EDesign Lab is a collaboration between teachers, technologists, and design facilitators…

Class of 2012

Ryan Raffa Technologist	Abe Cohen Teacher	Luke Brownfield Technologist	Hsing Wei Director
Steve Kinney Teacher	Mike Edwards Technologist	Pritika Nilaratna Technologist	Matt Burke Teacher
Liza Stark Facilitator	Alex Wood Teacher	John Derian Teacher	Ralph Vacca Facilitator
Jonah Brucker-Cohen Technologist	Anna Pinkas Technologist	Eric Allatta Teacher

Teachers

	Eric Allatta Eric’s educational philosophy is largely shaped by two major experiences: his studies at St. John’s College and his time as an apprentice to a master luthier. At St. John’s Eric studied classics of the Western philosophic tradition, including four years of mathematics, working through the texts of great mathematicians from Euclid to Minkowski. Eric has long had an interest in how instruments are tuned and with that interest began an apprenticeship in the art and craft of fine guitar making and repair. The culmination of this four year apprenticeship was building a commissioned parlor guitar, which he designed and built. He joined the New Visions for Public Schools/Hunter College Urban Teacher Residency in June 2011, and began his teaching career as an Algebra II/Trigonometry teacher at the Bronx Center for Science and Mathematics. Eric earned his M.A. in Urban Adolescent Mathematics Education from Hunter College, and currently teaches mathematics and Computer Science at the Academy for Software Engineering.
	Matt Burke Matt Burke teaches Global Studies at KAPPA International High School in the Bronx, where he also serves as the 9th Grade Team Leader and as a Data Specialist. He received his BA from Boston College and his M.Ed from Hunter College. He is currently pursuing an MA in European Studies at Columbia. Matt seeks to incorporate technology into his classroom as a dynamic tool for differentiation, literacy instruction, and engagement. When not teaching, Matt enjoys reading medieval literature and writing short stories.
	Abe Cohen I am a teacher, educator, and learner working in the South Bronx. I’ve worked in District 75 schools, working with students who have moderate to severe emotional and behavioral disorders and/or learning disabilities. I currently teach at Bronx Arena High School in Soundview, NY. Our school works to empower over-age, under-credited students to achieve academic success so they can earn a high school diploma. We work in a blended model, where students work through self-paced curricula. I work as a science teacher and generalist – this means I support students in their science work, as well as design and facilitate lessons throughout the day for the same 25 students. I am a huge believer in technology in the classroom, as a tool for accessibility and connectivity (among other things). Teachers and technologists have the ability to transform education, and I am looking forward to being part of that change.
	John Derian I teach Living Environment and Physical Science at The Brooklyn International High School to 9th and 10h grade students. The curriculum I develop is interdisciplinary, project-based science that embraces student inquiry and collaboration. My experiences in education include an education internship at the American Museum of Natural History, a Cell Biology supplemental instructor at the University of North Carolina Wilmington, a high school teacher in San Pedro, Belize, and a National Geographic Student Expedition leader to Hawaii to study the natural history and culture through scientific inquiry and photography. Recently, I served as a science curriculum consultant for a new international public high school opening in New York City. Additionally, I helped teach graduate students in the I-START program at Long Island University on the best practices for developing science curriculum geared towards English language learners. In my spare time, I enjoy getting out of the city and into more natural surroundings!
	Steve Kinney Steve Kinney is the lead teacher and technology coordinator at the Scholars’ Academy in Rockaway Beach, Queens. There, he oversees an investment of over $1 million in technology, including a one-to-one iPad initiative in the seventh and eighth grades, a one-to-one Kindle pilot in the sixth grade, and the iLearnNYC program in the eleventh and twelfth grades. He is an New York City Teaching Fellows alumni and worked as an instructional technology specialist for the Department of Education’s Office of Educational Technology. Steve teaches web design and programming to middle and high school students. He is the school’s data specialist and developer of a student information database that drives the school’s inquiry initiative. Steve graduated cum laude from Rutgers University with honors for his thesis work on urban sociology, has a masters degree in Special Education from Hunter College, and is pursuing an advanced certificate in educational leadership and technology from the New York Institute of Technology.
	Alex Wood Alex Wood is constantly looking for new ways to make his classes interesting, engaging, productive, and fun! Discovering and developing new technologies for classroom use is one of the ways Alex works to achieve this goal. Alex’s love for teaching began in 2002 when he spent two years as an English language instructor at a community college in Vietnam’s rural Mekong Delta. Since then he has taught in the Boston and New York City Public Schools, and is currently is a social studies teacher at Townsend Harris High School. His interests include traveling, digital storytelling, talking politics, cooking, and hanging out with his new daughter. Alex holds a Bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Princeton University and a Master’s in education from the University of Massachusetts Boston. He’s very excited to join this year’s EDesign Lab cohort.

