SEGL’s distinguished faculty members have come from across the country to help accomplish the School’s mission. They are passionate about providing students with the best possible opportunity to grow into ethical leaders in an engaging, collaborative community.
Faculty
Alexa Adams
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Education
Alexa Adams is Director of Admissions and Financial Aid at SEGL. Prior to SEGL, she worked in admissions and residential life at the High Mountain Institute (HMI) semester program in Colorado, where she also serves on the Alumni Council. She has experience leading high school students on summer expeditions through Europe, New England, and Colorado. Alexa is a graduate of Bates College, where she majored in Anthropology and minored in Religious Studies, and studied in Alaska, Jamaica, and Nepal. At Bates, she also played for the varsity soccer team and worked on a local organic farm.
Noah Bopp
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Noah Bopp is SEGL’s Founder and Head of School. He has nearly two decades of teaching experience. Prior to SEGL, he worked at the Mountain School of Milton Academy, where he directed the History program and served as a dorm parent. From 2002-2007, he led the Duke University TIP Global Dialogues Institute, which he created as a “pilot” for SEGL; he also co-led the Duke TIP in Paris program, which he co-created in 2001. He began his teaching career at St. George’s School in Newport, Rhode Island, where he taught history and philosophy, and chaired the school’s Community Service Council. He is a graduate of Oberlin College (where he captained the men’s basketball team), Duke University, and the Klingenstein Private School Leadership program at Teachers College, Columbia University. Noah is a trustee of the Mithil Prasad Foundation, which was co-founded by SEGL graduate Rachna Prasad, and on the Advisory Council at the Andi Leadership Institute. He posts on Twitter @NoahBopp.
Caila Driscoll
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Caila Driscoll teaches Math and Ethics & Leadership at SEGL in DC. She began her teaching career at the Field School in Washington, DC, where she taught Math, Spanish, Economics, and Photography, and coached basketball, soccer, and softball. Most recently, she worked as a program associate at Freedom House, coordinating ongoing programs (working on human rights and democracy issues) in Cuba, Ecuador, Guatemala, and Venezuela. She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Economics and Spanish from Middlebury College and a Master’s in Foreign Service from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service.
Farshad Foroozan
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Dr. Farshad Foroozan (SEGL in DC) is an experienced educator who has taught mathematics at the George Washington University since 2007. Prior to GWU, he taught mathematics and electrical engineering at the University of Maryland, where he received the 16th Annual Excellence in Teaching Award. He holds a BA with high honors in Mathematics from Rutgers University, an MA in Pure Mathematics from CUNY New York City, and a Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics and Scientific Computation from the University of Maryland, College Park.
Tamiya Fowler
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Tamiya Fowler is currently pursuing her BA in Business Management at Howard University. This is her second year on the SEGL team. Prior to her time at SEGL in DC, Tamiya worked as a Program Assistant and a tutor with Breakthrough New York, a New York City nonprofit that supports talented students from low-income backgrounds by providing educational support from middle school through college and into their careers. Currently, she runs her own perfume business called Mia’s Good Smells. At Howard, she serves as a Management Team Leader for the 21st Century Advantage Program. In that role, she works to support incoming students through their first year of Business School. She is a graduate of SEGL in DC’s Fall 2017 semester.
Kyle Freiler
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Kyle is a Residential Advisor and an Ethics & Leadership/English Teaching Fellow for SEGL in DC. Prior to SEGL, he taught English, coached cross country, advised the Global Issues club, and supervised a dormitory at Hawai’i Preparatory Academy. He is a graduate of Middlebury College, where he majored in English and Philosophy, and earned several awards for academic excellence. At Middlebury, he also founded and directed both a literature and a philosophy club, studied ethics at Oxford through a research fellowship, served as a peer mentor for several classes, and volunteered at a summer middle school program in his hometown. After graduating, he spent a year teaching and tutoring at a Title 1 middle school in Denver through the AmeriCorps program City Year. Kyle is a graduate of Conserve School, a high school semester program in Land O’Lakes, Wisconsin.
