Kristin Cipollone, PhD is Associate Professor of Curriculum and Instruction in the department of Elementary Education at Ball State University. She is also director of the award-winning Schools within the Context of Community, a community-engaged teacher preparation program. Dr. Cipollone’s research focuses on two separate but related topics: the ways in which schools can both reproduce and disrupt inequalities and the preparation of equity focused, community and culturally responsive and sustaining educators. Her work has been published in Teachers College Record, Sociology of Education, Journal of Teacher Education, and the American Education Research Journal, among others. She is also co-author of the book Class Warfare: Class, Race, and College Admissions in Top-Tier Secondary Schools. Prior to becoming an academic, Dr. Cipollone taught fourth and fifth grade in New York City. 

Rachel is currently an undergraduate senior at Ball State University, double majoring in History and Philosophy. She is the Editor-in-Chief of Stance, another immersive-learning class at Ball State. She is also involved in the university’s Immersive Learning Advisory Board. A fun fact about her is that she can solve a Rubik’s cube!

Daniel Klinestiver is a POP alumnus and a member of the Ball State class of 2019. Daniel was involved with POP during all four years he spent at Ball State. In that time, he attended some of the first POP outreach visits, participated in efforts to expand POP’s outreach, and led breakout sessions at the first two Conferences for Pre-College Philosophical Engagement. Since graduating, Daniel has returned to his native Indianapolis where he is a proud member of the warehouse team at Gleaners Food Bank. His philosophical areas of interest include Marxism, critical theory, and political economy. He is excited to continue contributing to the work of POP.  

Claire Katz is the Murray and Celeste Fasken Chair in Distinguished Teaching and Professor of Philosophy at Texas A&M, where she currently serves as Associate Dean of Faculties. A Baltimore native, she majored in philosophy at UMBC. She holds an MA in Teaching (teaching of philosophy to K-12 students) from Montclair State University and a PhD in Philosophy from the University of Memphis. She teaches and conducts research in the intersection of philosophy, gender, education, and religion and pre-college philosophy. In 2015, Dr. Katz launched a highly successful K-12 philosophy program, which educator workshops for K-12 and university teachers/administrators; training for university students in facilitating philosophical discussions with pre-college students; and developing and running a week-long philosophy summer camp (Aggie School of Athens) for 6th-12th graders. Her development of the pre-college philosophy program at Texas A&M, including the philosophy summer camp, has become a leading model for pre-college philosophy programs nationally and internationally. In addition to more than 50 journal articles and book chapters, Dr. Katz is the author of three monographs: Levinas, Judaism, and the Feminine: The Silent Footsteps of Rebecca (Indiana 2003); Levinas and the Crisis of Humanism (Indiana 2013); and An Introduction to Modern Jewish Philosophy (I.B.Tauris, 2014). She is the mother of two aspiring feminist philosophers. 

Zoe Lawson is a POP alumna who worked with the organization for three years while a student at Ball State where she triple-majored in philosophy, political science, and Spanish. She now works as a high school science teacher at Indiana Math and Science Academy North and lives in Indianapolis. She is so glad to be able to continue helping POP and working to help bring philosophy to students all around Indiana! 

Dave Pappas teaches in the English Department at Herron High School in Indianapolis. His main areas of instruction are Critical Inquiry, English 12, and Debate. Dave has a passion for teaching students the art of inquiry and dialogue in the service of greater knowledge and understanding.  A native of Detroit, MI, Dave holds a Master of Arts in Teaching from Wayne State University, a Master’s in Divinity from Anderson University, and a Bachelor of Arts in English from Wayne State.

Sarah Vitale is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Ball State University. Her research focuses Marx and post-Marxism, especially on the notions of production, labor, and human nature, as well as contemporary feminist theory. She is Co-Editor of the Radical Philosophy Review, the journal of the Radical Philosophy Association, as well as co-editor of The Weariness of Democracy (Palgrave Macmillan 2019). Her other publications include “Community-Engaged Learning and Precollege Philosophy During Neoliberalism” (Teaching Philosophy 42:4), and Post-Marxist Political Ontology and the Foreclosure of Radical Newness (Philosophy Today 64:3). Vitale is the founder of the POP and a proponent of precollege philosophy.  At Ball State, Vitale teaches introduction to philosophy, existentialism, and classes on critical theory. 

Chris Walker is the Principal at Muncie Central High School and has served in this role since July 1, 2016.  Chris graduated from Shenandoah High School in 1998 and earned his Bachelor of Science degree from Ball State University in 2003 in Social Studies Education.  Chris started his teaching career in the Indianapolis Public Schools in August of 2003 as a World Geography teacher at George Washington High School.  Chris was hired as the Director of Athletics at GWHS in 2005 and served the next 9 years as an AD in IPS and Lebanon.  Chris earned his Master of Arts degree in December of 2014 from Butler University.  Prior to coming to Muncie Central, Chris served as the Associate Principal at Marion High School.  Chris has been married to his wife Katie, BSU graduate in 2000, for 19 years.  They have 3 proud MCS students. Tyler is a senior and Tate is a freshman at MCHS and Grace is a 7th grader at Northside Middle School. 

Emma Hamilton is a POP alumna who worked with the organization for three years before graduating with a BA in Philosophy in 2022. Emma loves that POP gets high school students excited about philosophy and believes POP gives high school students valuable opportunities to engage with their peers in meaningful ways. Emma’s philosophical areas of interest include feminist philosophy, meta-ethics, and existentialism. She now works in academic publishing but enjoys serving on our Advisory Board in her free time.