Technologists

	Luke BrownGold Luke BrownGold is an exhibit technologist for the Liberty Science Center. He is responsible for researching technology trends and developing compelling digital interfaces and physical experiences. In the past he was a creative technologist for Big Spaceship, a digital design agency in Brooklyn where he primarily did web development. Luke has a love of tech that extends into G.U.I.s, D.I.Y., H.C.I., and many other 3 letter abbreviations. He is passionate about effective game design and all things web.
	Jonah Brucker-Cohen Jonah Brucker-Cohen is a researcher, artist, and writer. He received his Ph.D. in the Disruptive Design Team of the Electronic and Electrical Engineering Department of Trinity College Dublin. His work and thesis is titled “Deconstructing Networks” and includes over 77 creative projects that critically challenge and subvert accepted perceptions of network interaction and experience. His work has been exhibited and showcased at venues such as San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, MOMA, ICA london, Whitney Museum of American Art (Artport), Palais Du Tokyo,Tate Modern, Ars Electronica, Transmediale, and more. His writing has appeared in publications such asWIRED, Make, Gizmodo, Neural and more. His Scrapyard Challenge workshops have been held in over 14 countries in Europe, South America, North America, Asia, and Australia since 2003.
	Mike Edwards Currently at The Huffington Post, Mike Edwards has worked as a professional developer for 14 years at a wide variety of places, including a Japanese television station, Barnes and Noble.com, and the American Museum of Natural History. His design work has spanned the northern and southern hemispheres in both the medical and educational fields. He holds a BA in Anthropology from the University of Virginia and an MFA from Parsons The New School for Design, where he served as research faculty for three years investigating the intersection of game design and learning.
	Pritika Nilaratna Pritika designs and develops user experiences that facilitate intuitive interactions between people and media. Her design work is motivated by humor, critique and social intervention in and through technology. Her interests range from physical computing and craft to digital experience design. As a senior developer at Brooklyn United, a creative digital studio, Pritika focuses on interaction design, user experience, and development for web applications and coordinates technical communication between the studio and its clients. Pritika’s work has been featured on TechCrunch, PCWorld, Hackaday and The Creators Project, and she graduated from Parsons The New School for Design as Valedictorian of the Design and Technology program.
	Anna Pinkas Anna Pinkas is a visual artist working and living in Brooklyn, NY. She holds a BFA from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and is a graduate of New York University’s Interactive Telecommunications Program. Her work aims to excavate the extraordinary slumbering within the mundane, and to follow Georges Perec’s appeal “to question that which seems to have ceased forever to astonish us.” Her choice of medium changes according to projects – from drawing to digital media and physical installation – but the sequential aspect of animation (her initial formal approach) is always at play. She is fascinated by the technical, aesthetic and ethical inquiries brought about by the digital realm and is particularly attuned to the need to relate algorithms to existing paradigms and concrete projects.
	Ryan Raffa Ryan Raffa is a designer and musician, and he asks questions about sound, rhythm, and how computation can be applied in research and the creative process. As a musician and composer, he has toured throughout the US, been featured in Aronson Gallery, and performed live at the High Museum, Radio New York, KEXP, and NPR. Ryan is the recipient of the Michael Kalil Endowment for Smart Design Award, and he has given talks and presented his work in art, design, and technology at SIGGRAPH, ACM Conference on Creativity and Cognition, Critical Themes at SVA, Maker Faire, Open Hardware Summit, and the inaugural New School Arts Festival, Noir. Ryan graduated with honors and as valedictorian from the MFA Design and Technology program at Parsons The New School for Design (’11) where he is now Adjunct Faculty and Director of the Bootcamp Summer Intensive.

