Meet the Amazing Educators Who Work at Turnitin

You’d like to think that the people behind the software you use also understand the work it is you do.

At Turnitin, our bench is deep with people experienced in educational software who feel passionate about learning and who want to help educators enable learning.

And of course, many of our employees are themselves, educators and former educators. Educators work in all the various departments at Turnitin, whether Marketing or Sales or Engineering or Learning and Innovation. Here are a few of us for you to meet.

I taught kindergarten at a private school in Cleveland Ohio, first grade at a Somali Charter School in Columbus Ohio, and Kindergarten at an inner-city public school in Chicago.

I loved what every teacher loves the most--the kids. I loved hearing the completely unfiltered stories from their home lives, I loved having dance parties with them and taking field trips, I loved reading to them and the times they accidentally called me "Mom." I loved seeing their little faces light up when they learned something new or read a whole book by themselves.

I have great empathy for teachers, I understand how hard it can be and how much work, and how much you have to give. I know how it feels to burn out and to feel like the problems are so big, there is nothing you can really do about them. I also understand how rewarding teaching can be and how necessary tools such as Revision Assistant and Feedback Studio are and the impact they can have on teacher workload and efficiency.

I taught 2nd, 3rd, and 4th grade (all subjects) in the Bay Area. I also have experience teaching higher education (education graduate school and credential programs).

In everything that I do, I am an educator first. I think anyone with teaching experience would agree that once you are an educator is it forever a part of your identity. At Turnitin, my experience allows me to analyze everything from an educator's point of view. Our team works cross-functionally with many teams at the company and it's part of our job to consider the impact on learning. When approached with new tasks like considering new product features or instructional resources, each of us reflects on some questions: 1) How will this help students? 2) How will this help educators? From there, we share knowledge, discuss, and make informed decisions around our work.

I taught English, ELL English, Study Skills, and Creative Writing to 7th and 8th graders.

As a Product Writer at Tii, I think having a teaching background helps me anticipate some of the topics and categories of information that educators search for when they have a question about one of our products or are on the hunt for a classroom resource on our guides site. I also think that, specifically having taught writing, I understand how valuable all our products are, especially Revision Assistant. Writing is incredibly tricky and time-consuming to teach and to learn, and Revision Assistant is a great tool for guiding students and supporting teachers through that process.

I taught 6th grade ELA for nine years in the Bay Area.

I think that especially in middle school you see amazing growth in who students are as individuals when they start sixth grade and who they have become when they head off to high school.

I used Turnitin in my classroom, so as I work with K12 school districts, I am able to pull from my own experience in the classroom to support implementation and engagement across grade levels and sites. We often talk about how to best approach implementing Feedback Studio in various subject areas, what types of rubrics and QuickMark sets may help support teachers, and the best ways to teach students to use the information provided to them within Feedback Studio to become better writers.

I taught math and computer science in Baltimore City public high schools (Digital Harbor High School, in particular) for six years.

Revision Assistant's invention was fairly directly inspired by my teaching experience (and that of my ELA and Social Studies teacher-colleagues). My experience has also led to a close and trusting work relationship with Turnitin's in-house team of teaching/learning/curriculum subject-matter experts.

What I love most (present tense) about being an educator is the ability to influence, support, and shape the development of students and fellow educators. My greatest accomplishments are tied to the lessons that stick with people over time and for me, it doesn't have to be a purely academic lesson. The impact that helps to solve a future problem or a life lesson that came from a piece of text or a belief in the necessity to use language thoughtfully and artfully - those ideas that really stick with someone are the things that make it worthwhile for me.

My years as a teacher, coach, principal, and supervisor inform nearly every action I take in my current role. On our team, we keep the needs of students and teachers at the forefront of every decision we make. We ask ourselves and each other how what we're doing will support teachers and/or students during every discussion and brainstorming. We think about equity and policy and pedagogy, as well as the sheer practical realities of education, all day every day in the hopes that we can be a voice for students and teachers across the company.

I was a middle school and high school English Language Arts teacher for eight years prior to joining the Tii team. I primarily worked with seventh graders and tenth graders, but over the course of my tenure, I also taught eighth, eleventh, and twelfth-grade students. Using my Master's degree in Curriculum and Instruction, I also played a major role in curriculum planning for our district, and I was a part of the district's technology "task force" that investigated, implemented, and supported new pieces of technology for teachers and students.

Absolutely every aspect of my work here at Tii is a direct result and reflection of my time in the classroom. Every decision that is made on my team, from the resources that we create to the words that we write in a comment, comes from a place that considers the well-being and development of students and teachers first. Being able to be a voice for teachers and students is a job that I take very seriously, but I am so thrilled to be part of a team whose members think likewise and work toward that same goal each and every day.

Like my colleagues on the Teaching and Learning Innovations Team, prior to working at Turnitin, I was in the trenches with my fellow educators. I taught seventh grade Language Arts for fifteen years outside of Pittsburgh, PA, working alongside some of the most dedicated and resilient individuals with whom I was lucky enough to serve. Holding various leadership positions throughout my tenure at the district, I piloted a promising writing software program called “Revision Assistant,” and through my consultations with its creators, I followed them here when Turnitin acquired their start-up company.

Everything we do on the Teaching and Learning Innovations Team is informed by our expertise in literacy instruction and our experiences in real classrooms with real students. We strive to create instructional resources that we would use in our own classrooms, those that are rooted in research-based best practices and effective pedagogical approaches. I'm thrilled and honored to be able to continue developing Revision Assistant and its instant formative writing guidance, and for our team to extend our educational expertise to all of Turnitin's products.

Prior to working at Turnitin, I held positions at several higher education institutions. I was the Assistant Director of Marketing for Athletics for a small Division I university, the Assistant Academic Advising Coordinator for a large Division I university, and most notably an Adjunct Marketing Faculty Member.

My experience as an educator has allowed me to form strong, lasting relationships with my customers and approach each situation from an educator’s perspective. This type of selling, along with my education background, has proven to my customers that I am their trusted partner in academic integrity and feedback. I genuinely care about how our products work in actual classrooms for dedicated teachers (K12 and Higher Education). I am not just a salesperson.

I started working at Turnitin while I was halfway through my doctoral studies in educational leadership. I love being a Turnitin obsessed educator and look forward to many more years selling, teaching, and researching.