Bridge Welcomes New Teachers!

We are overjoyed to welcome three new teachers to the Bridge School community! The year ahead looks incredibly bright with these new faces in the barn.

Nikki Juvan–Younger Home Center Teacher

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Nikki Juvan brings her passion for the Arts and over twelve years of elementary teaching experience to Bridge School. Nikki believes very strongly in incorporating the Arts, particularly music and theater, across all areas of the curriculum and is especially excited about the Arts classes at Bridge.

She received a Bachelor of Music degree in Musical Theater from the Hartt School of Music/University of Hartford in Connecticut and her Master’s in Education from the College of St. Catherine in St. Paul, Minnesota. She holds a K-6 Vermont teacher’s license with Highly Qualified Teacher status. For seven years she was the Kindergarten teacher at St. Mary’s School in Middlebury where she used music and theater extensively in her classroom, including writing plays with her students that were performed at various community events. She also spent five years at the Renaissance School where she developed and taught the Music and Theater Arts Curriculum.

Nikki is an accomplished singer and actress, having played leading roles with Lyric Theatre Company (Sarah Brown in Guys and Dolls), Middlebury Community Players (Marian in The Music Man), and 5 different productions of The Sound of Music in which she played Maria. She is also the teacher and creator of the THT Kids program at Middlebury’s Town Hall Theater and has directed children’s theater productions at many different schools as well as with Lyric Theatre Company.

She lives in Middlebury with her husband, photographer Trent Campbell, and her college-age daughter and step-daughter. They have a dog and the two greatest cats in the world, Meredith and Willson.

Jen Grilly–Older Home Center Teacher

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Jen comes to Bridge School with over 10 years of teaching experience. Jen graduated from Indiana University of Pennsylvania with a B.S. in Elementary Education. While working towards her B.S., she student-taught at the Mckeever Environmental Learning Center, in Sandy Lake, Pennsylvania where she discovered that teaching kids about the natural world around them was her passion.

After graduating, Jen taught natural history, science and outdoor education across the country, including six years at Nature’s Classroom and three years at Ezperanza Academy in Lawrence, Massachusetts. At Esperanza Academy, Jen developed an athletic program and an outdoor education program. Jen also spent a season as a Wilderness Therapy guide for at-risk teens in Alaska, leading trips up to 52 days long. Most recently, Jen has served as the Assistant Director of the Wilderness Program at the Hyde School in Bath, Maine.

Through her travel and non-traditional teaching experience, Jen found a great appreciation for how we are all connected to each other and share the same dreams, strengths, and challenges.  Her goals as an educator are to ensure each student feels important and valued in her classroom, and to help them see their own unique potential, just as her teachers have done for her.

When Jen is not in the classroom or working with students outdoors, she can be found rejuvenating her soul as she hikes, bikes, canoes, swims, practices yoga, or sits on her back porch with some tea.  She and her fiancé love spending time with their dogs, cooking, and sharing meals with great friends.

Sarah Evans–Spanish, Arts and Bananas Teacher 

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Sarah joins Bridge School with a combined degree in education, English and Spanish from the University of Vermont, and Sarah has her Vermont Educator’s License. She is drawn to teaching because she enjoys fostering in others the excitement to learn, and loves sharing her passion for reading, writing, and the arts.

Sarah has always delighted in theater, ever since age six when she played her debut role (as a talking door). In the years that followed, she has had many wonderful opportunities to be involved in school and community productions such as The Wizard of Oz, Aladdin, SeussicalHello Dolly, and You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown. At the University of Vermont, she served as an officer of the theater troupe, the University Players, and wrote and directed two shows during her time there. Her senior thesis took the form of a play, entitled Like Any Other Woman, which tells the true story of the first female mayor in the United States. Sarah has been happy to share her love of theater with her sixth grade class while student teaching, and is excited to work with Bridge School students on theater and writing projects!

Sarah completed her student teaching at Edmunds Middle School in Burlington, VT where she both taught 6th grade and advised the Drama Club. During the summer, Sarah works as Assistant Director and Head Counselor if Malta Community Center Youth Theater Program in New York.

Sarah is a red belt in Taekwondo, sells hand-knit hats on her own Etsy store,  and she has lived in several Spanish speaking countries abroad!

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