JOANNA GELLER
Program Associate
jgeller@CommonCents.org
Joanna joined Common Cents in August 2006. During her years at the University of Michigan, she was inspired by her own service-learning experiences building school/family/community partnerships in Detroit. After two years as the Community Development Fellow directly supporting schools and recipients of Penny Harvest grants, she is now overseeing citywide school support and program development. She is excited to take the many valuable lessons she has learned from Penny Harvest coaches, organizations, and of course, Penny Harvesters themselves, and apply them to program oversight. These lessons have also inspired her to pursue a long-term career focused on helping schools and communities maximize their rich resources and create change together.

TEDDY GROSS
Executive Director
tgross@CommonCents.org
Teddy Gross is the founder and executive director of Common Cents, a national not-for-profit educational organization, which specializes in designing citizenship programs for children and young people, and supporting their work in schools throughout the country and across all demographic divides.

The organization started in 1991, and grew out of the desire of a four-year-old child to help a homeless man in New York City. As the girl’s father, Teddy responded by developing the Penny Harvest, which has continued to evolve over 17 years, and is now a robust year-long program that uses philanthropy the service-learning to teach the skills of democratic participation, moral reasoning, and community building to children during their first decade of school. Under his leadership, a lab at Common Cents continues to pilot new models and programs in civic development.

Teddy's interest in innovating social justice programs is the natural outgrowth of a lifetime's work as a journalist, newspaper editor, children's book author, and playwright. He has served as the editor in chief of a the Phoenix, a Boston weekly paper. His career as a playwright began at the prestigious Eugene O’Neill National Playwright Conference, where he was a resident for two summers, and continued with many plays and productions, both in regional theatres across the country and off-Broadway. He is also the author of a children’s book, and a frequent speaker at national and international conferences on service-learning and civic engagement.

Under Teddy’s leadership, the Penny Harvest has become the largest child-philanthropy program in the United States, helping to nurture a new generation of caring, informed and capable young people.

KYLIE GURSKY
National Program Associate
kgursky@CommonCents.org

Kylie, new to New York, joined Common Cents after working with Penny Harvest Seattle/King County as an AmeriCorps VISTA member.  Through that, and a year as an AmeriCorps literacy tutor in Mt. Vernon, Washington, she developed her passion for service-learning and youth empowerment.  She received her BA at Western Washington University in 2005 where she studied philosophy, political science and economics.

MAGGIE JACOBY
External Relations Manager
mjacoby@CommonCents.org
Maggie joined Common Cents after freelancing at Edelman Public Relations in their Corporate Social Responsibility Practice.  Prior to that, she spent a year in Rajasthan, India, working with a local NGO, Astha Sansthan. Her primary responsibility was to streamline the organization's communications function.  While on assignment, she developed and implemented a study that examined how widows were able to meet their survival needs in the face of oppressive socio-cultural restrictions.  Previously, she worked at the International Rescue Committee (IRC) in the development department where she helped identify and develop strategies to increase donor support, aided in event management and contributed to the grant-writing process.  Maggie earned a degree in Urban Studies and Community Health from Rutgers University in 2001.