Welcome to Hendy Avenue
Vision and Mission: At Hendy Avenue Consulting, we believe that investing in great teachers and leaders has the potential to dramatically change the landscape of education in our country and the lives of millions of children. Since 2013, we have partnered with school system leaders to create equitable opportunities for traditionally underserved students and positive environments for the adults who support them. Our work includes designing and implementing academic strategies, talent strategies, and leadership development initiatives, each customized to the unique needs of our partners.
Who We Are: We are a team of dedicated, experienced education professionals who have committed our lives to improving educational outcomes for children for the past 15-20+ years. We are former teachers, school leaders, district leaders in talent and academics, and current school board members. We are smart, funny, caring, and enthusiastic partners that you’ll enjoy working with.
Hendy Avenue Consulting is a certified Women Business Enterprise with consultants in Brooklyn, NY, Cleveland, OH, and Washington, DC. We partner with districts, states, and charter management organizations nationwide - and welcome an opportunity to help you meet your goals.
Our Team
Erica Murphy
Consultant
Erica Murphy
Consultant
Erica joined Hendy Avenue Consulting because she believes that effective teacher development programs and high quality observation and feedback cycles are essential to supporting and growing our nation’s teachers.
Before joining Hendy, Erica served as the Chief Curriculum and Instruction Officer at Ascend Public Charter Schools. In that role, Erica managed the design and implementation of Ascend’s unique liberal arts curriculum and supervised the professional development of all instructional leaders, principals and principal managers. Prior to assuming this role, Erica served as school director of Brownsville Ascend Lower School for five years. During that time, her school’s proficiency rates increased 30 percentage points in English language arts and 34 percentage points in mathematics. In school year 2016-17, Erica’s school achieved the second-highest score improvement among New York City charter schools. Erica joined the Ascend network as a second-grade teacher, team leader, and instructional coach at Brooklyn Ascend Lower School where she consistently posted the highest math results in the network. Before joining Ascend, she was a research associate at the New York City Department of Education’s Research and Policy Support Group, and she spent several years as an elementary school teacher in a NYC Department of Education school in the South Bronx.
She holds a master’s of public administration from Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs; a master’s in elementary education from Lehman College; and a bachelor’s degree in psychology and Spanish from Washington University in Saint Louis.
Jeremy Abarno
Consultant
Jeremy Abarno
Consultant
Jeremy joined Hendy Avenue Consulting to contribute to the work the team does to grow the leaders and teachers who are responsible for providing the conditions for students to thrive. Jeremy facilitates Hendy Avenue’s NYC Chief Talent Officer Cohort, partners with Chicago Public School’s talent office in developing principal training, supports The Nationals Youth Baseball Academy with strategic planning and currently works with Hebrew Public to improve their math instructional leaders.
Jeremy started as a teacher in East Harlem in 2000 and has dedicated his career to the children of New York City. He served as the Principal at PAVE Academy public charter school. Prior to joining DREAM, Jeremy was the Managing Director of Mathematics and later Talent at Ascend Public Charter Schools in Brooklyn, a network of nine schools serving more than 4,000 students in central Brooklyn.
Before joining Hendy Avenue, Jeremy was the Chief Talent Officer of DREAM in East Harlem. In this role, Jeremy led the development of DREAM’s overall talent strategy including recruitment, professional development, workforce planning and human resources for DREAM’s schools, afterschool and community programs. Jeremy holds a Master’s in Special Education from City College and a School Building Leader license from Baruch. He is a graduate of New York University in elementary education. Jeremy lives in Brooklyn with his wife and three children.
Jessica Wilson
Consultant
Jessica Wilson
Consultant
Jessica joined Hendy Avenue in September 2017 because she has a passion for improving outcomes for children through supporting the adults who serve them. During her tenure at Hendy, Jessica has led several projects focused on talent strategy, including the Independence Mission Schools as they aim to implement a more rigorous instructional framework, and to design teacher leadership positions to support that framework; the Delaware Department of Education as they aim to revise and reinvent their teacher evaluation framework; and Promise Academy, a drop-out recovery high school in Cleveland, as the school re-starts to continue to serve youth in Cleveland.
Prior to joining Hendy, Jessica served as the Executive Director of Talent Impact at the Cleveland Metropolitan School District (CMSD). In this capacity, she managed the implementation of evaluation and performance management systems for all CMSD employees, including teachers, school leaders, administrators, and support staff. Jessica also managed the district’s licensure and certification work, ensuring that all educators were properly licensed, and supporting educators to attain and maintain licensure appropriate for their role in schools. Prior to joining CMSD, Jessica was a Project Director at TNTP. During her tenure at TNTP, Jessica led district diagnostics in Florida examining district’s success in implementing new college and career-ready standards, managed the creation and implementation of the teacher evaluation system in Newark, New Jersey, and led teacher career ladder staffing in Pittsburgh Public Schools. Jessica also managed the creation of the TNTP Core rubric, TNTP’s teacher observation and development rubric aligned to the Common Core State Standards.
