Our Team – Staff Development and Learning

Our Leadership Team

Our programs are developed by a powerful team of educators with experience in creating innovative learning opportunities.

https://learn.projectember.org/Joshua%20Rothhaas

Joshua Rothhaas

Founder & Director

Josh was the founding educator at Brightworks, one of San Francisco's most progressive project-based learning schools. From there he spent 4 years managing, directing, and expanding Tinkering School before co-founding Project Ember in 2015. Josh has spent years leading teams of educators and co-developing context-specific ways to create a failure-positive environments where ideation and experimentation thrive. At camp or in the classroom he is always connecting with children on an individual level and helping them to engage with their project from a place of authentic enthusiasm.

https://learn.projectember.org/Dianne%20Hurvitz

Site Director

Dianne Hurvitz was a founding educator of Khan Academy's brick-and-mortar Lab School on Google's Campus in Mountain View California. From there she moved to the Education Team at RAFT (Resource Area for Teaching) and began to work with Project Ember during the RAFT-Project Ember partnership to build maker spaces in over two dozen bay area public and private schools. Dianne continues to work in classrooms directly with student music programs, directs Project Ember's Day Camp, and co-leads Project Ember's design team.

https://learn.projectember.org/Katie%20Richmond

Founder & Director Of Community

Our Founder, Katie Richmond Katie joins Project Ember with an assemblage of skills harvested from a life of saying yes to strange and wonderful projects. As a graduate from the University of Southern California with a degree in film production, she had early opportunities to manage large casts and crews, collaboratively designing and building imaginative worlds.

https://learn.projectember.org/Jason%20Pittman

Business Development

Jason Pittman was a teacher in the Washington DC area for ten years and was recognized as The National Science Teachers Association's Early Educator of the Year, became Bob Ballard's teacher at sea for three seasons of the broadcast expedition, and partnered with Michelle Obama and her "Let's Move" program to teach lessons in school gardens. Jason is the former Master Curriculum Designer for Khan Academy's Lab School, Education Director & CEO at RAFT (Resource Area for Teaching), and STEAM Team Director at the Monterey County Office of Education.

Project Ember wants to make online learning BETTER

Our goal is to create a platform for high achievement through teamwork and collaboration among students and staff.