The Living Education Center
The Living Education Center
Who We Are

The LEC community consists of our Students, School Director, Core Teachers, Part-time Faculty, Board of Directors, Alumni, Families and Friends.

Students

The students at the Living Education Center represent a wide diversity of economic, social, racial and educational backgrounds. LEC students create a community where each is honored both as an individual and as an important member of that community. Each student actively participates in virtually everything we do here. Students often assist with the selection, planning and implementation of elective courses, field trips, camping trips, fundraisers and projects. They cook on camping trips, clean the school spaces daily, go downtown for lunch, teach classes, work in local businesses, attend meetings and public hearings, meet with local decision-makers, do homework and eventually graduate.

Currently we are:

Grade 12
  • Rachel Cary
  • Brianna Franklin
  • Graeme Gilchrist
  • Brandon Munroe
  • Tasia Oswald
  • Sarah Passantino
Grade 11
  • Betsy Gilbertson
  • Hollis Rinehart
Grade 10
  • Sage Jollofsky
  • Adam Mills
Grade 9
  • Hayden Ardrey
  • Jasper Farish
  • Arlo Millich
  • Nick Walker

Core Teachers

Core teachers are full time LEC staff, responsible for required academic and arts classes and selective electives. Each spends much of their time with the students and therefore function as both teachers and counselors.
  • Zap McConnell began teaching at LEC in 1998. Trained at North Carolina School for the Arts, Zap is a tireless artist, dancer, community forum organizer, activist and performance artist. In 2002 she became our Creative Arts Director. Zap has continually taught classes that call on her skills as artist and activist to empower young people. "If I have empowered my students to develop their own personal sense of integrity, to do what they say and say what they mean, then I have succeeded as a teacher."
  • Jennifer Connor received her B.A. in English from University of Massachusetts in Amherst. After moving to Charlottesville she spent four years as a Teaching Aid for young people in foster care and she has worked in several area schools. She is a co-founder of Charlottesville Food Not Bombs, which serves weekly community meals, and served as Director of Community Bikes, a public bicycle workshop. She received the 2007 Pushcart Prize for Poetry and was nominated as Best New Poet. In the summer you may find her on her bicycle around town or in far-flung places, or possibly operating a giant paper-mache puppet at Bread and Puppet Theater in Vermont.
  • Kate Adamson received her B.A. in English from University of Massachusetts in Amherst. After moving to Charlottesville she spent four years as a Teaching Aid for young people in foster care and she has worked in several area schools. She is a co-founder of Charlottesville Food Not Bombs, which serves weekly community meals, and served as Director of Community Bikes, a public bicycle workshop. She received the 2007 Pushcart Prize for Poetry and was nominated as Best New Poet. In the summer you may find her on her bicycle around town or in far-flung places, or possibly operating a giant paper-mache puppet at Bread and Puppet Theater in Vermont.

School Director

School Director

Ernie Reed is the founder and school director of the Living Education Center. He has been teaching continuously since 1973. He taught for three years as a middle and high school teacher at Daybreak Institute, in Los Gatos, California and co-founded and taught for two more at Kaleidoschool, also in Los Gatos.

He was 1/2 of the home schooling team for his 5 children throughout the 1980s and early 90s.

From 1987-91, he was the Science Curriculum Director for Oak Meadow School a correspondence school which emphasizes home schooling educational support and services www.oakmedow.com. For Oak Meadow, he taught high school classes in Biology, Environmental Science and Anatomy, Physiology and Nutrition.

In 1992, along with his wife (now deceased), Sue Wellbeloved-Reed, Ernie founded the Living Education Center for Ecology and the Arts. He acts also as LEC’s Administrative Director, does academic, career and college counseling, and teaches various science, math, government and elective classes.

Ernie was on the Board of Directors of Live Arts www.livearts.org, from 1999-2006; is Council Chair President and CEO of Heartwood, www.heartwood.org, a coalition of over 50 grassroots forest protection groups in the central and eastern US which provides network and organizational support, litigation support and services, and sustainable communities promotion among its member groups and activists; and Vice President of Wild Virginia, www.wildvirginia.org, which is dedicated to forest, species and habitat protection in the George Washington National Forest.

He received the 2007 Commonwealth Environmental Leadership Award from the Charlottesville Waldorf Foundation www.greenestschool.org .

