Jeremy Cohan is excited about, practiced in, and creative with learning. Knowing that no two persons are quite alike—and that learning can be the best of life—he tries to bring thinking alive with his students. He himself is a lifelong learner: he has degrees in Philosophy and Music from the University of Chicago and Middle-Childhood Education from Pace University/Teach for America, and is writing his dissertation in Sociology at NYU.
Jeremy was born to two teacher-parents and fell for school early and hard. He’s been at it ever since. In college, he tutored small groups of accelerated students at a Jewish Day School in math and in modern interpretations of religious texts. He also co-directed the school musical, bringing to his teaching the skills he developed as he wrote, directed and acted in his college theater troupe.
Upon finishing college, he came to New York to begin teaching middle school in the South Bronx with Teach for America. His first year, he taught English, Math, and Science to a small class of students with special needs; his second year he taught English as a second language through drama. This was a challenging environment: he learned to draw connections between students and the material, make his explanations crystal clear, and offer loads of creative ways in. He published an article on drama and teaching in the summer 2008 newsletter of the Curriculum Network of the National Association for Gifted Children. He also ran an after school drama club, wherein he and students wrote and performed their own original musical. The principal shared that it was the most remarkable thing he’d seen the school accomplish.
After beginning his PhD study, Jeremy began to teach undergraduates and masters students in seminars. He moderated free ranging discussions touching on philosophy, history, and sociology. His undergraduates frequently found what they expected to be a sleepy obligation transformed into, as one student put it, “a stimulating and intriguing space that I looked forward to every week.” His first year he also tutored several of his former pupils in preparation for the New York City specialized high school exam (SHSAT). When he went to Chicago to conduct his dissertation research, he got back into private tutoring, and remembered how much he enjoyed working one-on-one with students. He tutored two adolescents in a literature course he designed, “Strange Journeys.” The mother of one of these students warned Jeremy that her son had never met a literature class he liked—yet she relayed some weeks thereafter that his literature hour was by far his favorite class.
Jeremy, then, is eminently qualified and experienced in tutoring subjects as diverse as literature, writing, mathematics, theater, music, philosophy, history, sociology and standardized test preparation. Most importantly, he has a love for teaching, and for seeing how creative and rigorous pedagogy can rocket a student forward in his/her development.
In his spare time Jeremy still performs—he recently starred in a production of Stoppard’s Arcadia, and he sings with a new music choral ensemble, Cantori NY. He’s always reading something and strives to be politically engaged.
