6th / 7th - Johnson

Dana Darby Johnson comes to our school with 13 years of teaching experience, including Santa Fe Indian School, Santa Fe High, and a whole decade at ATC Charter School, where she taught 7th grade English for ten years, and 9th and 10th grade English. She has also taught Spanish, multicultural studies, and comparative religion, and is qualified to teach gifted classes. She is a member of the Secretary of Education’s Teacher Advisory Committee.

Dana had several previous careers. She was a lexicographer when she lived in Wales, writing and editing dictionaries for publishers in London, Glasgow, and Edinburgh. She also worked in the field of neurotoxicology, the poisoning of the brain and nervous system that can be caused by pesticides. Prior to that, she wrote and edited a women’s health newsletter, and abstracted research for the National Institute on Drug Abuse. Dana enjoys bringing these experiences into her curriculum.

After growing up in the Virginia suburbs of Washington DC, Dana graduated from St. John’s College in Annapolis, Maryland. She lived for many years in Wales, part of the United Kingdom, and then settled in Santa Fe, New Mexico in 1992, where she raised her daughter, Rhiannon -- who attended El Dorado Community School!

Teaching students of all ages to love Shakespeare, and helping students write or speak their own stories, are some of her many passions in the classroom. Dana hopes to make a positive difference in the lives of students, especially in helping them find joy, wisdom, and connection with the stories and poems that humans have shared about “what it is to be human.”