By Wendy Chen
At least a dozen teachers are being hired to replace those leaving this summer to retire, take other jobs or pursue higher education.
Upper school chemistry teachers Christopher Dartt and Stephanie Quan will leave their jobs. Dartt taught Advanced Placement Chemistry and Honors Chemistry. He is moving to Seattle, where his wife accepted a job with Microsoft. He hopes that he will be able to continue to teach, but if not, he would consider returning to the chemical industry.
Quan, who currently teaches chemistry, will purse a graduate degree at UCLA.
Upper School English teachers Heath Moon, Martha Wheelock and Geri Harding will also be retiring.
Harding taught AP English Literature and AP English Language. Besides teaching English, Harding was also a part of the faculty development committee and ran the independent study program.
Wheelock, also Head of the Upper school Humanities Department, taught Gender Studies and Ethics in addition to English. After retirement, Wheelock wants to give back to the international community of women and to teach girls in Africa or possibly South America.
Moon will read and study philosophy and art history. He will also work part time teaching or tutoring.
Kyoko Tomikura, who taught Japanese, will be leaving the school because the Japanese program will end this year. Tomikura, who knew the program was being phased out when she was first hired, is a part time student at California State University, Northridge. After graduating, she would like to teach Japanese in the United States or move back to Japan and teach the language to foreigners.
Upper school dean Canh Oxelson has accepted a position as Horace Mann School Director of College Counseling. He will still be available to the rising seniors in his charge.
Angela Loyd, who works for upper school computer services, will be moving to Austin, Texas so that she can be closer to her family. She hopes to find a similar job to the one she currently holds in Austin.
Four teachers at the Middle School will be leaving their jobs as well.
Jordan Ethé will give up his job to take care of his young son Cassius while his wife Hilary Ethé ’00 will return from maternity leave to teach AP Environmental Science at the Upper School.
English teacher Katy Cooper will be moving to Denver with her husband, who is going to be the film commissioner for Colorado.
Chinese teacher Xiaomei Mu and French teacher Stéphanie Portal will also be leaving the school.
