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Ari Frede
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Assistant Head of School
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Ari Frede joined Science & Arts Academy as Assistant Head of School in 2021. Growing up in rural New Hampshire in a community of professional artists greatly influenced his passion for arts in schools. A lucky streak of excellent teachers and John Holt’s How Children Fail inspired him to go into teaching.
Mr. Frede brings experience teaching students in inner cities and the rural South, from elementary to high school, Special Education and general education in Massachusetts, New Orleans, Mississippi, and Winnetka, Illinois. He has served as a Principal Intern and Assistant Principal with Chicago Public Schools and later founded an arts-based elementary charter school in Chicago and based his doctoral capstone on the experience. Most recently he served as Head of School for the Ancona School, a progressive, Montessori-fusion school on Chicago’s south side before joining SAA.
His academic and professional interests have spanned leadership, pedagogical and policy, including learner-centered approaches, arts integration, problem-based learning, children’s literature, African-American fiction, social and emotional learning (SEL), youth political voice, and educational equity. He has published articles and presented on blues education and the oral tradition, student choice, music and literature, and interdisciplinary education in the humanities.
He chose Hampshire College for his BA for its learner-directed approach. His master’s thesis at the University of Mississippi theorized using blues and students’ oral tradition strengths to help build their skills in the written tradition. He was hooded for his Ed.D. at the University of Illinois at Chicago in 2017.
Ari works in other venues to advance education, too. He has supported the strategic growth of nonprofits in arts education, schools fortifying faculty collaboration, international webinars, and local political work that supports educational equity. He plays a few instruments poorly, loves to cook, study Jewish theology, and goes for long bike rides.
Mr. Frede brings experience teaching students in inner cities and the rural South, from elementary to high school, Special Education and general education in Massachusetts, New Orleans, Mississippi, and Winnetka, Illinois. He has served as a Principal Intern and Assistant Principal with Chicago Public Schools and later founded an arts-based elementary charter school in Chicago and based his doctoral capstone on the experience. Most recently he served as Head of School for the Ancona School, a progressive, Montessori-fusion school on Chicago’s south side before joining SAA.
His academic and professional interests have spanned leadership, pedagogical and policy, including learner-centered approaches, arts integration, problem-based learning, children’s literature, African-American fiction, social and emotional learning (SEL), youth political voice, and educational equity. He has published articles and presented on blues education and the oral tradition, student choice, music and literature, and interdisciplinary education in the humanities.
He chose Hampshire College for his BA for its learner-directed approach. His master’s thesis at the University of Mississippi theorized using blues and students’ oral tradition strengths to help build their skills in the written tradition. He was hooded for his Ed.D. at the University of Illinois at Chicago in 2017.
Ari works in other venues to advance education, too. He has supported the strategic growth of nonprofits in arts education, schools fortifying faculty collaboration, international webinars, and local political work that supports educational equity. He plays a few instruments poorly, loves to cook, study Jewish theology, and goes for long bike rides.
