Cortnie Belser

Cortnie Belser is a native of Baltimore, Maryland, where she has grown in youth organizing, youth workforce development, college and career access, among other community sectors. She is a graduate of Swarthmore College with a special major in Black and Educational Studies. Her senior thesis, “Revisiting Miss Ella Baker’s Grandchildren,” explores youth organizing, specifically Black and Brown youth for education liberation, as a pedagogical ideology and framework for teachers and schools. She earned her master’s in Education from Johns Hopkins University. Her curriculum expertise is in general education access and equity, Gen Z and popular Black youth culture, social justice inquiry, data-driven social-emotional instruction, and more. She is in her second year teaching middle school Humanities at City Neighbors Charter School, developing project-based arts integration curriculum. Her ideal pandemic Saturday could be a crime or cyber docuseries, a 10-mile waterfall hike, or finding a long lost gift card. Her favorite zoom features are Annotations and Polls.