Teacher Bios

Brigid Gerard
Brigid is originally  from New Jersey , but has lived in the Northwest for the past 25 years. She graduated from Oklahoma State University in 1980  and taught first and second grade at a private school in Oklahoma before moving to the NW with her family, where she homeschooled her children for the next 15 years, while substitute teaching in Portland part-time. She received her Riggs training from the Riggs Institute in Beaverton, Oregon, and has tutored  students  privately for the past 16 years.  She enjoyed teaching Spalding, a similiar phonics  program, as well as Faith to Kindergarten and firstgraders last year at Agia Sophia Academy, and decided to apply that experience a little closer to home and in her home church of Annunciation, in service to homeschooling families.

She and her family reside in Milwaukie on a 3/4 acre mini farm with gardens, chickens, a rabbitry and bee hives. Her love of herbs led her to start her own business called St. Brigids’ Healing Arts in which she creates herbal salves and goat milk soap to sell to local businesses and friends. She is thrilled to have created her “dream job” of teaching a love of reading, writing and spelling to young children. Even more so, at the Church community where she has enjoyed being a member and taught Sunday School  for many years.

Carrie (Anna) Thienes
Carrie is a homeschooling mother of two who holds an MA in Teaching and a BS in Mathematics. She has been teaching and tutoring mathematics in various settings since 1994. Before having children, Carrie taught at Lake Oswego High School and St. Mary’s Cathedral School in downtown Portland. She has maintained a private tutoring business ever since having children. In addition to teaching and tutoring, Carrie was a founding board member of Agia Sophia Academy and served on the Executive Board as the Director of Curriculum for 5 years, selecting and evaluating curriculum, sing policies and hiring staff. In spite of having a wonderful school such as ASA available to her, Carrie chose to homeschool due to the special needs of her daughter, now 6, who faced challenges for which the homeschool environment was the best choice for their family. Carrie’s keen interest in supporting her own daughter’s learning challenges lead her down a journey of studying the connections between nutrition and the brain, which lead her to study for an advanced certification in Nutritional Therapy, Functional Endocrinology, and Hair Tissue Mineral Analysis. She now owns and operates a private Nutritional Therapy Practice in Beaverton, Oregon specializing in customized nutritional programs of diet, supplements, and lifestyle changes to promote healthy brain development in children and adults alike. Carrie is excited to bring her passion for education and loving young children in service of the community of Church of the Annuciation's new homeschool support program.