Facilitators

Hsing Wei Hsing Wei is a designer, researcher, convener, and tinkerist. Her experiences have spanned from venture philanthropy to user experience, game, and interaction design. She continues to develop new content, products, and partnerships for a range of for-profit and non-profit clients. She enjoys thinking about and developing technology-enriched experiences that solve problems, connect communities, produce meaningful interactions, and enable novel ways of interacting with the world. While an Honorary Resident at Eyebeam Art & Technology Center, her role as Senior Innovation Officer at New Visions meant getting to start-up collaborations like EDesign Lab.
Liza Stark Liza Stark is a designer, artist, educator, and recent graduate of the MFA Design and Technology program at Parsons The New School for Design. She likes to combine electronics with paper, textiles, and all sorts of everyday materials to create crazy mashups that challenge how we perceive technology as a creative force in our lives. Holding a deep interest in the intersection of learning, making, and games, she has taught game design in Abu Dhabi and New York City, as well as numerous soft circuit and computational craft workshops to a range of ages and skill levels. Her work has been featured in Maker Faire, Open Hardware Summit, CIANT, ACM Conference on Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interfaces Conference, and more. She currently teaches in the MFADT program at Parsons and constructs all sorts of fun things as Senior Design Assistant at the Institute of Play.
Ralph Vacca Ralph Vacca joined New Visions in 2011, working within the Innovation Unit. Ralph is Co-Founder of Kognito Interactive (www.kognito.com ), a learning simulation design company in New York City. He earned a Masters in Educational Leadership New York University and was a NYU Reynolds Fellow in Social Entrepreneurship. He is pursuing a Ph.D. in Educational Communications & Technology at NYU, focusing on Interactive Media for Social Justice Education.

ALUMNI

Class of 2011

David Baiz Teacher	Sarah Prendergast Teacher	Luke Brownfield Technologist	Hsing Wei Director & Facilitator
David Jimison Technologist	Nick Lawrence Teacher	Dara Ross Teacher	Scott Peterman Technologist
Justin Blinder Technologist	Anna Reeve Teacher	Ilya Lyashevsky Technologist	Ralph Vacca Facilitator
Aiwen Wang-Huddleston Technologist	Nathan Finney Teacher

