Steve Coxon

403 Park St. ▪ Christiansburg, VA 24073 ▪ (540) 230-3216 ▪ coxonsteve@hotmail.com

http://coxon.cesclass.info/

Education August 2008 – present William and Mary Ph.D. Educational policy, planning, and leadership

▪ Assistant to the Executive Director, Center for Gifted Education

January 1999 – May 2000 Virginia Tech M.A.Ed. English education

▪ Q.C.A. 3.97 of 4.0

August 1995 – Dec. 1998 Virginia Tech B.A. English, minor biology

▪ Silhouette Student Literary Magazine art editor, radio show host, benefits coordinator, 1997-2000
▪ Collegiate Times features editor, writer, photographer, 1996-1998

Teaching August 2001 – May 2008 Christiansburg Elementary School, Christiansburg, VA

Positions ▪ Fourth and fifth grade classroom teacher

▪ Supported gifted and special needs students in a full-inclusion classroom

▪ Designed, set-up, and maintained Congo River and Lake Malawi biotope aquariums, 2002-2008

▪ Developed and implemented curriculum for summer gifted enrichment courses for 4^th-11^th grades, 2003-2007
▪ Gifted Evaluation Committee, 2005-2008

▪ Web master, 2005-2008

▪ Superintendent’s Advisory Council representative, 2003-2007

▪ Morning Reading Intervention Program director, 2003-05

July 2005 Blacksburg Middle School, Blacksburg, VA
▪ Summer academy humanities teacher for nontraditional gifted middle school students

August 2000 – June 2001 Mt. Diablo High School, Concord, CA
▪ Senior world literature, junior American literature
▪ Multimedia Academy small learning community
▪ Created literature-based projects for hypertext and animation

January 2000 – May 2000 Blacksburg Middle School, Blacksburg, VA

▪ Teacher internship, eighth grade language arts

▪ Graduate research paper on creative writing quality: “A comparison of responses to literature”

Selected Sept. 2003 – April 2008 FIRST Lego League coach, Christiansburg, VA

Other Positions ▪ Guided ten elementary students through designing and programming Lego robots to complete tasks for the competition each year
▪ Facilitated student research and presentation for each year’s topic
▪ Coordinated parent volunteers and college mentors

▪ Taught Robotic Invention System and NXT-G programming
▪ State competition judge for Robot Design, 2006
▪ State competition Judges’ Award, 2004 and 2005

▪ Regional competition Robot Design Award, 2003, 2004, and 2005

January 2005 – Sept. 2006  Family Preservation Services, Christiansburg, VA

▪ Therapeutic foster parent for an elementary-age boy

Presentations March 2008 “Build It!”
▪ A hands-on presentation of building challenges educators may use to enhance gifted education
programs including binder clip and craft stick towers, toothpick bridges, and note card bridges
presented at William and Mary’s Center for Gifted Education’s National Curriculum Network Conference.

March 2007 and 2008 “Robots Gone Wild: Lego and Logic”
▪ A three-part hands-on experience for teachers of the gifted interested in Lego
robotics: 1) Manipulation of multiple Lego robots; 2) Overview of NXT-G programming
language; 3) Presentation of classroom lessons and ideas for starting a team presented at
William and Mary’s Center for Gifted Education’s National Curriculum Network Conference.

August 2004 – Dec. 2006 “Education in Malawi, Africa”
▪ Slide show and discussion about my experiences teaching on a Fulbright grant presented at churches and schools

December 2006 “Differentiation Marketplace”
▪ A hands-on overview of activities for meeting the needs of gifted elementary students presented to Montgomery County Public School teachers

Certifications August 2001 Elementary Education K-5 in Virginia (valid through 2012)

June 2000 English Education 6-12 in California and Virginia

Memberships Sept. 2001– August 2008 Virginia Education Association

Sept. 2001– August 2008 Montgomery County Education Association

Selected March 2007 National Curriculum Network Conference, 15 hours
Additional College of William and Mary

Development

November 2006 “Reaching for Relevance and Rigor,” 21 hours

National Association for Gifted Children Annual Convention

March 2005 National Curriculum Network Conference, 15 hours
College of William and Mary

October 2004 Bertie Kingore: “Differentiation: Simplified, Realistic, and Effective,” 8 hours

Virginia Association for the Gifted

August 2004          Crisis Intervention Training, 4 hours
Family Preservation Services

September 2003 JASON Project: “Rainforests at the Crossroads,” 6 hours

Blue Ridge Public Television

November 2002 Project Wild, 12 hours

Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries

October 2002 JASON Project: “From Sea to Shore,” 6 hours

Blue Ridge Public Television

August 2002 CPR and First Aid, 6 hours (certification maintained through 2007)

American Red Cross

August 2002 “Soar to Success Reading Comprehension Intervention,” 4 hours

Montgomery County Public Schools

October 2001 Ruby Payne: “A Framework for Understanding Poverty,” 12 hours

Montgomery County Public Schools

November 2000 “Creating Violence-Free Public Schools,” 8 hours

California Teachers Association

Selected June 2007 Thailand

Travel

Experience July 2006 St. John, U.S. Virgin Islands; England; Scotland

July – August 2004 Malawi

▪ Six weeks modeling the teaching of writing and science on a Fulbright-Hays Grant

▪ Host to a Malawian teacher in my home and classroom the following fall

2000 – 2003 Denmark, Sweden, the Netherlands, Russia, Mexico, Luxembourg, Belgium, Germany, and Austria

May – July 1998 England, Scotland, Spain, France, Italy, Austria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Germany, and the Netherlands

▪ Six weeks of literary study abroad in the U.K.

▪ Six weeks of continental travel