By Ana ’15 and Margaret ’15. All photos by Margaret ’15.
Lincoln-Douglas Debate Coach and Librarian Adam Torson has been involved with Lincoln-Douglas debate since he was in the 8th Grade. He has coached debate ever since he finished law school in 2010 at Hamline University in Saint Paul, Minnesota. His most recent post, as assistant coach of Lincoln-Douglas Debate for Harvard-Westlake School, was performed over the Internet. Torson grew up in Fargo, North Dakota, which he said is very different from LA, mostly because of the milder weather and heavier traffic. In his free time, Torson can be found playing golf or reading.
Foreign languages instructor Isabelle Coitoux moved to LA in June after having taught French at the Bryn Mawr School for Girls in Baltimore this past year. She is adopted and, growing up with a French father and an Algerian mother, had almost every kind of French food available but admits to disliking brains and blood sausage. Coitoux first got her driver’s license this summer. Outside of School, you might find her at the beach, at an exercise class or at the head of a procession of domestic animals: as she says, “I have a tendency to attract cats.”
In addition to teaching, English instructor Edward Miller composes music for short films and reality shows through Bunim/Murray Productions, which produces popular shows such as Keeping up with the Kardashians and Bad Girls Club. He started playing piano when he was seven years old and played classical music until he was 18, when he moved to New York for college and started playing jazz. He now plays piano and sings in a pop-jazz band called Layabout. The band has toured Germany, and Miller speaks fluent German. If you Google “Layabout You Eclipse the Sun,” you can watch him perform in a music video!
Community Outreach Assistant Samantha Lyon grew up in Los Angeles and went to Windward School, where she worked for the past two years doing Service Learning. In her spare time, Lyon loves to garden. She especially enjoys growing native plants. “There are beautiful flowers, and all these cool grasses, and I have hummingbirds and butterflies and bees just hanging out in the garden all the time,” Lyon said. She also likes to ride her bike, which she says is more dangerous here than in New York City because people in LA don’t pay attention to cyclists.
History and social sciences instructor Annie Brown grew up in Cambridge, Massachusetts and has a Masters in Education from Harvard University. Brown taught at a public school called STEM (Science Technology Engineering and Math) Academy for two years until she was laid off because of Los Angeles Unified School District budget cuts. Brown spent the next few months writing a book about teaching for new teachers, at which point she was hired to teach at Marlborough. She is still working on her book but said that it is more difficult to find time for writing now.
Physical education instructor Christine Burke has been teaching yoga for 13 years. She owns the Liberation Yoga studio on South La Brea Avenue, which she started with her husband eight years ago. In addition, Burke has always loved acting and fine arts: she appeared in the 1997 NBC show Union Square as the character Carrie for sixteen episodes. When she was much younger, however, her dream job was to be the person in charge of creating street names so that she could come up with interesting names such as Rossmore.
Associate Director of Academic Technology Shauna Callahan taught French at The Archer School for Girls for the past seven years, where she incorporated technology tools such as Evernote, Google Docs and ePals into her classroom. She lived in France for two separate years: first during her junior year in college with a host family in Tours and next as an English Teaching Assistant in a fishing village called Quimper, in Brittany. Callahan loves drawing and painting, French cooking, yoga, cheese and apple pie. Her favorite article of clothing is a Martha’s Vineyard black dog sweatshirt she got when she was 18.