Jessie Duroe Hadley

Jessie is pleased to be to joining OCP as the Monday/Wednesday/Friday Chickadee teacher. She first became aware of OCP when looking for a school for her son. While attending the open house Jessie immediately knew it was a school where she would love to teach. She was drawn to the purposefulness of the curriculum and the warm community. Over the past two years her son attended OCP as a Chickadee and an Owl and Jessie served on the personnel committee.

Jessie comes to OCP with a Master of Arts in Teaching and a variety of teaching experiences including teaching preschool for three years in San Francisco. She taught an ESL enrichment class, fourth grade in a school for children with learning differences, and kindergarten. More recently, she has tutored both adults and teenage refugees in basic literacy.

Her philosophy on early childhood education is that children learn best in a safe, secure, and loving environment where they can develop positive relationships with caregivers and peers and where they can explore the world around them. Based on her experience and training, she believes that young children learn through play and that it is a teacher’s responsibility to provide stimulating play opportunities for children to help them to grow and learn. Part of helping children grow is respecting them as individuals: they need to be understood, listened to, and taught at their level.

She is looking forward to beginning this new journey with the Chickadees and their families!

Tara Koski

Tara is excited and honored to join the team at Oakhurst Cooperative Preschool. She knows this is a fantastic opportunity to work in collaboration with the parents and children to create a learning environment based in warmth, creativity and love.

Becoming a teacher of the Chickadees is a wonderful transition from being a stay at home mom. Tara lives in Oakhurst with her husband and their two beautiful kids, a girl of 10 and boy of 7.

Before her life as a mom, Tara's passion was being an elementary school counselor, which she did for 8 years. She holds both a Master's and Specialist in Education. Her work as a counselor was a creative blend of teaching, caring for, and encouraging the children and families at her schools.

She plans on using the lessons learned as a parent and counselor to promote a classroom of learning and love for her students. Tara is also passionate about teaching that engages all of our senses with an appreciation for diverse learning styles and personalities. She is thrilled to be on this journey of learning with the Chickadee family.