Michael with Raina Telgemeier, author of Smile and Sisters
Michael Gianfrancesco has been an English Teacher for 14 years and currently hangs his mortarboard at North Providence High School in North Providence, Rhode Island. He also sometimes teaches classes at Johnson and Wales University as an adjunct English professor, and despite having done that for many years, still cannot get used to students calling him "professor."
Michael has dedicated his career to bringing pop culture and especially comics and graphic novels to classrooms all over the country. He has presented at Harvard, Fordham, Brown, and Lesley Universities to name a few. He has also done workshops at such educational conferences as NEATE, NCTE, and ALA. In addition, he has sat on or curated panels at New York Comic Con, C2E2, San Diego Comic Con, Wildcat Comic Con, Rhode Island Comic Con, and Denver Comic Con.
He was fortunate enough to ally with a cohort of teachers from the Chicago area (see links to their websites on the main page) who share his passion for comics in the classroom. Together they formed the Comics Education Outreach program which brings books and teaching guides to classrooms all over the world! Follow the link for more information about this great free program for schools!
He and his extracurricular student-run club the Nerd Herd have been building up his classroom lending library of graphic novel titles for the last couple of years and is always pushing to make it larger. If you are interested in donating your old comics, he is very interested in accepting them!
Through the years, he has been thrilled to learn that there are many other nerdy teachers like him. If you are a nerdy teacher and you are using or want to use comics in your classroom, you've come to the right place! If you are interested in having Michael speak at your school or provide professional development for you or your colleagues, you can contact him at michaelteach@gmail.com or via twitter @tryingteacher anytime!
Click the link below for Michael's curriculum vitae.