Rebecca Coven

Rebecca Coven is an educator, organizer, and professional development facilitator who believes that education is a tool for liberation and justice. As such, she has dedicated her career to helping young people become active and engaged citizens in their communities. After graduating from Wesleyan University with a double major in sociology and English, she worked for several years in education policy research. After receiving her master's degree in secondary education from the University of Pennsylvania, she taught high school social studies and English for nearly a decade in public schools in both Philadelphia and Chicago. During this time, she founded and managed several youth leadership and development programs, ranging in topics from youth organizing to youth-led restorative justice. In 2018, her social justice teaching was nationally recognized as a recipient of the Teaching Tolerance Award for Excellence in Teaching.

Since then, Coven has worked to shift others’ beliefs and mindsets around education by facilitating transformative professional development and professional learning communities. Her facilitation focuses on deeper learning pedagogies (specializing in project-based learning and inquiry-based learning), fostering equitable and inclusive spaces through anti-racist and anti-bias (ABAR) practices, pedagogies, and policies, and youth civic engagement.

Rebecca currently supports educators in promoting youth civic engagement and youth leadership as Mikva Challenge’s Director of School-Based Programming.