Teachers

	David Baiz David Baiz is an eighth-grade mathematics teacher at Global Technology Preparatory. David has been teaching middle school math for six years, first entering the profession through the NYC Teaching Fellows program. He earned his Masters of Education in Mathematics at City College (CUNY). After teaching in the South Bronx for three years, David helped open Global Tech as a founding member of the school and currently serves as UFT Chapter Leader. As a teacher, David has been awarded the Goldie Anna Award for Excellence in Education for his work with digital portfolios, a $10,000 Cisco Innovation Grant to bring mobile learning technology to the classroom, and was recently selected for the Math for America Master Teacher program. David believes every child is capable of success, and as 21st Century educators, it is our responsibility to prepare students for a tech-focused and information-driven world.
	Nathan Finney This will be my 2nd year teaching at Columbia Secondary School for Math, Science and Engineering. Last year I taught math (7th), regents geometry (8th/9th), and an engineering course (9th), which combined physics, programming and electronic design. This year I am teaching regents physics and engineering. I have worked professionally as a graphic artist and web production manager, and more recently as a STEM educator. I have a masters degree from Teachers College in physics and general science education (7-12), and a bachelors degree from University of California Berkeley with majors in physics and art. My career as a teacher began with the idea that physics and math are interesting. While that sentiment has definitely become more complex, it still remains a fundamental motivator. I want to share the power of knowing about the universe and being able to act on that knowledge. As a professional I want to exploit every skill I have for this task, and develop new skills along the way. My primary focus now is how to incorporate immersive technology into my courses, and refine technological tools and procedures that make that process more open, more streamlined and better organized for everyone’s success.
	Nick Lawrence Nick Lawrence is beginning his fourth year at East Bronx Academy for the Future. He teaches the eighth grade U.S. History classes, high school German, and the AVID elective for ninth grade. He is also active on the School Leadership Team, AVID site team, technology committee, programming committee, and school culture committee.Nick grew up in Kansas City and attended the University of Kansas for his B.S. in Education and his M.S. in Curriculum and Instruction. His program included a year of student teaching, which he completed in rural Kansas and on a U.S. army base in Germany. After the move from Kansas to teach in the Bronx, he wrote his master’s thesis about the use of collaborative media platforms to foster online collaborative and social skills in students. Out of that work grew a larger, interstate effort that now includes his former professor and advisor, five middle school and high school history teachers, and approximately 300 students across Kansas, Missouri, and the Bronx.His initial motivation for joining the field of education was to help create citizens who contribute positively to society.
	Sarah Prendergast Originally from Willoughby, Ohio, Sarah graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in Mathematics and Religious Studies from Kenyon College in 2009. After being accepted as a Math for America Fellow she moved to New York City and earned a Master’s degree in Mathematics Education from NYU in 2010. With a strong passion for public education and a border line obsession with mathematics, Sarah brings a high level of excitement and fun to her high school class room. She believes that a combination of enthusiastic teaching, appropriate differentiation and student hard work is the key for every student to excel in math class and enjoy themselves along the way. She is currently teaching Integrated Algebra and a math elective course called Digital Math Shorts at the NYC iSchool, a small humanities high school in lower Manhattan. Sarah lives in Brooklyn with her boyfriend- Zach and their pup- Murph.
	Anna Reeve I am a Special Education Coordinator at Achievement First Endeavor. I have been teaching special education for five years at the high school and middle school level with a focus on literacy interventions. After working as a teacher’s aide in Philadelphia through an AmeriCorps program, City Year, I went on to graduate from NYU with a concentration in Urban Education and Community Organizing. Upon graduating I joined Teach for America in an effort to become part of a collective movement that believes education is the civil rights issue of my generation. I believe that students with special needs often represent the “achievement gap within the achievement gap” and I am determined to find ways to maximize all students’ potential. I am particularly driven to find the intersection of authentic performance based assessment with data driven instruction.
	Dara Ross From 2001-2003 I served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Mongolia. I lived in a ger and taught English at a small village middle school. The many rewarding experiences that I had while serving in the Peace Corps inspired me to pursue a career as an educator. After my Peace Corps service I entered and graduated from The Elliot and Roslyn Jaffe Peace Corps Fellows Program at Teachers College, Columbia University with a Masters Degree in Education. I am now a Humanities teacher at the Brooklyn International High School where I teach English to English Language Learners (ELLs) who are recently arrived immigrants to the United States.

