About Meredith

Meredith Collins is a certified teacher and longtime learning enthusiast. She began her career as a classroom teacher, helping young readers, writers, and mathematicians find joy and fulfillment in learning. Early in her teaching career she discovered the work of John Holt. She soon moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts, in part to volunteer for the organization he founded, and went on to serve as editor of Growing Without Schooling magazine. She has been working closely with homeschooling families ever since.

Meredith believes that the most profound and lasting learning happens when people are authentically motivated - when the work they do satisfies an interest or commitment that is real for them. In all of her work with young people, Meredith uses the specific interests and capacities of the individual to address areas of struggle or challenge: she supports young readers in finding books and other texts they can truly love, encourages young writers to find written forms that express their talents and strengths, and shows young math students that math can be - even for those who are less numerically inclined - an engaging and useful endeavor. Most of all, Meredith is committed to supporting young people in living lives that make sense to them - lives that grow out of the things they care about and the ways in which they are inspired to participate in their families and communities. When learning is aligned with the actual commitments of a person, struggle often dissipates and tremendous growth becomes possible.

Meredith grew up in southwestern Maine. She has lived and worked in many rural, urban, and suburban areas in the northeastern United States, and now makes her home in Portland, Maine, where she works with children and families as a tutor, learning consultant, and coach. Meredith’s business, New Septembers, was founded as a means for working toward a world of learning and education in which no child has to dread the arrival of an exquisite time of year.

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