A woman with long dark hair and sunglasses is smiling, wearing a floral dress and white sneakers, standing in front of a weathered wall with a wooden door and green foliage overhead.

Meet the high school teacher mentor

ALLOW ME TO FIGURATIVELY

TAKE SOME WEIGHT OFF OF

YOUR SHOULDERS…

Your high school classroom…

does have the ability to largely run itself

by HS students who are empowered to take ownership of their learning and their environment)

can meet the diverse needs of all the kids in the room

including you, dear educator

should not require you to martyr yourself in the process

and I’m here to help you make sure that does not happen

shop the courses

AS A RECOVERING CONTROL FREAK

IN EDUCATION

Here’s some of the mistakes I made in the beginning (rites of passage, if you will):

I spent many a night and weekend planning everything down to the minute and being all too hard on myself when lessons didn’t go the exact way I planned
I treated my classroom like the early 2000s gem The Wedding Planner. I was JLo and I catered to my students like 30 bridezillas who absolutely depended on me to make everything easier for them in order for this experience to run without a hitch.

While many fellow teachers would hear this story and lovingly laugh it off as necessary growing pains and "part of the process,” here’s what 10 years of experience has taught me:

Those years of burning out, feeling defeated, working myself to the bone they're a result of both me and the generations of educators before me being a product of teacher prep programs that are part of a much larger struggling education system.

So, deeply human teaching can perhaps be called an experiment of sorts

We're rejecting the null hypothesis (STEM teachers, that one's for you) that teachers should stand at their podium for 30 out of the 50 minutes and then gradually release responsibility.

We're building classrooms that are student-led and inquiry-based.

We’re anchoring our units with juicy essential questions that don’t have a Blooms Taxonomy word in sight.

Here are the results from my own classroom:

Students rise to the occasion

Attendance and test scores go up

Teaching feels more sustainable and joyful

Group of five people taking a selfie on a rocky coastline with ocean waves and an island in the background on a cloudy day.

WELCOME TO THE DEEPLY

human teaching universe

This is a home base for high school educators who care about the big picture of pedagogy AND the small daily moments that can’t be measured by a quiz score or a lexile level.

Here, you’ll find ongoing conversations that have no clear answer, plenty of exceptions to the rule, and a community of educators who are figuring it out and tinkering and rebuilding every single day.

A woman with glasses, earrings, and a nose piercing smiling at the camera. She is wearing a light-colored denim jacket over a patterned shirt. Behind her, there is a large green plant, a corkboard with papers, and string lights hanging from the ceiling.

HEY, I’M DREA

and here’s a handful of titles I’ve held in education (some of them being second jobs, because Lord knows we didn’t get into this profession for the money)

camp counselor, substitute teacher, high school teacher, teacher mentor, curriculum writer

here’s MY SELF-PROCLAIMED TITLES I’M

ReALLY PROUD of though:

→ Conflict Resolution Extraordinaire: One time, my principal actually covered my class for 20 minutes so I could sit with two freshmen girls and help them work through their beef

→ Student Rapport Specialist: I laid the groundwork so that students actually felt comfortable coming to me when they knew one of their friends was making poor choices (because they wanted to keep their friends out of trouble, not get them in trouble)

→ Professional Bamboozler: I proudly told my students at the beginning of each term that I was going to bamboozle them into writing essays without them knowing it (and always succeeded at doing so)

HERES SOME THINGS YOU’LL

NEVER HEAR ME SAY:

"I get paid whether you learn or not"

ew, very cringe, very ick

"The bell doesn't dismiss you, I dismiss you"

it’s giving crazy, it’s giving out of touch

"Get the hell out of my classroom"

i fear she has lost the plot

Oh Wait, I’ve yapped your

ear off about my

identity as an educator

and almost forgot i’m

an actual human

(we tend to do that)

Drea reading on her Kindle outside with a clear blue sky in the background

GUILTY PLEASURE

TRASH REALITY TELEVISION
Vanderpump Rules, Love Island, Secret Lives of Mormon Wives (the holy trinity)

IN THE SUMMER

YOU CAN FIND ME IN THE POOL
I’m talking for hours. You’ll have to pull me out kicking and screaming. And if I’m in a floatie with my Kindle pruning by the second? Just know that I’m exactly where I want to be.

FAVORITE CONTENT

PODCASTS + AUDIOBOOKS
I’m an Enneagram 5 girly, and that basically means my mind is always hungry for more lore and more knowledge. On an average week, I’m learning about educational psychology, copywriting, designing learning experiences and whatever Amy Poehler is up to

WEIRD HABIT

I CAN’T NAP
I think it’s a combination of my world-class sleep training (I go to bed at 11 and wake up at 6:30 365 days a year) and the fact that I’m always plotting my next hyperfixation hobby session, my next book binge, and contemplating the state of the world.

PROUD MEMBER OF

DINK CLUB + BOOK CLUB
Dual Income No Kids
(though I’ve considered ending my subscription to that club in the near-ish future…)

Meanwhile, I’ll never end my subscription to club (aka me and my best friends monthly yap sesh obsessing over fake dating and rivals to lovers tropes)

IF You’RE ALSO A PODCAST GIRLY +

PASSIONATE EDUCATOR, you’ll love…

AND WHEN YOU’RE READY

to dive into the

Deeply Human Teaching Universe

I’m currently accepting interest forms because I’ll be launching the beta version of the program in exchange for honest feedback and a written and video review.

FILL OUT THE INTEREST FORM
These courses are made to finish in a weekend and walk you through what you need to address the two biggest teacher pain points:

Classroom Management + How to plan (actually) good units

HEAD TO THE SHOP
I’m on a mission to make my blog the go-to resource for high school educators to find all the teacher secrets they don’t teach you in the credential program.

LET’S READ SOME BLOGS
I have two free trainings that address the two biggest pain points for high school teachers:

A. How the heck do I run a high school classroom?! I need a classroom management system that works!

GET THE 10-MINUTE TRAINING ON CLASSROOM MANAGEMENT
B. How the heck do I plan a unit?! Where do I start?!

GET THE 10-MINUTE TRAINING ON PLANNING A REALLY GOOD UNIT
(COMING SOON)