Our Team

Writing and teaching have been in my blood for as long as I can remember. As a sixth-grader, I simultaneously started my elementary school’s first student newspaper, the P.S. 11 Courier (Look it up; I’m sure the Library of Congress has a copy!) and had my first paid job as a tutor of English to two Japanese children, ages 8 and 5. I cut my teeth in professional publishing by working first at Newsweek, and then at People, Life, Condé Nast Traveler and Sesame Street magazines and The Charlotte Observer. After I got a master’s in English Lit at Rutgers University, I became a staff writer and editor at a small educational development company in New York City. From then on, I was hooked on creating engaging and effective school materials that would inspire children to love learning as much as I’ve always done.

I’ve been a freelancer for more than 35 years, working with all of the major educational publishers and many developers (of which Sikana has been by far the best). I also have a graduate certificate in gerontology and am a community educator and national blogger on older adult issues. Children and elders…learning never ends. My calling is to serve these populations as best I can with passion and skill.

Throughout my career, I have loved the public side of being a teacher—connecting with students, engaging with them through interesting content, and watching their minds grow and change over time. I have learned, however, that I am most fulfilled by the private side of this profession, and by the behind-the-scenes work of researching best practices, aligning assessments and tasks with standards, crafting rigorous lessons, and sharing ideas with other teachers. This is where I find my true creative flow. I guess it’s the introvert in me!

Following this passion, I left a position teaching French and Study Skills at the middle-school level to pursue a new path in educational publishing. I am thrilled to join the team at Sikana!

When I am not creating lessons or developing curriculum materials, I love exploring new coffee shops and restaurants, as well as reading books and watching movies with my husband and child.

Teaching is my vocation. I started teaching fresh out of college. I taught high school English, Social Studies, and Computer Technology for eight years in California. At the pinnacle of my teaching career, I was the district Technology Coordinator, a Mentor Teacher, ran a successful Writing Across the Curriculum program, and implemented an International Baccalaureate program at a brand-new high school. In 2000, I decided I wanted to try something new! I worked as a full-time assessment specialist for CTB/McGraw-Hill and Riverside Publishing. I started out as a writer and editor, and eventually led teams on several large-scale state assessment projects for states including Georgia, Louisiana, and New York, and on large item banks for both CTB and Riverside. As a freelancer, I’ve overseen the development of over 10,000 items for various clients’ Common Core assessment products.

I am a self-confessed “process junkie” and excel at creating clear specifications, documenting workflows and procedures, and keeping my colleagues motivated. I am really proud of the work environment we have created at Sikana.

I was always the kid who loved school, so after completing my science degree in 2002, teaching seemed like the natural choice. I graduated in 2004 with my bachelor of education (secondary science and ELA). I spent some time as a substitute, all the while feeling that what I’d really like to be doing is developing the materials used in classrooms. With a little luck, I soon scored my first gig: writing sample TOEFL and TOEIC tests for ESL students. Another company hired me soon after, and I began to think that maybe I could actually make a living as a writer.

I officially began my full-time freelancing career in February of 2007, and I haven’t looked back since. With a background in both ELA and science, as well as course work in math, the list of projects I’ve worked on is long and diverse. I have written complex science passages to target the NGSS standards, developed SE and TE pages to teach vocabulary, and created math items. In recent years, much of my work has been focused on developing assessment materials to target the Common Core standards for ELA. I’ve worked with many different companies, but I’m most proud of the long-term relationships I’ve built with a small number of highly valued clients, including Sikana.

I started out as a teacher in the Boston Public Schools. After an adventurous two years, I became a reading specialist and worked as a supervisor/teacher at a small private school, The Reading Institute. A move to New York City led to a 25+ year career in education publishing. I’ve been lucky to work on a variety of projects from video scripts to read-alone books and chapter books to PEs, TEs, and workbooks to assessments, assessments, assessments…. I also published two nonfiction books and recently several indies, including a novel, The Secret of Jeanne Baret, about the first woman ever to sail around the world. It took many years of research.
In my free time, I love hiking and hanging out with my husband and our critters (two cats and a bossy chihuahua). Sometimes I do author visits at schools and libraries. And I’m writing another novel.

I started off as a writer, and have always continued to write in some form, whether it be stories from my life or assessment passages. I began as a newspaper reporter before moving into educational publishing as a writer and editor. Projects I’ve helped lead include numerous K-12 English/language arts and mathematics textbooks, workbooks, and test banks. Educational publishers I’ve worked with include Pearson, McGraw-Hill, Loyola Press, and others, and I also developed nonfiction trade books with Heinemann-Raintree/Capstone and Agate Publishing. For some strange reason, I enjoy managing workflows, communicating with writers to ensure quality and consistency, editing manuscript, and meeting tight deadlines.

