Our Team

The NVWP is led by a team of passionate educators and staff who are dedicated to improving writing instruction, writing practice, and learning at all educational levels; to developing teacher leaders across the disciplines and elevating their professional standing; and providing support for young writers and their families.  This page includes the bios and photos for the NVWP’s Directors and Co-Directors, and our full time office staff.  Our leadership team also consists of many outstanding NVWP Teacher Consultants who lead a variety of programs for the NVWP.  (A complete organizational chart will be available soon.)

NVWP Director, Dr. Paul M. Rogers

Paul M. Rogers, (PhD 2008 University of California, Santa Barbara) is an Assistant Professor of English at George Mason University and the Director of the Northern Virginia Writing Project. He became a Teacher Consultant with the National Writing Project after completing the South Coast Writing Project’s Invitational Summer Institute in 2004. In addition to working with K-12 teachers throughout Northern Virginia, at GMU he teaches courses in academic writing, professional writing, and advanced nonfiction writing. He also teaches a course on entrepreneurship and leads graduate seminars in the teaching of writing, composition theory, and research methods.

His recent books and articles include: “The Writing Across the Curriculum Sourcebook” co-edited with Terry Zawacki (Bedford St.Martin’s, 2011); “Traditions of Writing Research” co-edited with Charles Bazerman et al (Routledge, 2010), and “Rejoining the learning circle: When inservice providers conduct research” in the January 2011 issue of English Education.

Professor Rogers was a 2008 recipient of AAC&U’s K. Patricia Cross Award for leadership in higher education, and was a co-recipient of NCTE’s 2009 Janet Emig Award for research in English education.  Paul serves as a Senior Scholar for the George Mason University Center for Consciousness and Transformation, and as Faculty Director for the Mason Center for Social Entrepreneurship.  He works on the Stanford Study of Writing Research team, and is the corresponding secretary for the International Society for the Advancement of Writing Research. Contact: (progers2@gmu.edu or 703.993.5176)

NVWP Co-Director, Cathy Hailey

Cathy Hailey teaches Creative Writing for ninth through twelfth graders as part of the Center for the Fine and Performing Arts specialty program at Woodbridge Senior High School in Prince William County, VA.  Cathy is beginning her thirty-third year of teaching in Prince William County, her twenty-seventh at Woodbridge High; throughout her career she has taught a variety of classes including Advanced Placement Language and Composition.  She earned her A.B. in English from Duke University where she took English education courses from the Director of the Duke University Writing Project, and student taught with a cooperating teacher who had been through their Invitational Summer Institute.

In 1981 Cathy participated in the Northern Virginia Writing Project’s Summer Institute, where she presented on Small Group Experiences with Reading and Reading Response Journals.  She earned her MA in English with a concentration in Professional Writing and Editing from GMU in 1991.  Before completing her thesis, she taught English Composition courses for Northern Virginia Community College.  Cathy’s first important role in the NVWP was as the Prince William County liaison to the Board, but when the idea of having a Student Summer Institute (SSI) came up, programs for students became her primary focus.  She has worked with the SSI since 1988 and later added Young Writers Workshops (YWW) on Saturdays, which incorporated a parent program.  Cathy is currently Co-Coordinator of Young Writers programs, and she was named Co-Director of the NVWP in June 2011.

Cathy has been a literary/art magazine sponsor throughout her career.  She works with the Virginia High School League teaching magazine publication and creative writing classes at their workshops and judging for their contests.  The 2011 issue of Woodbridge High School’s award-winning literary/art magazine, entitled Eddas Sterling, is the twenty-fifth issue she has guided students in producing.

Cathy writes mostly poetry and nonfiction.  Her most recent publication was an article for the Virginia Writing Project Journal about her experience, sponsored by the Mark Farrington Personal Writing Award, at the Geraldine Dodge Poetry Festival in Newark, New Jersey.  She is currently co-writing a monograph for the Youth, Family, and Community series forthcoming from the National Writing Project.

 NVWP Co-Director, Kim Sloan

Kim Sloan teaches for the FCPS Interagency Alternative Schools as a Reading and Writing Resource and for The George Washington University Graduate School Elementary Education Model Program where she teaches the literacy block of classes for pre-service teachers.  Kim is beginning her nineteenth year as an alternative school teacher and has been teaching graduate education classes steadily since 2000.  She earned her B.A. degree in English and Secondary Education from James Madison University and her M.S. in Language Education with a concentration in Reading from Indiana University.

