Staff
Anne Rodgers, Occupational Therapist, Registered
Anne has been with Walbridge since 1987 with a five year hiatus. She specializes in sensory integration and also works at the School District of Belleville. She has been working with children since 1978, including her own four children who are now all grown.
Karen Bakken, Teacher
Karen has been at Walbridge since 1998. She is trained in Orton-Gillingham and tutors at her home in her "spare" time. Karen loves teaching and strives to teach children in ways that they can best learn. She is a graduate of UW - Whitewater and lives with her husband in Mt. Horeb and has three grown daughters.
Nancy Donahue, Teacher
Nancy is going on her second year of teaching at Walbridge and has a BA in Clinical Psychology and received her MA in Education in 2005. She has over 15 years of experience in classroom teaching and program development. Over the years Nancy has conducted research and developed a special interest in educational programs for children who are not "mainstream" learners, "project-based" learning, and integrating the arts and technology into learning in other subject areas.
Sally Allen, Teacher
Sally first joined the Walbridge team in 1987 with a masters and teaching degree in Special Ed. She quickly recognized that Walbridge encourages an environment that respects individual learning differences and provides a team approach that promotes self-esteem and success in all of our students. Sally has taught reading/literature, writing, and math to students across grade levels and thrives on watching the students learn and grow. Walbridge continues to be an exciting place for students and teachers to experience success in the classroom.
Irene Meinholz, Reading Tutor
Irene has been at Walbridge for four years as a reading tutor. She tutors students with the Project Read method in reading, spelling, writing, and comprehension. Irene adores seeing the wonderful change in kids after being at Walbridge for an amount of time and loves the way the staff works together to initiate programs for each individual child; doing so immediately for the sake of the child.
Nancy Johnson-Tourtouropoulos, Teacher
Nancy started teaching at Walbridge in 2006. It has been a pleasure for her to work with multi-age classrooms and all ranges of intelligence. She received a BA in Physical Education and Psychology in 1982 and then moved overseas and taught ESL in Athens, Greece. Nancy received the Cambridge certification for teaching EEL students (which is equivalent to TESOL in the US) and returned to the US in 1993 to teach in the Madison Pubic School system. She received her adaptive PE certification in 2000 and is currently working on her MA in Education and ESL at Edgewood College.
SueAnne Boyum, Director of Development
SueAnne is a 2002 graduate of Loras College and has just completed her first year at Walbridge School. She sincerely enjoys how her position impacts her personal growth and professional career. SueAnne could not be more proud of working with such a dynamic staff that emanates compassion to every single child with a genuine care for the students’ unique learning differences. Walbridge is an authentic asset to the Madison community and she plans to keep it that way.
Carol Johnson, School Secretary
Carol received an Art Education degree from UW Whitewater and has been at Walbridge now for 10 years. She loves the flexibility and ever-changing daily activities of a small private school and watching the kids develop healthy lasting relationships with their peers. When Carol is not working, she enjoys spending time with her two daughters and two horses, and nurturing her passion for reading.
Steve Lien, Principal
Steve is an experienced educator, serving both the public and private sector, for over 30 years; ten of which were in teaching and 20 in administration as a Principal. Steve brings an impressive level of education credentials as well as the developed knowledge attained from serving as the executive director of Child Development, Inc. He has an extensive background of Board practices both here in the Madison community and in Washington State, where he and his family lived prior to moving to Wisconsin. Steve's recognizes his most recent accomplishment as learning the art of shoveling snow. steve.lien@walbridgeschool.com