Operations Manager, Outdoor Environment Coordinator
Ben and Mercedes founded All Roads Learning Community in 2003. Ben worked behind the scenes at All Roads maintaining the outdoor environment, subbing in the classroom, and doing the shopping until 2009, when he began working in the All Roads Casa (for children 3 – 6). Drawing on his college background in sociology, Ben developed an outdoor curriculum for the children that incorporates open ended materials, cooperative sustained play, and project based learning into the context of a Montessori environment. Ben, an Oregon Master Gardener, continues to develop the outdoor environment for Portland Montessori Collaborative. Ben draws on his seventeen years of experience in the food service industry in his capacity as our school’s founding chef and now as the Kitchen Director. Ben works with the children and the staff to develop a food curriculum based in current best practice, with an emphasis on compassion and sustainability. Ben is an artist, a craftsman, and a writer. He enjoys cooking, reading, tinkering, gardening, and spending time with his wife Mercedes and their son.
