 Jerry Mintz has been a leading voice in the alternative school movement for over 30 years. He has a BA from Goddard College, and a Masters in Teaching in the Social Sciences from Antioch New England Graduate School.He worked as a public school teacher and a public and independent alternative school principal for 17 years. He founded several alternative schools and organizations and became the first executive director of the National Coalition of Alternative Community Schools, serving from 1985-1989. In 1989 he founded the Alternative Education Resource Organization which he continues to direct, and is Managing Editor of its networking magazine, The Education Revolution. He has lectured and consulted with schools and organizations in the United States and around the world, including Russia, the Czech Republic, France, England, Israel, Denmark, Holland, Ukraine, Japan, Austria, Germany, India and New Zealand. He was a founding member of International Democratic Education Conference and has helped organize and spoken at many of them, including the one at Stork Family School in Vinnitsa, Ukraine, Summerhill School in England, Tokyo Shure, in Japan, Christchurch, New Zealand, Bhubaneswar, India, and Berlin Germany. In 2003 AERO co-hosted the IDEC in the United States for the first time. Over 90 schools from 25 countries and 25 states were represented. He has been a guest on numerous local and national radio and TV shows, including Fox News Network's Hannity and Colmes show and National Public Radio's All Things Considered, and Talk of the Nation. He has hosted two national weekly radio shows, one on the Talk America Network, the other on the Cable Radio Network. Jerry was Editor-in-Chief for the Handbook of Alternative Education (Macmillan 1994), which lists 7,300 educational alternatives and later the Almanac of Education Choices (Macmillan/Simon & Schuster 1995). His essays, commentaries, and reviews have appeared in numerous newspapers, journals, and magazines including The New York Times, Newsday, Paths of Learning, Green Money Journal, Communities, Saturday Review, Holistic Education Review as well as the anthology Creating Learning Communities (Foundation for Educational Renewal 2000). His latest title is No Homework and Recess All Day: How to Have Freedom and Democracy in Education (Bravura 2003) and is currently working on an anthology of essays written throughout the course of his career as a teacher, principle, and non-profit director. Jerry's website can be found at www.jerrymintz.com.  Ron Miller - Ron Miller is recognized internationally as one of the major thinkers and activists in the emerging field of holistic education. He has written or edited eight books and authored numerous articles, chapters and book reviews. He has spoken at conferences in the U.S., Canada, Mexico, England, and Turkey. After receiving a masters degree in humanistic psychology, Miller trained to be a Montessori educator, but after a brief teaching career he became interested in the entire range of educational alternatives and their shared critique of the cultural beliefs underlying mainstream education. He earned a Ph.D. in American Studies at Boston University, where his research led to two groundbreaking books—What Are Schools For? Holistic Education in American Culture (Holistic Education Press, 1990) and Free Schools, Free People: Education and Democracy After the 1960s (State University of New York Press, 2002). In 1988, Miller established an independent journal, Holistic Education Review, that began to define the scope of this emerging movement and a community of scholars and practitioners aligned with it. (The journal continues to be published, under the title Encounter: Education for Meaning and Social Justice). In the 1990s, Miller launched several publishing and book distribution ventures, including Holistic Education Press, the Resource Center for Redesigning Education (which published the book review periodical Great Ideas in Education), and the Foundation for Educational Renewal, which published the magazine Paths of Learning from 1999 through 2004. In 1995, he organized the Bellwether School near Burlington, Vermont, which has become a model for holistic educators and researchers. Since the mid-1990s, he has been on the faculty of Goddard College in Plainfield, Vermont, working with students of education as well as teen homeschoolers. Throughout his career, Miller has sought to bring diverse alternative
education movements into contact and collaboration. He has helped organize
conferences and meetings and done extensive editing, manuscript reviewing and
advising for colleagues, researchers and graduate students. He is currently the
editor of Education
Revolution, the newsletter of the Alternative Education Resource
Organization, and the education writer for the online journal
Global Intelligencer.
In his edited volumes, including Educational Freedom for a Democratic
Society (Resource Center for Redesigning Education, 1995), Creating
Learning Communities (Foundation for Educational Renewal, 2000), and, with
Riane Eisler, Educating for a Culture of Peace (Heinemann, 2004),
Miller has brought together diverse theorists and practitioners whose ideas are
on education’s leading edge.  Carol Morley - I met Jerry in 1993 when I was seeking an alternative to public school for my son who was in 8th grade at the time. With Jerry's encouragement, we decided to homeschool, which we did though the end of high school when my son received both a regular diploma and a GED. Early on, I volunteered to help Jerry with some of the editing, transcribing, and data entry for AERO. This soon became a regular routine, which continues to this day, albeit from a distance via mail, phone and email.My work with AERO primarily consists of editing the Mail and Communications section of the Education Revolution magazine and transcribing audio tapes for Jerry. In addition to this, I run a fairly successful and growing online retail business, assist my son with his IT business, and manage my and my husband's ever-increasing population of rescued animals (current count: 9). I have an Associates Degree in Secretarial Science from SUNY Farmingdale, and a Bachelors Degree in Small Business Management from SUNY Empire State College. My husband, Tom, and I have been married 33 years, have a grown daughter and son, and two grandchildren.  Aleksandra Majstorac Kobiljski - Aleksandra was born in Serbia and Montenegro and educated at the University of Belgrade (Serbia) and Central European University (Hungary). She met Jerry Mintz at IDEC 2000 in Tokyo where she was a member of Tokyo Shure's IDEC Organizing Committee in her capacity as a translator. She joined the AERO team in September 2004 at the Roslyn Heights headquarters. Besides her involvement in the alternative education movement, she is currently working towards her doctorate in history at The Graduate Center- CUNY (New York). Isaac Graves - Born in St. Louis, raised in the Capital District of New York State. Attended The Free School in Albany, NY for many years, attended public school for a few years, and homeschooled for a few as well. Isaac is currently a teacher and adviser at Harriet Tubman Free School (The Free School's high school program) in Albany's south end.Current AERO Activities include webmaster, bookstore manager, and most importantly AERO's annual conference director. Staff member since the fall of 2003. |
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