About RJ

Since 1967, when I graduated from Moravian College, I have taught in Salisbury schools.  My career began in the high school as a 7th grade English teacher, then moved to what is now the Administration Building for 3 years (looked very different in those days), and then to newly-constructed Middle School until the mid-eighties.  At that point I took a five-year educational sabbatical and revisited my Masters Degree work at Lehigh University (Lucy B. Moses Teaching Assistant Fellowship in conjunction with Dr. Peter G. Beidler) and began studies in 18th Century British Literature, Medieval Literature, and Gender Studies in the Ph.D. program (degree incomplete).  During my degree studies, I learned to read in Old and Middle English, Classical Latin, Medieval Latin, German, Hebrew, and Yiddish.

A first-year member of Keystone Technology Integrators and the Discovery Educator Network, I am also a first-year member of the PA DEN Leadership Council and have and continue to serve as PA DEN Blog Coordinator. In 2010, I was surprised with the DENny Legend Award.

A believer of lifelong learning, as part of my continuing education, I have published, presented at conferences, engaged in staff development training, been awarded educational fellowships, and joined professional organizations that have furthered my classroom learning and teaching skills.

Publications:

• Award-winning PP & L Energy Conservation Unit
• A History of the World (Edition of Jane Austen's Juvenalia, with Dr. Jan Fergus, Professor Emeritus, Lehigh University)
• Test Prep: Fun, Fast, and Free (Discovery Education)
• Giving the Past a New Perspective  (scroll to p. 5 for article written in conjunction with Jennifer Brinson)

Conference Presentations:

• PETE&C 2010: Student 2.0 (in conjunction with Jennifer Brinson)   
• Boston (Medieval Studies: Chaucer)
• Seattle (18th Century Studies: Frances Burney)
• South Carolina (18th Century Studies: Frances Burney)
• 16th Annual High Schools That Work (What's for Lunch; No Textbook? No Problem--2 separate years)
• NECC: Integrated Project: The 1940s
• PETE&C: Integrated Project (3 years)

Staff Development:

• Discovery Educator Network at Pennsylvania State University 
• Carbon Lehigh Intermediate Unit (in conjunction with Stephanie Maciag)
• Keystone Technology Integrators Summit

Educational Fellowships:

• Lucy B. Moses English Department Teaching Assistant, Lehigh University
• National Endowment for the Humanities in Independent Study: British Library, London 1993 (very pleased with this fellowship since only 15 awarded annually)

Professional Blogs:

• Changing Connections (Learning, Teaching and Technology)

• Pennsylvania Discovery Educator Network (State Blog for Discovery Educator Network)

• Learning Curve (Class Blog for Students and Teacher)

• Salisbury 21 Photoblog (Learning with Photoblogs)

        Avocational Blogs:
             Learning Llamas (Life on The Farm)
              Beating Back Cancer (One strategy at a time ~ One day at a time)

Professional Wikis:

• Learning Curve (21st Century Design for Learners, Creators, and Consumers)

• CFF Tech Ed (IU 21's Aggregate of Cross-Curriculum Resources, Tutorials, and Examples)

• Salisbury Township School District Best Practices (Educator Contributions to Best Practices)

• Class Wikis for Students (Students Learning and Teaching)

Professional Organizations:

• NCTE (National Council of Teachers of English)
• ISTE (International Society for Technology in Education)
• PAECT (Pennsylvania Association for Educational Communications and Technology)
• STAR Discovery Educator Network
• Keystone Technology Integrator
• Diigo Educational Pioneer

       Avocational Organizations:

• GALA (The Greater Appalachian Llama and Alpaca Association)
• PLAA (Pennsylania Llama and Alpaca Association)

During the past 3 years, I have served on the District Technology Committee, the Salisbury High School Technology Committee, and the Salisbury High School Building Leadership and Health and Safety Committees.
CFF Senate Testimony 2007:

Classrooms for the Future Senate Communications and Technology Committee and the Senate Education Committee Hearings 2007 from RJ Stangherlin on Vimeo.
 
In addition to my passion for education, I am also a llama owner and breeder and enjoy living and working on our 185-acre working farm.  We own a city home in Salisbury Township, but llamas are not likely to fit the township ordinance for pets, so we reside permanently at The Farm, with visits to the city residence.  I also enjoy international travel with Jennifer Brinson and our students.  And, perhaps proudest of all, I am a grandmother to four delightful children, ranging in ages from 6 to 13, and step-grandmother to two freshmen at college (DeSales University and LCCC). If you are interested in learning more about llamas and life on The Farm, you may want to visit Learning Llamas for a window into my after-school life. 


In March, 2010, I was diagnosed with Non-Hodgkins Follicular Lymphoma, and decided to make my diagnosis a learning and teaching experience. In less than a year, my NHL transformed to Diffuse Large B-Cell Lymphoma (DLBCL) and with the presence of a rare onogene, c-myc, my cells grew rapidly. I was not supposed to live since 6 different protocols did not work. On the seventh try, my cancer was controlled enough to have a stem-cell transplant. On December 23, 2013, I was declared lymphoma free. Happy endings.

You can follow my story on my renamed blog (formerly Beating Back Cancer), After Cancer. All the Beating Back Cancer posts remain, just a new name. You may notice that I could not change the url, so the only thing that changed was the name of the blog.