French Broad River Academy

Will Yeiser-Co-founder and Director

Will Yeiser just finished up his master’s in education in school leadership at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, where he studied nontraditional school models and developed the French Broad River Academy. Prior to graduate school, he taught Spanish at Asheville Middle School, KIPP: Asheville Youth Academy, and Warren County Middle School through the Teach for America program.

Before entering the public education sector, Will taught whitewater paddling skills with David Byers at nearby Camp Mondamin for five summers. He also taught kayaking in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, launched a small whitewater adventure company that led extended paddling trips throughout the Northern Rockies and Northern California, taught at a Swiss kayak school, and also worked as a ski instructor for the Jackson Hole Mountain resort.

Will and wife Kelly with sons Ayton (left) and Jack (right)Will currently lives in Kenilworth neighborhood near downtown Asheville with his wife Kelly and two boys, Jack and Ayton. He and his family are excited to be back home in Asheville and the southeast and launch the French Broad River Academy in the fall of 2009! Click here to see resume

Exploring the Costa Rican rain forest during the 2008 Pura Vida tripDavid Byers-Co-founder and Founding Teacher

David taught for the last two years at Asheville High School, teaching biology and physical science to 10th, 11th, and 12 graders, as well as 9th-grade Earth Science. He has worked for nine summers at Camp Mondamin in Tuxedo, NC, (where he befriended Will Yeiser way back in 1990!) as a whitewater canoeing instructor, wilderness trip leader, and head counselor. He also spent a summer leading youth in the wilderness of the western U.S. and Canada for Adventure Treks, based in Hendersonville, NC.

David graduated from Asheville High School in 1992 and UNC-Chapel Hill in 1996. He spent a semester studying Spanish language and culture at La Universidad de Sevilla in Seville, Spain in the spring of 1994. David also completed a master’s degree in coastal environmental management at Duke University’s Nicholas School of the Environment in the spring of 2001.

Like Will Yeiser, he is an alumnus of Teach for America having taught middle school science in inner-city Los Angeles from 1996-1998. David also taught 9th-grade biology for one year at KIPP: Pride High School in Gaston, NC. He has traveled to Europe and South America several times, and led the Pura Vida 2008 trip to Costa Rica for Will Yeiser’s Spanish class! David has been trained as a wilderness EMT through Wilderness Medical Institute, and he completed a NOLS semester in Patagonia, Chile in the spring of 1999. David loves playing guitar, being outdoors, and he spends much of his free time hiking in the mountains of WNC.  Click here to see David's resume.

David in Patagonia, Chile during his NOLS course
Frazier Worth-Math Teacher

Frazier with his familyFrazier Worth is a native of western North Carolina has lived in Asheville for 18 years. He is a graduate of Davidson College with a B.S. in Biology. He received his North Carolina Teaching Certificate in Science from UNC-Charlotte. He taught at The Patterson School in Lenoir, NC for 5 years, then at Asheville High School for 7 years (where he prepared founding teacher David Byers and countless others to successfully pass the AP Physics exam). Following Asheville High, he home schooled his children Allen and Anne Worth for 3 years during middle school.

Frazier is currently a math tutor and taught two classes for home schoolers this year in physics and chemistry. He also assisted with an Algebra II course at The Fletcher Academy in Fletcher, NC. Over the course of his career, he has taught:

• geometry
• algebra I
• algebra 2
• physics
• advanced placement (AP) physics
• ... and many more.

Bridgit with her familyBridgit McCarthy is a graduate of Kennesaw University in Marietta, Georgia and has taught in a variety of southeastern settings.  She began her  career in rural Georgia teaching language arts, social studies and reading.  Additionally, she built and directed the reading department, separate from language arts, in her first year of teaching.  In St.Petersburg Florida, she was a member of a pilot block schedue program at Madeira Beach Middle school.  The program's mission was to integrate subjects, create authentic assessments and incorporate community service.   At Evergreen Community Charter School in Asheville, she used Expeditionay Learning Outward Bound teaching methods in her Language Arts classroom.