Masters
Successful people understand the importance of passion in a teacher. They know, often from personal experience, that a great teacher can change a life. Our growing list of “masters” who want to help us support our strongest teachers includes Pulitzer and Nobel Prize winners, academic superstars, MacArthur “geniuses,” artists, policy makers, politicians, and business leaders.
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Azar Nafisi
Professor of literature, Johns Hopkins University, and author of Reading Lolita in Tehran
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Robin Nagle
Anthropologist-in-residence for the New York City Department of Sanitation
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Mae Ngai
Lung Family Professor of Asian American Studies and professor of history, Columbia University
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Mark Norell
Macaulay Curator and Director of the Division of Paleontology, American Museum of Natural History
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Mary Norris
Longtime New Yorker copyeditor, author
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Francisco Núñez
Conductor, composer, and founder of the award-winning Young People’s Chorus of New York City
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Jeff Nunokawa
Professor of English, Princeton University
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Jennifer Oxley
Emmy Award-winning co-creator of Peg + Cat
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Dan-el Padilla Peralta
Assistant professor of classics, Princeton University
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Richard Panek
Award-winning author of The 4% Universe: Dark Matter, Dark Energy, and the Race to Discover the Rest of Reality
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Laurie L. Patton
President of Middlebury College
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Stephanie Pfirman
Professor of environmental science and environmental and applied sciences, Barnard College.
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Richard Prum
Professor of ornithology at Yale University, MacArthur “genius”
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Amy Richards
Activist, writer, feminist
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Christian M. Rojas
Professor of chemistry, Barnard College
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Jonathan F.P. Rose
President, Jonathan Rose Companies
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Jacqueline Jones Royster
Dean of Liberal Arts and professor of English, Georgia Institute of Technology
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Karen Russell
Pulitzer Prize finalist for her novel Swamplandia! and MacArthur “genius”
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Carl Safina
Safina Center founding president, MacArthur “genius,” and professor at Stony Brook University
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George Saunders
Award-winning author
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Geoffrey Sayre-McCord
Professor of philosophy at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
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Paula Scher
Acclaimed graphic designer, principal at Pentagram
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John Sexton
President emeritus of New York University
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Shobana Shankar
Socio-cultural historian of West Africa and the global south, Stony Brook University
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James Shapiro
Professor of English, Columbia University
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Russell Shorto
Prize-winning author of The Island at The Center of the World
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Daniel J. Siegel
Clinical professor of psychiatry, UCLA School of Medicine and founding co-director of the Mindful Awareness Research Center
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Charles Simic
Fifteenth US poet laureate
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Tracy K. Smith
US poet laureate, professor of the humanities, and director & professor of creative writing at Princeton University
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Wil Smith
Director, Seeds of Peace Camp
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Stephen Sondheim
Broadway composer, winner of multiple Tonys, Grammys, and a recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom
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Allen Spiegel
Dean emeritus, Albert Einstein College of Medicine
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Art Spiegelman
Graphic novelist, Pulitzer Prize winner
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Eliot Spitzer
Former governor and attorney general of New York
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Sree Sreenivasan
Social media strategist and former chief digital officer for New York City
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Gloria Steinem
Feminist, activist, and co-founder of Ms. magazine
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Hanni Stoklosa
Executive Director of HEAL Trafficking and ER physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital
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Cheryl Strayed
New York Times advice columnist and best-selling author of Wild and Tiny Beautiful Things
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James Tanton
Author, consultant, ambassador for the Mathematical Association of America, chair of the Advisory Council for the National Museum of Mathematics, and a founder of the Global Math Project
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Ramie Targoff
Professor of English, co-chair of Italian Studies, and Director of the Mandel Center for the Humanities at Brandeis University
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Nancy Tarshis
Speech-language pathologist, special educator, and author
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Maria Tatar
Chair, Program in Folklore and Mythology, Harvard University
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John J. Thatamanil
Professor of theology and world religions, Union Theological Seminary
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Shirley Tilghman
President emerita, Princeton University
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Isabel and Ruben Toldeo
Fashion designer and artist
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Deborah Treisman
The New Yorker fiction editor and host of the New Yorker Fiction Podcast
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John Tresch
Mellon Professor in History of Art, Science, and Folk Practice, The Warburg Institute, London
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Paul Turner
Elihu Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Yale University
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Basil Twist
MacArthur “genius” and puppeteer
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Thomas Wartenberg
Professor of philosophy, Mt. Holyoke College
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Yohuru Williams
Distinguished university chair, professor of history, and founding Director of the Racial Justice Initiative, University of St. Thomas
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Deborah Willis
Professor and chair of the Department of Photography & Imaging at Tisch School of the Arts, NYU
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Peter Winkler
Mathematician, author, and professor at Dartmouth and the National Museum of Mathematics
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Ranald Woodaman
Director of exhibitions and public programs, the Smithsonian Latino Center
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Betty Yu
Multimedia artist, photographer, filmmaker, and co-founder of the Chinatown Art Brigade
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Jerry Zaks
Broadway director and winner of multiple Tony Awards