Subject Teachers
Reza Assakereh, Woodworking Teacher
Reza Assakereh has been an active member of the DWS community since his son started attending preschool in 2018. For over thirty years he has taken great joy in working with his hands in a variety of trades. Reza is passionate about teaching children of all ages the practical and rewarding skills that come from working with your hands to create something useful out of raw wood. He has seen how woodworking can support their development of creativity, perseverance, and independence by making something on their own. When he is not working, Reza loves connecting with family around the world, getting out in nature, and cooking nourishing food.
EMAIL: woodworking@daviswaldorf.org
Dahlia Haberman, Handwork Teacher
Dahlia Haberman has been the Handwork teacher at DWS since 2005. Before coming to the U.S. in 1985, she trained in Art Teaching and Handwork Education in Israel. In 2008 she completed her Handwork Subject Teacher training at Rudolf Steiner College in Fair Oaks. Mrs. Haberman established a rich and comprehensive Handwork program in DWS in the past 17 years, based on the Waldorf view of child development. Mrs. Haberman currently serves as core faculty member on the Waldorf Handwork Educators, an online teacher training program.
Mrs. Haberman’s passion is passing the joy of making things of beauty on to children and adults. She has been also involved in the life of the school as a parent volunteer, member of the College of Teachers, editor of the yearbook, chair of Winter Craft Day, as well as having taught handwork to DWS parents and served on several committees. Mrs. Haberman is a mother to three adult children. Her daughter Ella graduated from DWS in 2009. Mrs. Haberman loves to be in nature, spend time with family, and, of course, sew, knit, learn and teach crafts from different cultures.
EMAIL: handwork@daviswaldorf.org
Shellie McCallen, Handwork Teacher
Shellie McCallen, along with partner Rob and 2 children, began their journey at Davis Waldorf School in 2010. Her children, Callen and Mary Jane, have since finished their adventures at DWS and are continuing their education at Sacramento Waldorf School. After volunteering for many years as a parent in the classroom during Handwork, in support of school festivals and class plays, and occasionally covering the front desk, Shellie joined the DWS office team full-time as Office Coordinator in 2018.
She has a wide variety of interests and skills including spending time with family and friends, tent camping, designing outrageous costumes for the Burning Man art festival and traveling home to visit family in Washington State as much as possible. She loves to create things by hand and hopes to keep traditional fiber arts alive with an attempt at Scandinavian bobbin lacemaking in the near future. You might find her discovering buried treasure at local thrift and vintage stores.
EMAIL: handwork2@daviswaldorf.org
Alisa Haller, Gardening Teacher (Lower School)
Alisa Haller has been involved in school gardens since 2013, first as a classroom parent volunteer, then as a Garden Coordinator at Cesar Chavez Elementary School in Davis, and now as the Gardening Teacher at Davis Waldorf School. Alisa’s passion for bringing fresh and seasonally-inspired foods from the garden into the kitchen began while working in several local and Bay Area restaurants. She is dedicated to providing nutrition, garden, nature and ecology education to children of all ages.
BFA, Sonoma State University; MFA, Mills College.
EMAIL: gardening@daviswaldorf.org
Marta Juliao, Spanish Teacher
Marta Juliao has been a Spanish Teacher at Davis Waldorf School for the past 21 years and currently teaches First through Eighth Grade. She was born in Colombia and moved to the United States in 1993. Marta received her Bachelor's degree in Economics from the Universidad Javeriana in Bogota, Colombia. She also attended Rudolf Steiner College in Sacramento for several Spanish training classes.
Marta is an interpreter and a translator, and has mentored other Spanish teachers in the area. She enjoys teaching children at school, and also offers private tutoring sessions for children and adults in Spanish. In addition, Marta is an artist and has had several landscape exhibitions in the Sacramento region. She has been teaching art lessons as an after school elective at DWS for several years now. She has an art studio in Davis and offers private art lessons as well, teaching acrylics on canvas.
Marta loves traveling, painting and learning from other cultures. She is married and has two daughters.
B.S. Economics. Universidad Javeriana, Bogotá, Colombia
EMAIL: spanish@daviswaldorf.org
Angela Kost, Strings Teacher
Angela Kost started music ensembles at UCSD, UC Berkeley, UCLA, and the University of Washington during her twenty years working as a biology research assistant. These groups were comprised of scientists from academic departments and ranged from bluegrass bands to chamber music orchestras. She also played in university symphonies at Stanford, UCLA, and UCSD.
Angela enjoys fiddling and has won numerous fiddling awards, including first place in twin fiddling with her daughter at the 2016, 2019, and 2022 California State Fiddle Championships. Angela began teaching strings at DWS in 1993 and currently teaches strings in grades 4-8 and after school fiddling classes. Our students perform at school and community events. Angela also enjoys performing with her family and friends at nursing homes, weddings, and special occasions. When she is not playing her violin, Angela farms a 13 acre organic walnut orchard in Rumsey in the beautiful Capay Valley.
B.A. Biology, Stanford University; M.S. Ecology, UC Davis; Post-graduate studies in Music, UC San Diego
EMAIL: strings@daviswaldorf.org
Alice Stamm, Early Childhood Eurythmy Teacher
Alice Stamm has been teaching eurythmy since 1975. She began her eurythmy training in Eckwalden, Germany and finished with Else Klink in Stuttgart. Alice also trained in therapeutic eurythmy, receiving a diploma from the Goetheanum in Dornach, Switzerland.
Having moved back to the States in 1978, she has taught in trainings, Waldorf schools, and did performing work in Spring Valley, Kimberton, Chicago, on the west coast in Los Angeles, and now in Fair Oaks. For the past 12 years until she retired, she built up both pedagogical eurythmy and remedial work at a Highland Hall Waldorf school in L.A. and since 2004 has been teaching at Rudolf Steiner College in Fair Oaks as well kindergarten eurythmy at Davis Waldorf School and several public schools in the Sacramento area. She does mentoring of colleagues as well.
She is president of the Eurythmy Association of North America which she began with six other colleagues in 1979. She also helped to form the Section Collegium for the Performing Arts in North America in 1988.
EMAIL: eurythmy@daviswaldorf.org
Samantha de Bie, Upper Grades Math Teacher
Bio to Come.
EMAIL: math@daviswaldorf.org
Jack Tetreault, Games Teacher
Bio to Come.
EMAIL: games@daviswaldorf.org
Zoë Garcia, Music Teacher
Bio to Come.
EMAIL: sing@daviswaldorf.org