Since becoming a Teacher Consultant with the Northern Virginia Writing Project in 1997, Kim has taken on many leadership roles for the NVWP.  She became Co-Director in 2003 and was named Professional Development Coordinator in 2006.  Kim’s current work for the NVWP includes setting up high-quality and TC-led courses and professional development series for area school systems.  She is a member of the NCTE, and has also grown professionally through her work for the National Writing Project, having recently presented at two annual meetings, and the Local Sites Research Initiative. Her latest publishing has been in The Journal of the Virginia Writing Project, and she is currently working on an article about being an itinerant teacher and co-authoring a book on how the Writing Project methodology nurtures pre-service educators in order to help them become teacher-leaders in their field.

NVWP Co-Director, Mary Tedrow

Mary Tedrow currently teaches Advanced Placement Literature and Composition 12, English 11, and Creative Writing at John Handley High School in Winchester, Virginia.  She has been a teacher of English since 1978. Her career covers grades 9-12 ranging from self-contained special ed. to advanced placement students.  Mary has a Masters in Education, Emphasis in Teaching, from Shenandoah University and a B.A. in English and Journalism from Shepherd University.  Her certifications include National Board Certification in Adolescent and Young Adult English Language Arts, a post-graduate professional teaching license and is a Certified Journalism Educator.

Mary has been a Co-Director of the NVWP since 2005, and in an effort to keep the work of the Project within easy access of every teacher in the areas she has served as the Director of the Shenandoah Valley Summer Institute.  Mary’s's association with NVWP began in 1981 with a 695 class, but expanded after becoming a TC in 1998 and a 695 coordinator in 1999.  The transformation in her teaching led to the honor of Frederick County District Teacher of the Year in 2001. That recognition has opened up other opportunities including work with the Teacher Leaders Network of the Center for Teaching Qualityand serving as a Commissioner on the NEA Commission on Effective Teachers and Teaching, 2010-2011.

Mary says that all she learns in the policy arena only reinforces the philosophy of the Writing Project: Teachers are the best teachers of teachers. They have the expertise to meld the world of the theoretical with the world of the practical.  Our knowledge of pedagogy and students is the true hope of reform in American education. Throughout her career Mary has also been a freelance writer. For six years she combined her teacher knowledge with writing and wrote Reading Connections Intermediate, a national monthly newsletter for parents of middle-school students.  In the years she was home with her three children, she wrote advertising copy, edited dissertations, and worked as a part-time newscaster for WINC, a local radio station.  All of these real-world writing experiences find their way into the classroom. Currently, her writing focuses on education policy.  Mary maintains a blog at walkingtoschool.blogspot.comand is an occasional contributor to Teacher Magazine and The Answer Sheet.  Her current writing project is a personal challenge: a YA novel in the fantasy arena.

NVWP Administrative Specialist, Sara Duval

Sara first joined the staff of the Northern Virginia Writing Project in 2003. She worked as a student assistant for the Project until she graduated with her BA in Music in 2005. Upon graduation, she held various positions at George Mason University in office management and student advising, but ultimately returned to the NVWP as the Administrative Specialist in 2010. Sara handles a wide variety of tasks for the NVWP, including managing communications, budgets, scheduling, and logistics. She works closely with the Project’s leadership and is recognized among the NVWP leadership for her outstanding organizational skills and detail oreintation. In her free time, Sara enjoys reading, listening to music, visiting the beach, trying out new restaurants, and spending time at home with her boyfriend, Ben, and cat, Indigo.

NVWP Founder and Director Emeritus, Don Gallehr

Donald R. Gallehr is the founding Director of the NVWP,  the former Chair of the Board of Directors of the Virginia Writing Project, and former member of Board of Directors for the National Writing Project.  He is the 2008 recipient of the David J. King Teaching Excellence Award, which honors significant contributions for educational excellence at George Mason University. He continues to teach advanced nonfiction writing, the teaching of writing, and theories of composition, as well as freshman and advanced composition in the disciplines at GMU. His articles include: “Portfolio Assessment in the College Writing Classroom,” in Process and Portfolios in Writing Instruction (NCTE, 1993); “Wait and the Writing Will Come: Meditation and the Composing Process,” in Presence of Mind: Writing and the Domain Beyond the Cognitive (Boyton/Cook, Heinemann, 1994); and “What is the Sound of No Hand Clapping: Using Secularized Zen Koans in the Writing Classroom,” in Spiritual Empowerment and Pedagogy (Boynton/Cook, Heinemann, 1997). His research interests focus on learning beyond the cognitive and its application to the classroom, and he currently serves as a reviewer for NCTE’s Journal of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning.