YAEd: Learning in the Age of Climate Change: Climate in the Classroom

Mike Fishback graduated from Yale in 2001 with a political science degree and later earned an Ed.M. from Harvard. He is in his 20th year as a middle school humanities teacher at independent and charter schools, currently teaching social studies at Almaden Country Day School in San Jose. Mike has designed geopolitical simulations and interactive models of activism to help young adolescents appreciate the challenges and opportunities of large-scale climate action.

Elissa Levy earned a BS in physics from Yale in 2009. After spending 8 years as an investment analyst and project leader in the hedge fund industry, she became a high school physics teacher. She taught for 6 years at public schools in New York City and now lives and teaches in northern Virginia. She has developed materials to enable physics teachers to teach their energy unit through the lens of climate change.

Tom James graduated from Yale in 2012 with a B.S. in Computer Science & Mathematics and a teaching certificate through the Yale Teacher Preparation Program. He is in his 12th year as a high school educator and has taught in public, charter, and independent schools in New Haven, northern Virginia, and New York City. He has served as a high school math teacher and department chair and earned an Ed.M. from Columbia University in educational leadership. He currently works as the interim Assistant Head of High School at Grace Church School in Manhattan.