Alvin Fridie
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Before SEGL in DC, Alvin Fridie taught for ten years at the New School of Northern Virginia, a small independent school in Fairfax County. He has also worked at two charter schools in Washington, DC. He earned his BA in Physics with Honors from Rutgers University, where he won the Mary Wigner Memorial Scholarship for excellence in Physics. Following his work at Rutgers, he studied Biophysics for ten years at the University of Virginia. He is currently pursuing a Master’s degree in education at American University. He is the recipient of several teaching grants.
Margaret Hardy
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Education
Margaret Hardy is Assistant Director of Admissions at SEGL. Margaret has worked in admissions for the past decade-plus, primarily as the associate director of admissions and financial aid at Lakeside School (Seattle, WA), as well as at The Bush School (Seattle, WA), The Webb Schools (Claremont, CA), and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Margaret is a graduate of Pomona College where she studied sociology and psychology and worked as a tour guide and interviewer in the admissions office. She has her MA in educational psychology from Ball State University with an emphasis on adolescent development and gifted/talented students, and is currently getting an MA in couple and family therapy through Antioch University New England.
Shizuha Hatori
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Shizuha Hatori is Academic Dean and Ethics and Leadership Coordinator at SEGL in Johannesburg. She is a graduate of Wesleyan University, where she studied government and gender, conducted original research New York City, studied abroad in Denmark, and earned a Freeman Asian Scholarship (a merit-based full tuition award given to one “exceptionally able” student from each of 11 Asian countries). She is an Executive Board Member of the Ryugaku Fellowship, a non-profit Japanese organization dedicated to “empowering youth and making global education more accessible to schools in Japan.” She also designs curricula, mentors students, and fundraises for the Ryugaku Fellowship. In her spare time she teaches and practices Japanese drumming.
Susana Heureaux
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Susana Heureaux is Chef and Food Coordinator at SEGL in DC. was trained at the L’Academie de Cuisine culinary arts program in Maryland and did her professional externship at Mio, a Puerto Rican restaurant in Washington, DC. She most recently worked for Marriott at the Discovery Channel building in Silver Spring, Maryland, where she performed a wide variety of duties, including preparing special meals, monitoring food quality, and mentoring employees. Her quinoa chili recipe is beloved by generations of SEGL graduates, and she enjoys helping students share their culinary traditions from home while in DC for the semester. She lives in Hyattsville with her family, including her teenage daughter.
Lizzy Kildahl
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Lizzy Kildahl is Dean of Faculty and teaches History and Government at SEGL in DC. She came to the School after a stint teaching English in Northern Thailand. She is a graduate of Williams College where she majored in History with a focus on the Middle East. While at Williams, she served as President of the college chapter of Reclaim Childhood (which uses sports as a vehicle of empowerment for refugee girls & local women in Jordan), and studied abroad in Brazil and Portugal. She speaks Spanish and Portuguese. Lizzy is a graduate of Riverdale Country School, an SEGL sending school, where she won the Senior Prize in Philosophy.
Tyrel London
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Tyrel is a Residential Advisor and Ethics & Leadership/Admissions Fellow at SEGL in DC. Prior to SEGL, he taught English at Estrella Foothills High School in Phoenix, Arizona. He is a summa cum laude graduate of the University of Notre Dame, where he majored in American Studies and Film, Television & Theater, writing a joint honors thesis on art as liberation from cultural hegemony. He also acted and participated in departmental and professional theater productions, and worked with the American Indian Catholic Schools Network (AICSN), a consortium of American Indian Catholic schools from around the country that represents different states and tribes. During his time at AICSN he increased the organization’s budget, planned and executed professional development retreats for teachers, and liaised with the network’s benefactors and the U.S. Department of the Interior. Tyrel is from the White Mountains of Arizona, home of the world’s largest stand of ponderosa pines. He is also an SEGL graduate (Fall 2012).
