Philip Snow Gang, cofounder of TIES
Professor Gang is Academic Dean for the Master of Education (M.Ed.) program. A pioneer in the field of online learning communities, Gang is author of Rethinking Education and Conscious Education: The Bridge To Freedom. He created the ecological game, Our Planet, Our Home, and he appears in the anthology, Towards a New World View: Conversations at the Leading Edge.
After a ten year career in engineering and business, Gang became a Montessori teacher. He has been a Montessori school head, consultant and educator of teachers. During the 1970's he worked with Mario Montessori Jr. to develop a context for Montessori secondary education. In 1978 he helped initiate the National Erdkinder Consortium - a group dedicated to founding Montessori secondary schools.
In the early 90's Gang was on the faculty of California Institute of Integral Studies as a professor-mentor to students engaged in doctoral studies in the School of Transformative Learning. This was the one of the first collaborative on-line distance learning program.
Today, Gang’s major interest
is exploring eco-cosmological patterns and their implications for the human
journey.
He has written the short paper “Montessori Teaching and Learning” Download
here (PDF)
Philip Snow Gang Ph.D.
AMI 6-12 Training 1973
AMI 3-6 Training 1982
AMI Training of Trainers 1980-1984
Marsha Snow Morgan, cofounder of TIES
Professor Morgan is co-anchor for the Master of Education program in Montessori Integrative Learning. In 1989 she founded Nova Montessori School in Christchurch, New Zealand and was an early advocate for the Kids Edible Garden Project, a program to place permaculture gardens in government schools. Her masters thesis, An Ecogenesis for Education: A Context for Learning -- Perceiving Systemic Patterns in the Design and Creation of Learning Communities has been instrumental in the development of the TIES approach to teaching and learning. She explains "We are storytellers, mythmakers and symbol designers. Addressing the present planetary crises through Montessori education may provide new possibilities for Gaian renewal."
Morgan has worked as a Montessori teacher, school director, educator of Montessori teachers, consultant, and workshop leader. These initiatives have taken her through Europe, South America, North America and the Pacific Rim.
These days, she is interested in autopoiesis and structural coupling as metaphors for how individuals self-create in relationship to their environment.
Phillip and Marsha are also the creators of EarthTies, a virtual web-conferencing network promoting The Great Work.
Marsha Snow Morgan, MA
AMI 6-12 Training 1970
Valerie A. Brown
Emeritus Professor Brown completed her Master of Education at TIES in 2002. She is currently Director of the Local Sustainability Project, School of Resources, Environment and Society, Australian National University. This project undertakes research into whole-of-community solutions to local and global sustainability issues.
She was appointed an Officer of the Order of Australia in 1999 for national and international leadership in public and environmental health, and advocacy for sustainable development. Valerie is interested in the unbounded possibilities of on-line dialogue between people from all countries on linked local and global issues.
Valerie A. Brown AO, BSc DipAdultEd PhD
Emeritus Professor, University of Western Sydney
Director, Local Sustainability Project,
School of Resources, Environment and Society
Australian National University
Cindee Karns
Cindee Karns is a graduate of TIES LC5 and holds an M.Ed. with an emphasis in Experiential Learning from Endicott College.
She has worked as a pre-service teaching mentor at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and is a long time member of the Alaska Teacher Research Network. Since the main focus in her classroom has been teacher research, she has come to realize many of the same conclusions about teaching and learning as did Maria Montessori.
She has published "Turning over the Wheel: Discovering the Strength in Diversity" as a chapter in Living and Teaching in an Unjust World, as well as "Learning: A New Model for a Healthy Community" in Alaska Teacher Researchers', The Far Vision: The Close Look.
Her current interest outside of the classroom is initiating structured conversation with people of diverse ideologies using The World Café format (http://theworldcafe.com/) to promote dialog, understanding, and change.
Cindee Karns, M.Ed.
Alaska Teacher Research Network 1992-present
North Pole Middle School
North Pole, Alaska
John Fowler
John Fowler holds a Ph.D. in Integral Studies. He has been a Montessori director, administrator, and consultant since 1981. He is currently directing a Montessori upper elementary class at the Denison Montessori School, a magnet program in Denver, Colorado.
John is the creator of the Time Line of Light Cosmological Curriculum for children and adults.
John Fowler Ph.D.
AMI 6-12 Training 1980
