Erika’s Waldorf journey began in 2012 when she started attending Parent and Child class at the Waldorf School of Garden City (WSGC) in New York with her two-year-old son. She had been working as a physical therapist since receiving her Master’s degree from Quinnipiac University in 2001, but before her son was born, she made a career switch and obtained a Master’s degree in teaching from Stony Brook University. After just a short time immersed in the nourishing Waldorf community, Erika realized this was the path of teaching she was being called to follow.

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At WSGC, Erika wore many hats—working as an intern, substitute, and assistant in various early childhood classrooms. For the first time, she felt she had found her true passion in life, something she had longed for but never experienced in her years as a physical therapist. Inspired to deepen her path of lifelong learning, she completed a two-year anthroposophical foundations course from 2015–2017 and then enrolled in the Waldorf Early Childhood teacher training program at Sunbridge Institute, graduating in July 2022.

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In early 2021, Erika and her family moved to Western North Carolina, where they have been deeply grateful to join the strong and loving Waldorf community. Her two daughters now attend AWS, in 2nd and 7th grades, and her son, an AWS alum, is a freshman in high school. Erika feels profoundly blessed for the opportunity to learn from the children, to help nurture them, and to walk alongside families on their own Waldorf journeys.

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