Wayne Millan
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Wayne Millan teaches Latin and Greek at SEGL in DC. He is adjunct professor of Classics at George Washington University and has previously taught at American University.
Mpho Mphahlele
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Mpho Mphahlele is from Johannesburg, South Africa. She holds a BSc Degree in Biotechnology (majoring in Biochemistry and Genetics) from the University of Pretoria, which is well known for its contributions towards Research and Development in the country. Her teaching career began when she volunteered to teach Mathematics, English and ran workshops that focused on community sustainability for an SEGL partner organization called the Mamelodi Initiative. She then moved to Guangdong Shenzhen, China, where she taught English for two years. She is currently teaching Precalculus and Isi-Zulu for SEGL in Johannesburg.
Keith Mundangepfupfu
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Keith Mundangepfupfu is a Zimbabwean Ethics and Leadership fellow for the SEGL in Johannesburg program. He graduated from Wesleyan University with a BA Honors in College of Social Studies (Economics, History, Government and Philosophy) and a minor in African Studies. He also graduated with an MSc in Migration Studies from Oxford University. Prior to this Keith worked as a Policy Research Analyst in the Education Portfolio at the Robertson Foundation. In his spare time, Keith is a writer and has been published in African Literary magazines including “Brittle Paper” and “The Enkare Review”.
Mairéad O’Grady
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Mairéad O’Grady is SEGL’s Associate Head of School for External Affairs and Director of SEGL in Johannesburg program. She has been at SEGL since 2012. Prior to joining the SEGL team, she spent a fellowship year in Thailand, where she worked officially as a Global Ambassador and English teacher at Payap University while unofficially leading bicycle tours and hiking trips and directing a high school musical. She is a graduate of Grinnell College, where she majored in Music and French, receiving Honors in French and the Steiner Award for Scholarly Work in Music. While in college, she served as a residential Student Adviser and the Student Government All-Campus Events Coordinator, sang as a soprano in the Grinnell Singers, and worked as a tour guide and interviewer for the Office of Admission. Her love of French earned her a French Consulate grant to attend the “Festival des Francofolies” in southwestern France in 2007 and took her to Senegal for a semester abroad in 2008. Mairéad has also served as an international program leader for Walking Tree Travel (Senegal and Thailand) and SEGL (South Africa and Rwanda).
Alison Pratt
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Ali Pratt is Dean of Residential Life at SEGL in DC, where she co-teaches Ethics & Leadership and U.S. History. She is also the Director of the Summer Institute: London program. She holds a BA in History, with a concentration in Women and Gender Studies, from Kenyon College. Prior to her time at SEGL, she worked at the Johns Hopkins Center for Talented Youth in Maryland and East Knox High School in Ohio. While at Kenyon, she served as Upperclass Counselor and as President of the Kenyon Ballroom Dance Club.
Robert Jay Ross
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Robbie was part of the founding faculty team at SEGL back in 2009 and continues to volunteer by overseeing graduate affairs. Currently, he runs partnerships at Cultivate, an organization dedicated to hiring, training, and retaining top-notch talent across the social impact sector. Prior to that, he worked at Purpose, a digital agency and incubator working to amplify social movement building efforts worldwide. As Chief of Staff, he oversaw global people & culture operations for a team of 80 spread across six continents. He’s a firm believer in the power of establishing a trusting, inclusive, and equitable community, having witnessed firsthand how that critical element can propel a team (and its work) forward. Robbie carries an honors degree from Harvard College in Social Studies with a focus in “Human Rights and Development in Africa.” He is a board member of The Child Is Innocent, an NGO based in northern Uganda that helps to provide high-quality education and leadership training to children from the region. Having spent a great deal of time studying the darker side of human potential, he remains steadfast in his awe of people’s extraordinary resilience and in the profound power of forgiveness.