Jessica holds a bachelor’s degree from Saint Louis University and a Master of Science in Public Policy and Management from Carnegie Mellon University. She lives in Cleveland with her husband, two young children, and dog Sailor. Parenting children in elementary school is providing Jessica with a whole new perspective on teaching and learning in schools.
Rachel Modica-Russell
Consultant
Rachel Modica-Russell
Consultant
Rachel Modica-Russell chose to join Hendy not only because she fervently believes in the team’s potential to impact the education sector through their research-based and thoughtful work in talent strategy, strategic planning, leadership development, and programmatic support; she herself has experienced the quality of partnership and depth of expertise present on the Hendy team as a past Chief Talent Officer (CTO) cohort member.
Prior to joining Hendy, Rachel spent five years as the Managing Director of Talent for Explore Schools, a network of eight public charter schools across Brooklyn serving students in K-8th grade. In her role, Rachel shepherded work across all talent functions at Explore Schools, and worked in lockstep with school and network-based leadership on recruitment, Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging work, staff retention, and people development efforts for their 300+ community members. As Managing Director of Talent at Explore Schools, Rachel spearheaded exciting initiatives and programming such as a staff mentorship program, revising the organization’s approach to compensation, and building a career advancement policy and pathway protocol anchored in more equitable and transparent talent practices.
Rachel could not be any more excited to work alongside other members of the Hendy team to set adults up for success by way of developing smart, strategic people-focused infrastructure and initiatives to drive talent management and people development in schools.
Before working for Explore Schools as Managing Director of Talent, Rachel was a staff member at Uncommon Schools for over 5 years, first as a teacher, and closed out her time with them as Senior Associate Director of Recruitment where she led recruitment for both their Brooklyn and Troy-based regions. Returning to Explore Schools in 2018 was a full-circle moment for Rachel, as Explore is the very organization (Explore Schools) she began her career in education as a Teach for America Corps member and K-2 teacher.
Rachel received her master’s degree in early childhood education from Teacher U - Hunter College and holds undergraduate degrees in Spanish and Family and Human Services from the University of Oregon. After 14 years in Brooklyn, NY, Rachel and her wife and two children made the move back to Oregon to be closer to family. So far, so good :).
Sarah Rosskamm
Founder
Sarah Rosskamm
Founder
Sarah founded Hendy Avenue Consulting with a deep commitment to ensuring all students have excellent educators supporting them to reach their full potential. With nearly 20 years of experience in public education, Sarah believes developing and celebrating excellent educators is the foundation for great schools.
From her very first consulting project supporting the Delaware Department of Education to talent-focused projects across the country, Sarah brings her strengths in change management, communications and stakeholder engagement to all of her partners. Sarah is immensely proud of the team she’s built and is grateful for the wonderful partners we’ve been able to help meet their goals.
Before starting Hendy Avenue Consulting, Sarah was the Senior Director of Talent Development for Achievement First, a network of over 30 achievement-gap closing charter schools in New York, Connecticut and Rhode Island. In this role, Sarah was responsible for the Teacher Incentive Fund (TIF) funded AF Teacher Career Pathway designed to develop, recognize and reward excellent teachers. Sarah joined Achievement First in 2008 as a Broad Resident in Urban Education. Prior to joining the residency, she was the founding Executive Director of the University of Pittsburgh’s Learning Policy Center. Sarah’s interest in education policy developed as a teacher in low-income communities and she pursued this interest as a Coro Fellow in Public Affairs. Her classroom experience includes teaching fifth grade during the founding year of the KIPP San Francisco Bay Academy and teaching first grade as a Teach For America Corps Member. Sarah holds an MPM from Carnegie Mellon University and a BA in Human Services from George Washington University. Sarah lives in NYC with her husband, a regional superintendent, and their two sons. Together they lead the education non-profit, Revive The Dream.
Why the Name?
In this work we talk a lot about the needs of adults. We talk about politics and data. We talk about communication and operations. But at the end of the day, this is about kids. This is about making sure every child has a great education. Hendy Avenue is the elementary school Sarah attended and reminds her of being a child. This name helps to make sure we’re always focusing on the impact for students.
What People Are Saying
“Sarah is one of the most knowledgeable people in the field about the design and implementation of educator effectiveness systems. In addition to her deep content knowledge and experience, she has great operational judgment and a keen, practical sense of how to get things done. She is also always a pleasure to work with. I recommend her heartily!”
