Alum Awarded Einstein Distinguished Educator Fellowship

Camsie Matis, Ed.M.'05, recently received the Albert Einstein Distinguished Educator Fellowship from the Triangle Coalition for Science and Education. The fellowship offers public and private elementary and secondary teachers of math, technology, and science an opportunity to serve in the national public policy arena.

"The fellowship is very exciting and comes at perfect time in my career. I've been teaching for 10 years," Matis said. "My experience is 100 percent in urban public schools. I don't know there could be a better time in education to be an urban public school expert - especially with the federal administration's focus on urban public schools. I feel like I have a lot to offer."

Since graduating HGSE, Matis has worked as an administrator and teacher in California and New York schools. Currently, she works as an algebra teacher at Eastside Community High School in the lower eastside of Manhattan. In 2007, HGSE featured Matis work as part of the Everyday Heroes series.

Matis will leave the classroom for the upcoming school year to work in Washington D.C. at the National Science Foundation (NSF). "I spent three or four months working on the Obama campaign," she said. "I figured this is the year to be working in D.C. I talked to my students while applying and they all think I'm going to meet Obama."

At NSF, Matis will work in two groups: the computer information science and engineering group on broadening participation in computing, the goal of which is to get more nontraditional students involved in computers and engineering, and the 10,000 teachers in 10,000 schools project, which aims to increase advanced placement computer science courses nationwide.

"I am grateful for the opportunities presented to me at HGSE and the role HGSE has played in shaping who I am as an educator today," Matis said