Sirianna Santacrose
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Sirianna Santacrose is Director of External and Graduate Programs and Assistant Director of our SEGL at ALA program in Johannesburg. She is a magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa, and Phi Sigma Iota graduate of Hamilton College, where she earned a BA in Art History and in Hispanic Studies. At Hamilton, she was named an Ashoka Student Changemaker and won the Charles J. Hasbrouk Prize in Art History. She also holds a Master’s Degree in Sociology and Global Change from the University of Edinburgh (UK), where she earned two Edinburgh Awards, for Professionalism in Public Engagement and for Student Staff. Prior to SEGL, she worked as a Leadership Resident for the Harpswell Foundation in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, facilitating leadership, English, and critical thinking classes with 31 university students in support of the Foundation’s mission to empower the next generation of female leaders in Southeast Asia.
Kaira Smith
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Kaira is Executive Assistant to the Head of School and a Residential Advisor for SEGL in DC. She is a graduate of Vassar College, where she was a Questbridge Scholar, majored in Economics, and minored in Japanese. At Vassar, she worked and interned at the Thompson Memorial Library, served as an advisor for incoming first year students, and played for the national championship-winning women’s rugby team. She also led the Vassar Business Club, launching a pro bono student consulting initiative, and worked for three years as a coach’s assistant for the rugby team. She has volunteered with Sunrise Memphis and worked with Vassar Seed on fossil-fuel divestment and food sustainability. Kaira is a graduate of White Station public high school in Memphis, Tennessee.
Christian Starling
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Christian Starling is Academic Dean and English teacher at SEGL in DC. He is on his second SEGL tour of duty; prior to his return in 2017 he spent three years as an administrator and Humanities teacher at Community Charter School of Cambridge in Massachusetts. Christian is a graduate of Harvard University, where he earned a degree in Social Anthropology and a secondary certification in Visual and Environmental Studies. At Harvard, he spent most of his time focused on social justice work, in both volunteer and full-time employment positions year-round. He divided up his time as a director, elected officer, and student trustee at the Phillips Brooks House Association (PBHA), the nation’s largest student-run social justice and non-profit organization. Additionally, he worked as a recruitment intern for the Boston-based non-profit Artists for Humanity. In his recent tenure as a Citizen Schools National Teaching Fellow, he was leader of his campus’s Eighth Grade Academy and college and career prep curriculum lead in Charlotte, North Carolina. Christian grew up in Detroit, Michigan, where he served as Student Council President at the University Liggett School and was a Skillman Scholar. Christian is also certified by the College Board to teach AP English.
Natalia Straus
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Natalia Straus is Director of Development at SEGL. She has a distinguished 17-year fundraising career on both coasts including work with charitable health, conservation, religious, academic, and performing arts institutions. She comes to SEGL from Brandeis Marin, a K-8 Jewish day school in Marin County, California where she served as Director of Advancement. Natalia holds a BA in Interpersonal Communication from George Mason University. When she is not aligning donors with giving opportunities, she can be found on her meditation cushion, dancing when the mood strikes her, out with her husband and sons, or baking something yummy to share with friends and co-workers.
Patricia Thomas
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Dr. Patricia Thomas is Director of Advising and Wellness and teaches Spanish and French at SEGL in DC. She comes to SEGL after a long and distinguished career teaching and mentoring students. Among other stops, she has held administrative positions at the Duke University Talent Identification Program (TIP) and taught at Trevor Day School, Teachers College, Columbia University, and Emory University. For many years she served as an academic adviser and student support specialist at the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation. More recently, she has worked as a multilingual mental health counselor in Northern Virginia.
Xianghui Xing
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Xianghui Xing comes to SEGL in DC after a long career teaching middle school, high school, and college students in the United States and in China. She holds a BA in English from Beijing Foreign Studies University in China, where she was named “Best Orator” in the Beijing College Student Debate Contest, and an MA in English from Clark University. She is currently working on her English PhD dissertation at Tufts University.