About Me

My career as a physical education teacher and coach which began with a Master's at Smith College merged the two careers in a way I had never expected. After updating and digitizing my skill set in a second Master's Program, I became an instructional technology teacher and consultant; and I have been invited to present at conferences around the country. My two divergent careers melded together when I began to specialize in assistive technology. Coaching teachers and students to expand their use of technology to create and learn comes naturally to me. I may not be a digital native, but I am a digital learner in every sense.

As a life-long learner,  it is my passion to continually update my skills and advance my career to take on leadership positions.  I earned a Massachusetts Supervisor/Director License in 2014.  I earned the Technology Director Certification through the Massachusetts Chapter of CoSN, METAA, (Massachusetts Educational Technology Administrator's Association) in 2016. This course covered: Leadership and Vision, Strategic Planning, Ethics and Policies, Instructional Focus and Professional Development, Team Building and Staffing, Stakeholder Focus, Information Technology Management, Communications Systems Management, Business Management, and Data Management. I completed my Massachusetts Principal/Assistant Principal K-6 and 5-12 licenses between 2016-2020.

My career path led me to Nantucket where I accepted a position as Instructional Technology and Technology Integration Specialist at the Cyrus Peirce (yes, that is the correct spelling!) Middle School. My goal in the Nantucket Public School District was to demonstrate how careful and strategic use of technology could engage students and make the curriculum more accessible through Universal Design for Learning. I imagined all the possibilities and worked hard to make them happen with new tools, ideas, and professional learning. The position morphed into a specialist in the Encore rotation, and time to work with teachers during their planning time quickly disappeared. That this was disappointing is an understatement.

I have remade and re-imagined myself through professional learning, a 21st Century reality.  I am Apple and Microsoft Certified. I earned and have renewed my Google Level I and II Educator Certifications and am working toward my Google Trainer Certificate. I was part of one of the first cohorts in ISTE's new Certification Program. I completed my portfolio and became one of the first 100 ISTE Certified Educators.  The rigorous digital portfolio process required for this certification took many months to complete. 

Technology and social media open the world to us for unlimited, self-directed, personalized professional growth. Exceptional, high-quality professional learning must also be available to faculty and staff as part of any strategic plan. Being a professional involves a willingness to let go of ideas and concepts that no longer serve us or our current conditions and replace these with new concepts and new tools that help us develop a vision for tremendous growth. This includes re-designing learning spaces and being creative with our use of time. One of my greatest strengths is my ability to design professional learning that synthesizes the curriculum, technology, and pedagogy to improve teacher practice and ultimately increase student achievement. I work to meet the needs of those in attendance. My experience and awareness of potential next steps allow me to build on the work I have already accomplished and keep any school or district moving forward.

It takes extensive experience, patience, and trust to help a district build upon or change its culture. One must listen and observe. Districts must hold open discussions to envision the future and prepare all students for college, career, and/or a life fulfilled. It is critical to assemble a great team of stakeholders to set the conditions for the creation of connected classrooms or take the leap to a 1:1 or 1:Many environment. My participation in the writing of District Improvement Plans, Technology Plans, Strategic Plans, Responsible Use Policies, and recently academic honesty policies that include using AI has taught me a great deal about true collaboration. Experience writing technology vision statements and responsible use policies are an important first step, but understanding and articulating this to the entire community is a critical part of the work.

I thrive in collaborative, distributed leadership settings and work closely with staff and administrators to map out a strategic direction for the growth of an entire program. Expanding on an excellent educational foundation makes the transition to a dynamic, digital ecosystem a realistic goal for students, staff, and community. Blending, differentiating, and personalizing the learning to reach and teach each and every student is an audacious goal and a realistic possibility when technology is combined with imaginative and dynamic pedagogy. As a visionary and transformational leader, I am working to ensure that my skill set is deep and wide enough to serve in a setting that is poised to be “Future Ready.” Whether I am working directly with students in a classroom or lab setting or leading at the district or institution level, I openly share my ever-expanding skillset with those around me.

It is an honor to continue to lead at the regional level as the President of New England ISTE. I run a successful webinar series and now have archived over 80 amazing presentations. We offer badges, certificates, and an exit ticket script. We have been granted our 501c3 status and are in the process of creating some new membership options as we expand our reach across New England.

I am currently working at Hampshire College with faculty, staff, and students. I arrived at Hampshire in September 2019 as the new instructional technologist. I jumped right in and joined committees and got involved in re-imagining Hampshire College, a unique liberal arts college whose mission is to transform higher education. Our new academic program is based on 4 Learning Collaboratives that are transdisciplinary. There are no grades, no requirements, no departments, and no exams. Students create their own programs of study and all student work is portfolio and project/problem-based. Courses can be taken at any of the 5 Colleges, Smith, Mt. Holyoke, Hampshire, Amherst, and UMass.

In late November of 2019, as I watched the spread of COVID-19 worldwide, I developed a Tech Tuesday Program with drop-in hours and a mini-lunchtime-workshop-series. I tried to prepare faculty and staff for a possible shutdown. Some faculty took full advantage of these workshops, and I quickly made more connections.  This highlighted my skill set and I was selected to sit on the search committee for a new Dean of Faculty and VP of Academic Affairs.

The pandemic dramatically accelerated the transformation of life at the College. The speed at which I developed relationships was dramatic compared to the normal progression as a new staff member. Trust and need were compressed by Covid-19. I was asked to join the Remote2020 committee to support Emergency Remote Teaching and Learning throughout the Covid-19 Pandemic. Hampshire College had no online courses we sent our students home at Spring Break. We transitioned to fully remote learning beginning in mid-March of 2020 and currently support a hybridized model of teaching and learning.

I served on the HampshireForward committee. We spent the summer of 2020 planning for a Hampshire style of hybridized learning for the fall of 2020. It went quite well. We completed a 3 week January term of intensive courses and simultaneously modified our hybridized spring semester with an emphasis on Universal Design for Learning and the goal of  a "plus-one mindset" for accessibility.

This transition increased awareness of and revealed some critical accessibility issues regarding course materials and students knowing how to use the digital tools that we provide for these purposes. It was mission to spread Universal Design for Learning across the Hampshire College Campus Community. My timewas shared between The Teaching and Learning Initiative, The Office of Accessibility Resources, and the IT Department. I worked with faculty members to employ high-impact practices in their courses, classroom pedagogy, and student-centered learning. I  worked toward the goal of making course materials accessible campus-wide and retaining every student who chose to attend Hampshire College. 

I served on two important NERCOMP committees, The Innovation Task Force and the Professional Development Committee. I am proud to represent Hampshire in this important role. I had to step down from NERCOMP because Hampshire College chose to outsource the entire IT department to a managed services company. Since my position was housed in IT, I was laid off. 

I am once again looking for meaningful work.

Give me a call or drop me an email! gaby (at) strategy2design (dot) com.

Imagine the possibilities!