Tai Amri Spann-Ryan

Fourth & Fifth Grade Lead Teacher

Brother Tai Amri Spann-Ryan is from the Lenni-Lenape land of New Jersey, just outside of Philadelphia, and is a lifelong learner and a lifelong educator. He was raised in a Quaker household with a mother who was a high school music teacher and a father who was a history teacher and school administrator. He learned at a young age that those younger than him appreciated his warm and gentle spirit and that he enjoyed playing a mentor role. He studied Writing & Poetics at Naropa University’s Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics in Boulder, Colorado, after which, he began his education career running an elementary afterschool program at Chester Eastside Ministries outside of Philly. It was there that he began to hone his skill at understanding how to address the core wounds of the next generations.

Bro. Tai Amri went on to teach first grade at Greene Street Friends School, a small Quaker elementary school in Germantown, Philadelphia. From there, he went on to study at the seminary, Pacific School of Religion, in Berkeley, California. After seminary, he continued to work with at-risk youth as an afterschool program coordinator in the urban food desert of East Oakland’s International Boulevard. In 2014, he moved to Lawrence, Kansas, where he got his Master of Science in Education with a focus on Curriculum & Instruction. During this time, he continued to teach. He worked as a teaching assistant in the primary and lower elementary classrooms at Raintree Montessori, as a co-lead teacher in a 3-4 year old classroom at Hilltop Child Development Center, as a 7th grade English & Language Arts teacher in Topeka Public Schools, and finally, as a public school substitute teacher in Topeka, Lawrence, and Piper school districts.

After sending his daughters to Prairie Moon, he finally felt he had found a school system that reflected his many backgrounds. He began attending Great Lakes Waldorf Institute to prepare him to become the kind of teacher who integrates academics, creativity, and reverence for all life. Through his teaching, he hopes to live into the truth of the goodness and genius of every student, to reflect it back to them, and to help them recognize and bring their gifts out into the world.