Ben Snyder, Educator, White River Junction VT
Following twenty years as the Head of Upper School and Assistant Head at Noble & Greenough School in Dedham MA, Ben became the Director of EXCEL (Experiential and Community Engaged Learning) at Nobles. Prior to his arrival as Director of Admissions at Nobles in 1989, Ben worked for a tech startup in Cambridge, MA, a small international college in California and as a development officer for another independent school. During his tenure at Nobles, Ben has led many strategic planning efforts for the school including the school’s most recent strategic plan of 2009 while overseeing and developing virtually all aspects of Nobles’ academic and co-curricular programs. In addition to his leadership responsibilities, Ben was a history teacher, coach, advisor and leader of student service travel opportunities that he developed to South Africa, Rwanda, Cambodia, Turkey, Vietnam, India and New Orleans. Ben was intimately involved in the creation and oversight of two programs for low income, first generation college-bound students (Achieve and Upward Bound), both of which are closely connected to Nobles. Ben serves on the boards of the Cape Eleuthera Island School and the Agahozo Shalom Youth Village in Rwanda. He received his BA from Bowdoin College and his EdM. from Harvard University. Ben’s wife Sarah taught English at Nobles until 2014 and his two children - Abby N’07 and David N’08 - have both pursued careers in education and public service.