I’m glad to have found Sikana—Hilary and Val have fostered a community of writers and editors who combine positivity and quality in a way that keeps the best in the business coming back.

I have worked as a freelance writer and editor since 2001 and in educational assessment for even longer than that. I read and wrote my way through childhood and adolescence, from regularly hitting my weekly check-out limit at the local public library to editing my high school newspaper for most of my high school career. As an adult, I’ve essentially just carried on doing the same things – reading and writing and editing my way through life as a librarian and an ELA content developer.

Sikana brings immense passion and professionalism to every project – Hilary and Val are committed to creating high quality content and adept at building and supporting talented editorial teams.

I have been working as a full-time freelance writer since 1999. During that time, I have worked as a travel writer and photographer, blogger, educational writer, magazine and book author, puzzle and game creator, and ghost writer for an internationally-distributed dentistry magazine. I love to learn new things, write, and teach—and because of that combination of “loves,” my chosen profession has been a perfect fit for me for the past 17+ years. Here’s to another 17+ more!

On a personal level, I collect vintage typewriters, am a semi-pro jam, marmalade, and preserves chef, love old movies and television shows, am an avid runner and yogi, and try to globe-trot as often as time and money permits.

Working with Sikana has been one of my greatest career joys. Hilary and Val have created an amazing company with a topnotch team of writers and editors. Every project I have worked on with Sikana has been an absolute delight.

I have been passionate about reading and writing for as long as I can remember and I am grateful that my career as a freelance writer allows me to earn a living while pursuing those passions. I have been writing instructional and assessment materials for Grades K-12 and beyond for over 15 years. I also write marketing materials, website content, and grant proposals. Prior to this writing life, I was an attorney who litigated for the City of New York. Although I loved every exciting minute, I much prefer my quiet days of writing in my home office in Austin, Texas

When I am not working for my wonderful and diverse clients, I write fiction and memoir. My creative work has appeared in several publications including, Lilith Magazine and ducts.org. I also had the honor of reading my memoir piece “If You Close Your Eyes” for the first annual “Listen to Your Mother, Austin” in 2011. For much needed breaks from the written word, I practice yoga, take long walks, dance, shop at the local farmer’s market, cook healthy meals, draw, and explore the world.

I have been a freelance writer for over twenty years and a poet for most of my life. I’ve published seven collections of poetry: Queen Anne in Winter (1990), Women of Steam (1995), Murmurs (2000), Smoke (2005), Closet (2010), Multiple Choices (2015), and The Green Bean Incident (2020) My book, There is a Crooked River, offers poems about the Maine woods for young readers. In 2003, I wrote and performed The Haiku Project, a playful celebration of 100 original haiku. In 2004, I was honored to author Elie Wiesel: Surviving the Holocaust, Speaking Out Against Genocide, a biography for high school students. I earned a degree in English and Theater from the University of Notre Dame and a Masters in Linguistics and Writing from Northeastern University which empowered me to teach in three New England high schools. Today, I offer workshops, write educational materials for a variety of clients, mentor writers, guide a monthly poet’s group, and actively volunteer at a natural foods co-op and a community garden. I share life with an inspiring local arts community, two sons, two dogs, a cat, a scientist, and three powerful granddaughters.

I am a freelance writer of language arts educational materials and a fiction writer (mostly as Liza Kleinman). My short fiction has appeared in several magazines and in the anthology “Writes of Passage: Coming-of-Age Stories and Memoirs from the Hudson Review.” I am the author of a middle grade novel, “Azalea, Unschooled” (Islandport Press 2015). I live in Portland, Maine.

During my ten years as a middle school English teacher, I loved crafting lessons that helped students unlock meaning in literature. Finding the right question to create a lightbulb moment, the right scaffold to help students make meaning, the right model to unlock new writing abilities, was a thrill for me. This passion led me toward a career in educational publishing, where I can share my love of great curriculum and teaching tools with students and teachers around the globe. I have a Bachelor’s degree in English Literature and a Masters in Language and Literacy. Curriculum design allows me to use all of my interests, creating phonics and vocabulary lessons and lessons that prompt wonderful discussions of literature.

I am thrilled to be working with Sikana!

In my free time, I enjoy baking homemade challah, reading, and spending time with my husband and toddler.