Technologists

	Justin Blinder Justin is a programmer, interaction designer, and creative technologist. He graduated from Parsons the New School for Design with a BFA in Design and Technology. His work explores virtualized interaction, archiving, and community through the critical and playful use of technology. In the past, he has worked as a developer for the open source project ShiftSpace, and served as a research resident for the Brooklyn based R&D lab Uncommon Projects. Justin currently works as a software developer at R/GA.
	Luke Brownfield Luke is a web developer and creative technologist for Big Spaceship, a digital creative agency in NYC. He has been involved with interactive media for local businesses and US companies for several years. Luke has a love of tech that extends into GUIs, DIY, HCI, and many other 3 letter abbreviations. He is passionate about effective game design and all things web.
	David Jimison David is an artist, inventor, & student focused on the intersections of pervasive technology (eg. mobile, augmented reality, embedded computing) and creative cultures (eg. art, music, fashion.) As an artist, David creates playful and festive moments that challenge our notions of everyday life. His robots have been featured by publications including: BBC, Gothamist, and Boing Boing. His immersive installation event, UNDERGROUND, was listed as part of the “New Saturday Night” by New York Magazine. David was an 2008 Eyebeam Fellow. David’s consulting work and commercial inventions are done through his company Fever Creative. With over 10 years industry experience, David has consulted for Time Warner, MTV, and Library of Congress. His inventions have won awards from Nokia, MTVU, Cisco, and Siemens.
	Ilya Lyashevsky Illya is currently Director of Development at Broadcastr, a company working to create immersive, meaningful experiences around place on today’s leading mobile platforms. He previously co-founded Good To Know, Inc. which created Storied, an educational suite of software aimed at helping students learn vocabulary by reading original stories. He also headed mobile development at Electric Literature, a literary magazine which is published in a variety of digital formats, helping that publication become the first magazine of its kind to be published on the iPad, and using its iOS publishing platform to create apps for such organizations as Human Rights Watch and the Kenyon Review. Prior to that he had worked as a senior software developer at Motorola, upon graduating with a BS and MS in computer science, as well as a minor in creative writing, from Stanford University. He is, in addition, a published fiction author. Ilya is highly interested in finding ways to use media and technology in education, particularly for facilitating the learning of empathy and self-awareness.
	Scott Peterman Scott’s work spans the fields of physical computing, mobile technology, and many types of narrative. A lifelong student of history and the future, he currently works with rhizome.org resurrecting seminal net.art and 3D pieces and is the creator of the Imaginary Marching Band, a Kickstarter-funded series of wearable open source instruments that let you play music by pantomiming. He believes that open-source instruction sets are the ultimate test of any design – particularly when they educate others in the act of providing documentation for posterity. He is currently pursing his MFA in Design and Technology at Parsons, the New School for Design.
	Aiwen Wang-Huddleston Aiwen loves playing with homemade switches, soft circuits, and anything that combines the digital, screen-based world with simple physical materials such as paper, light, magnets, etc. In her previous life, she worked in graphic design and trained in Chinese calligraphy with a Zen calligraphy master for four years. She is a graduate of ITP at NYU where she collaborated on a variety of different projects ranging from video sculptures and experimental sound performances to living systems and collective story-telling. Aiwen is currently working on a children’s story, a book sculpture for the iPad, and a “Light Bridge” project that aims to direct sunlight down into New York City’s airshaft spaces.

Facilitators

Hsing Wei
Hsing Wei is a designer, researcher, convener, and tinkerist. Her experiences have spanned from venture philanthropy to user experience, game, and interaction design. She enjoys thinking about and developing technology-enriched experiences that solve problems, connect communities, produce meaningful interactions, and enable novel ways of interacting with the world. Being an Honorary Resident at Eyebeam Art & Technology Center and her role as Senior Innovation Officer at New Visions means getting to design and start-up collaborations like EDesign Lab.

Ralph Vacca
Ralph Vacca joined New Visions in 2011, working within the Innovation Unit. Ralph is Co-Founder of Kognito Interactive (www.kognito.com ), a learning simulation design company in New York City. He earned a Masters in Educational Leadership New York University and was a NYU Reynolds Fellow in Social Entrepreneurship. He is pursuing a Ph.D. in Educational Communications & Technology at NYU, focusing on Interactive Media for Social Justice Education.