About Mike
Hello! My name is Mike Dunn and I’ve been working in independent, progressive, public, charter, and outdoor schools for nearly 20 years. My career has focused on helping young people make positive, active, authentic decisions in their daily lives, while preparing them to upend oppression and cycles of poverty they may be experiencing. In the classroom, I have taught a range of subjects while consistently preparing students with the skills, tools, and reflective processes to be positive, productive citizens in our complex world.
I started this work as the primary counselor, developer, and innovator for a college guidance program focused on students with language-based learning disabilities and now act as the Dean of College & Career Counseling for students seeking an authentic, transformational high school experience.
I have helped students get clear on their interests, submit applications to colleges around the United States, and pursue a range of other paths that are in line with their values and the lives they wish to live.
As a first-generation college student I am committed to helping students and families more easily access the postsecondary planning process from research, and exploration to final decision. I also work with individual schools and school leaders to help hone their departmental functions, curricula, and leadership to better serve their local student populations.
I hold a BA in history from Michigan State University, a MA in secondary teaching from Wayne State University, a certificate in college counseling from the University of California, Los Angeles, and an EdD in school leadership from Northeastern University.
When not helping students find their future path, I am often roasting and drinking coffee, playing the guitar, and taking my therapy dog Kelly on walks in the Rocky Mountains.
Philosophy
At all stages of the college admissions and postsecondary planning process, the world has created a whirlwind of stress. Students are faced with unyielding pressure to end up at the "right" school, or to be sure that they are getting the best opportunities possible.
Stress for caregivers (parents, guardians, family, or others) comes in the unknown. Although caregivers may have attended college themselves, it seems as though so much has changed since those days of filling out paper applications and selecting two or three schools to consider.
For teachers and schools, the stress comes as you try to ensure that every student is racing to the top or trying to be the next Jobs, Bezos, or Marshmellow. For us all, the agita induced by the mere thought of college and the college-going process can be petrifyingly intense.
My work was created to address this agita – to help students find their best-fit option for continued learning and growth after high school, to help caregivers more aptly navigate the process, and to help schools continue to address the changing needs of their students.
The core of my approach focuses on encouraging students to exercise their voice and agency, with sessions designed to empower students to be actors in the future planning. I work with caregivers in a measured, timely, and encouraging manner to access a process that feels vastly different from what they may have accessed previously.
My approach is comprehensive and individualized, taking into account all aspects of a student's learning profile, and addressing all aspects of the process. I encourage students and caregivers to keep an open mind, to consider their future as one that is still in formation, and to be mindful of the timing of their process.