Ernie has a BSC in Economics and Education from the University of Santa Clara and did his postgraduate study in Economics and Natural History at University of California at Santa Barbara.

Ernie has led various workshops for the Sierra Club, Student Environmental Action Coalition, Heartwood, and the Virginia Association of Environmental Educators.

He doesn’t get out often enough into the forests or shorelines he works to protect but is often able to drag some students along when he does.

Board

Our board is composed of neighbors, educators, artists, and friends.

Part-Time Faculty

LEC’s Part-Time Faculty generally teach one or two classes a year and are practicing professionals, artists or activists in their field. We love them!
  • Greg Kelly is the Program Director and co-founder of The Bridge Progressive Arts Initiative which actively explores and promotes the dynamics of community and the power of collaboration. He holds an undergraduate degree with honors in Fine Arts and Art History from Colorado State University. His own work as an artist typically explores a wide range of mediums and practices including illustration, video, performance, writings, audio letters, cut flowers, and an on-going series of love notes to his wife Leigh. He is a 3-year veteran of LEC.
  • Stratton Salidis is working to move us towards peace, ecological health and social justice. He is a supporter of the Meadowcreek Bikeway. Sometimes he impersonates an emergency medical technician and makes up songs on the spot according to audience title suggestion. Critical analysis and the creative process fascinate him. Stratton has taught with numerous institutions including Live Arts and the Charlottesville Writing Center. He is very grateful to have had the opportunity to share what he is passionate about at LEC for the last eight years.
  • Bob Bennetta has been part of the Charlottesville music scene for 20 years. He is a professional jazz pianist, closet classical pianist, educator, composer and, his latest kick, arranger. He has been teaching various music classes at LEC since 2000, including History of Blues, History of Jazz, Elements of Music, Musical Theory and individual instruction in Piano.
  • Shana Kresmer-Harris’ teaching began when she was a farmer teaching other farmers the advantages of sustainable agriculture. Before that she had earned a BS in Agronomy but school failed to make a “conventional” farmer out of her. She has managed sustainable farms for 30 years, lived in intentional community, and creates and sustains communities of all kinds. Political activism has been central to her life since she was 10 and heard Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” speech. She has dedicated her life to seeing and accepting the wholeness of people and the world. Shana is passionately committed to the web of connection we exist in and teaches classes in Environmental Science and Social Revolutions. She loves yoga, walking in the mountains, singing, getting dirt under her fingernails, and dancing ‘til she drops.
  • Julia Reis is pursuing a doctorate in environmental engineering at the University of Virginia after having taught Math and Geology at LEC. She is working on incorporating public health concerns into multi-purpose reservoir management. Specifically she’s researching malaria reduction, water-control measures for a dam located in Ethiopia. She hopes to join/lead more field trips with LEC soon!
  • Darrell Rose teaches African Drumming. He is a full-time professional artist and musician, has had art showings in numerous galleries and studios in the area. He has performed with virtually every major musical artist and with thousands of students and school children going back as we can remember.
  • Hiromi Johnson was born in Tokyo, Japan. One of her missions is to help increase awareness of the health benefits of T'ai Chi and Ch'i Kung in the community. Besides teaching at Hiromi T'ai Chi, she also teaches at Charlottesville Parks and Recreation Program, at ACAC and presents workshops at the Clinical Connections Day on Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM) at the UVA Hospital. Hiromi has been practicing Japanese Tea Ceremony and Vipassana Meditation for over 20 years. She finds these practices complement the practice of Internal Martial Arts.
  • Shelly Stern is a local community organizer, mother, gardener, artist and bicyclist. She is constantly creating as a means to define an alternative to oppressive systems in our society. Shelly has facilitated arts classes in a primary school in Belize, at the Boys and Girls Club, workshops in her home and in the community. She is editor of local zine, Joyful Dissent which encourages our collective engagement in fostering community among us.
The Alumni, Families and Friends of LEC are too numerous to mention. LEC has served over 180 students and their families in our 16 year history. LEC graduates have been accepted to 38 (at last count) different colleges and universities. Our friends are project partners, guest speakers, staff alumni, donors, performers, mentors and employers of LEC students. We love you all!
Post Office Box 2612, Charlottesville, VA 22902
434-971-1647    lec@wildvirginia.org