Lander

is a student at UMass Amherst, studying Hospitality and Tourism, Natural Resources Conservation, and Spanish. I am pursuing a career in the outdoors, working with diverse people. Currently, my tutorials with the teens consist of Math, Spanish, and Writing.

Di Lin

is from China ad moved to the United States three years ago and she is currently a sophomore at Umass Amherst majoring in Chemistry.  She joined North Star as a math tutor this semester and is here on Tuesday mornings. She used to work in a Chemistry lab as a lab technician from the end of her freshman year and right now she is doing undergraduate research on caspase in the same lab. In her free time, she enjoys traveling, cooking, playing the piano and guitar.

Jenna Weingarten

is a recent graduate of Hampshire College who majored in Death in Adolescent Literature.  Much of my Division III thesis paper concerns the value of allowing adolescents to socialize themselves (in respect to how they relate to the literature they read).  Currently, I'm taking these concepts further and applying them to a self help book that I'm writing for teens.  The book advocates acts of deconstructing the Self at a young age, hence the class I teach at North Star, "Intro to Self De(con)struction". 

Nini Melvin

has a Master Degree in Dance Education from Temple University. She began dancing professionally at age 16 in Philadelphia, PA. Moving to NYC she choreographed and performed her own work as well as working with choreographers such as Anna Sokolow, Ron Brown, Doug Varone, Garth Fagan and many more.

She has been a teacher and practitioner of Eastern Healing Arts for over thirty years. She began teaching internationally in 1989 while studying shiatsu at the Ohashi Institute and teaching there for 10 years. Nini also taught for many years at the Omega Institute for Holistic studies.  She continues her studies in Chinese medicine and Tai Chi.

Nini works with movement as a tool for self -awareness and healing.  Her classes are a dynamic blend of meridian movements, dance improvisation, the Creation Cycle of the Five Elements from Chinese medicine, and shiatsu techniques.

Caitlin Fuller

is currently studying art education at Hampshire College. She is studying within the Five College Teacher Licensure Program and will receive a license to teach art in grades K-12. Caitlin is at North Star on Tuesdays and
Thursdays for tutorials ranging from portraiture to graffiti.

Amanda LaFauci

is a UMass student tutoring physics at North Star.