Desiré brings extensive experience in curriculum design, development, materials review, and instruction across grades 1–12, focusing primarily on grades 3–12. She has experience as an ELA educator and instructional coach in Guilford County, North Carolina. Desiré has written curricula for some of the largest school districts in the country, including Chicago Public Schools, the California Department of Education, and the New York City Department of Education. She’s also served as a Curriculum Operations Manager at an EdTech for learning intervention and extension and as a curriculum lead for EL Education’s latest revisions project focusing on Culturally Relevant Instruction, Social and Emotional Learning, and access for multilingual learners. Desiré has served UnboundEd’s organization in several capacities, including as an ELA Program Specialist, where she leveraged her professional learning experience to draft sessions and content for teachers and district leaders, focusing heavily on equitable instruction, increasing the cognitive rigor of instruction, embedding culturally sustaining practices, and providing access for high priority student groups. She now serves Benchmark Education Company as a Supervising Content Developer for the English Language Development team.

Desiré believes teaching students to read, write, speak, and listen fluently and fluidly, leveraging all aspects of their identities, is justice. Creating content that invites connection, cultural pluralism, and authentic interaction is where her heart lives because so many spaces attempt to silence and alter the experiences and histories of our most marginalized communities. Desiré believes that where there is knowledge, there is freedom. Being a part of an entity that works to provide students access to text and tasks and to critically engage in new knowledge that invites them to interrogate the world, is freeing for both herself and those that the content reaches.

When students have access to content, they can engage with, acquire, disseminate, and use that information in liberating ways, allowing them to contribute meaningfully to their communities. Desiré believes that this is how we nurture and foster knowledgeable, active, global citizens.