- Dan Weisberg, former CEO, TNTP
"Jessica Wilson's extensive expertise and ability to navigate ambiguity with grace and calm made her an indispensable resource to our network. She always thought about processes 3-5 steps beyond her contracted time with us in order to set us up for success even after she was gone. I look forward to working with Hendy again in the future."
– Jacqueline Younker, Chief Talent Officer, Democracy Prep
“One of our mission-critical partners at the Delaware Department of Education has been Hendy Avenue Consulting. Hendy’s leadership is comprised of people who have designed, led, and refined tools with high degrees of success. Their expertise, notably in the arena of educator effectiveness and professional learning, has been invaluable.”
– Christopher Ruszkowski, former New Mexico Public Education Secretary (former Chief Officer, Teacher and Leader Effectiveness Unit at the Delaware Department of Education)
"The team at Hendy Avenue is professional, thoughtful, and operate as a fluid team. They helped us not only to be strategic to get the job done, but pushed us to think about how we would grow and develop our strategy to moving our work forward in the future."
– Kim Kassnove, former Chief Talent Officer, Hebrew Public Schools
“I trust Hendy to take care of it all!”
– Daniella Steinberg, Hebrew Language Academy Charter School
"Hendy is worth the bang for the buck! They are extremely organized and accommodating and knowledgeable!"
– Evelyn A. Edney, Ed.D., Principal, Dover High School
"Hendy has provided high quality support for the entire duration of the pandemic. They were flexible and accommodating as our needs shifted due to circumstances beyond our control. We are excited to continue to work together to help our school leaders prepare to welcome students and staff back for a new school year."
- Mike Herring, Executive Director of Teacher Effectiveness, Chicago Public Schools
"Hendy Avenue Consulting helped bring to life our vision of establishing school based DEI goals and leaders leading through a lens of equity."
– Jennice Hyde, Managing Director of Talent, Hebrew Public Schools
"Our Hendy consultant has been a collaborator and thought partner in the process of taking teacher evaluation practices and turning them into opportunities for coaching yielding measurable improvements. His guidance in this process has helped us become more accountable, consistent and thoughtful about continuous improvement."
– Jill M. Lenihan, Instructional Coach, Academia Antonia Alonso Charter School
"Erica's partnership has been invaluable this year! I would not have been able to be successful without her - I'm grateful for her critical lens, her collaborative spirit, and her determination to get the work right!"
– Katie Carpenter, KIPP Texas Public Schools
"Being part of the CTO cohort experience was incredibly impactful on my leadership."
- Ross Thomason, Chief Talent Officer, Coney Island Prep
"Hendy Avenue Consulting provided services that were insightful, results-oriented, and thorough. Their support in management, implementation, and monitoring was instrumental in providing direction to help our team in the work of teacher evaluation. Very professional partners who invested in our work as if it was their own."
- Angela Socorso, Delaware Department of Education
"Very quickly into our project, it felt as if Hendy Consulting was just an extension of our team. The mutual give-and-take of ideas and sharing of tasks--in addition to the strategic thought-partnering--is what led to the efficient, impactful success of our project."
– Joshua Taton, Independence Mission Schools
"We could not have done the work without Hendy Avenue Consulting. The support, organization, and perspective was invaluable to our organization. We would definitely recommend working with their consultants!"
- Ashley Davis, Co-President, Brooklyn Early Childhood Directors Association (BECDA)
"Sarah has been phenomenal to get to work with - super clear and strategic, incredibly thorough follow-up, and helpful perspective and humor!"
- Tom Krebs, Kansas City Girls Preparatory Academy
“KIPP Austin has benefited tremendously from the expert consulting and support of the Hendy Avenue team. The resources and best practices they made available to us led to a comprehensive plan for the implementation of our own Teacher Career Pathway and the opportunity to learn from those that have designed and implemented similar systems in their districts already. Working with Sarah is a dream; she is smart, organized, and optimistic – all qualities you need to take an undertaking of this size from an idea to a reality!”
– Emily Schneider-Krzys, former Senior Director of Talent, KIPP Austin Public Schools
“Sarah has been an invaluable resource in spearheading Coney Island Prep’s work to revamp our teacher evaluation system. She brought with her a wealth of knowledge on the subject, and has a unique ability to think about such a system from a variety of perspectives, including new teachers, veteran teachers, teacher coaches, and principals. Sarah took the time to learn about what makes Coney Island Prep different and unique, listened to what we wanted to get out of a new evaluation system, and worked to achieve that. We would not have been able to do this work without her.”
– Jake Mnookin, Founder and former Executive Director, Coney Island Prep
"Hendy Avenue training, collaboration, and feedback are first rate and important for helping Positive Outcomes Charter School move our teachers to the fullest potential."
– Steve Norman, Dean of Academics and Instruction, Positive Outcomes Charter School