Founder & Director
Laura Fokkena has 25+ years experience working in the field of education as a literacy consultant, ESL teacher, and education director in K-12 out-of-school programs in the greater Boston area. She has a master's degree in International Education Policy from the Harvard Graduate School of Education and a Ph.D. in International and Comparative Education from Lesley University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She also spent ten years as an adjunct professor in Lesley's Global Studies and Sociology departments.
Laura homeschooled her daughter in elementary school and then sent her to one of Boston’s exam schools for high school; at that point she and her daughter both assumed that would be the end of the homeschooling chapter in their lives. But at 16, midway through her sophomore year, her daughter decided to leave high school and return to homeschooling. Within three weeks, Laura received calls and e-mails from twelve of her daughter’s high school friends, wanting to know how they could do the same. Stunned by the desperate tone from some of these teens -- most of them high-performing students who loved to read and loved to learn, but hated going to school -- Laura founded Rise Out in 2012 as a resource for teenagers who were unhappy in high school and searching for alternatives. Since then, the organization has expanded its programming to include students from veteran homeschooling families seeking greater challenges in their teen years.
Between 2014-2020, Laura taught three Rise Out classes every semester at Voyagers, a homeschool co-op in Chelmsford, Massachusetts. After the pandemic, Rise Out went fully online and has continued to offer an array of courses in history, English, science, and the arts, most sharing social justice themes.
In 2025 Laura completed the Independent Education Consultants Association’s Summer Institute and is now advising students and families on the college application process. She is especially interested in working with students who have non-traditional educational backgrounds (such as homeschoolers!) and American students interested in going to college in Europe.
After two decades of living in New England, Laura now divides her time between Berlin, Germany, and her hometown in northeast Iowa.
TEACHERS
Anna Mudd is an educator and instructional designer with 20 years of experience working with students and teachers from university to middle school settings. A former middle school classroom teacher, for more than a decade at Harvard she brought complex scholarship to public audiences and classrooms, working with faculty to develop teaching materials and professional development for educators. She holds a master’s degree from Harvard Divinity School, a graduate certificate in Climate Change Education from Antioch University, and a graduate certificate in Instructional Design and Technology from Emmanuel College. Working across content areas spanning cultural studies, scientific literacy, and the arts, she loves to explore with students how we know what we know, how we understand what forces shape our world, and how we can better understand and reimagine them. She also loves to draw and has published illustrations in local journals, and led art-making workshops in community and organizing settings around Boston. She lives in Boston with her partner and 11 year old son.
Alyssa Hartson graduated from The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee with a Bachelor of Science in Conservation and Environmental Science with a minor in Biology. She holds a Broadfield Science Teaching License in the State of Wisconsin. While teaching science she integrated overnight backpacking trips into her curriculum and service work projects, most notably building and maintaining sections of the Ice Age Trail in southeast Wisconsin.
In addition to classroom teaching, Alyssa spent over a year working in Antarctica and many summers as a guide on Matanuska Glacier in Alaska. She has also been a field instructor in Olympic National Forest, a snowmobile guide in Colorado, and a glacier guide in Norway and New Zealand.
Alyssa combined her love of science and the outdoors to create Wild Hearts Education Consulting, where she develops innovative outdoor programming and environmental education projects for grades 6-12, including a trauma sensitive teen yoga program.
Currently Alyssa lives in Montana, where she is a full-time teacher and co-owner of Uptown Yoga Studio in Butte.
Jemella Piersol-Freedman, a former homeschooler and Rise Out student, graduated from The College of Wooster with both a B.A. in German Studies and a B.M.E. in Music Education. A passionate educator, she has taught at individual and group levels for over eight years and has earned national recognition as a researcher in the fields of music history, popular music studies, and German studies. Her music reviews and research in German have been published in collegiate and popular avenues. She has received writing awards, including for her comparative analysis of George Harrison and Paul McCartney biographies, and was recognized by the Eugene O’Neill Young Playwrights Festival as Guest Playwright.
Evelyn Hendrickson, a former homeschooler and Rise Out student, studied political science and philosophy at the University of Massachusetts Boston, with extra focus on labor studies and geopolitics, especially in Latin America. Evelyn wants to help people learn how to break down complex ideas and discuss important issues in ways they can apply beyond the classroom, helping them make sense of the world we live in today. In working with students Evelyn draws on her own experiences as a homeschooler and as a neurodivergent student with unique strengths and challenges.
Evelyn lives in Massachusetts, where she has been a lifelong fan of comics, manga, games (both video and physical), Dungeons and Dragons, and reading. Her favorite people are her two younger siblings, who also happen to be her favorite two people to annoy.
Board of Directors
Michael Mayo (Board President). The first in his family to go to college, Michael went to Harvard and studied English and American Literature. After a year as a journalist in Washington, D.C., he moved to Boston’s Bowdoin Street and began his teaching career at Nativity Prep in Roxbury, a free middle school for boys from families below the poverty line.
Six years later, he worked with his Uphams Corner neighbors to open a school to serve the local community. At the same time, he spent his summers in Oxford, England, getting an MA in English and developing his fascination with modernism, literacy, politics, and pedagogy.
After seven years as the school's principal and director, Mike moved to Edinburgh to get an MSc in Modernism and Literature, and then to Oxford to get his doctorate in literature. His book, James Joyce and the Jesuits (Cambridge University Press), was his way of putting all the educational pieces of his life together in one place. For the past eight years, he has led a discussion group on Karl Marx’s Capital, which has been one of the best educational experiences of his life. It brings together academics, undergraduates, high school students (including some Rise Out students!), and people from all walks of life to discuss this world-shaking book. The work of the group has led to his book The Hidden Abode: The Promise of Marx’s Capital, forthcoming from Penguin.
He now teaches English in the U.K. at Oxford University, specializing in twentieth-century literature and literary theory. In addition to serving as Board President, Michael occasionally teaches Rise Out English classes, and serves as a 1:1 mentor to select Rise Out students designing their own upper-level English curriculum.
Arlene Dallalfar. Arlene divides her time between Cambridge and Tehran. She is a retired professor of sociology at Lesley University, where she taught courses in media literacy, globalization, and gender studies. She is also a filmmaker and is currently working on a documentary about the Iranian diaspora. She has a BA from Tufts University and an MA and Ph.D. from UCLA. She is interested in youth advocacy, transnational feminism, and issues of social justice.
Janee Ronca. Janee was Rise Out's first student and was 19 when she was invited to serve on its Board of Directors, not only for her deep interest in education and pedagogy, but because from its inception, Rise Out wanted to include student perspectives as an integral part of its decision-making process. More than ten years later, Janee has an A.A. degree in Education, works as a substitute teacher in Boston Public Schools as well as privately homeschooling. She has worked as an AmeriCorps volunteer with Jumpstart and has been a teaching assistant in several Rise Out classes, including Arts Monday and Big History. In addition to being a Board member, she currently serves as Rise Out’s Student and Intern Coordinator. She also offers a course on Fanfiction and runs Rise Out’s book club Nerd Herd.
Photo credit: Laura Fokkena (Dorchester, Massachusetts)