Meet Our Administration & Staff

Melissa Bilash is the Founder and Head of School at The Grayson School. She is a state-wide and nationally-recognized expert on educational practice and policy and has made it her life’s work that there should be no upper limit to what extraordinary children can learn.

As a federally-trained educational advocate, Ms. Bilash has received special Congressional recognition for her work, and has co-authored chapters in both the University of Denver Perspectives in Gifted Education: Legal Issues (Vol. 7), and the latest National Association of Gifted Children (NAGC) Guide to State Policies in Gifted Education. For nearly two decades, she successfully gained access for countless families to meet the needs of their gifted children through her private advocacy practice, Advocacy & Consulting for Education (ACFE).

Ms. Bilash serves on the Board of Trustees for the Association of Delaware Valley Independent Schools (ADVIS), as an Advisory Board Member for Gifted Research and Outreach (GRO), and as Co-Chair of the NAGC Special Interest Group for the Profoundly Gifted. She has been honored twice by the Pennsylvania Association for Gifted Education (PAGE) for her work in the field, and is proud to be a sought after speaker at national and international forums for gifted children, including the World Conference for Gifted and Talented Children, NAGC, Supporting the Emotional Needs of the Gifted (SENG), and Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s (MIT) SPARK and SPLASH programs.

Ms. Bilash is guided by her view that any gifted child with dreams and visions for their future deserves to be taught something new every day, to have their questions answered, and to let their academic needs drive the scope of what they are being taught.

Celina Bowen greets everyone at the front desk, managing phone communications and essential administrative operations while ensuring a welcoming, safe, and supportive environment for students, families, staff, and visitors.

Ms. Bowen earned her Associate degree in Liberal Arts from Montgomery County Community College. Prior to joining the Grayson team, she developed extensive leadership experience as a Store Manager at Talbots, where she honed her skills in customer service excellence, professional communication, multitasking, and organization. Ms. Bowen is dedicated to leveraging her strong administrative background and focus on positive community engagement to support Grayson’s students and families every day.

Rich Buxton is the friendly face and dependable driver who transports Grayson students to and from school each day. Mr. Buxton enjoys "van talk" with our students, learning about their day and everything else important in their lives.

Jessica Curtiss has a strong background in teaching and extracurricular activities for children. As one of the founders of The Grayson School, she leads with compassion and humility, and a simple, but effective philosophy: work hard and be nice to people.

Coach Curtiss holds a B.A. degree in Secondary Education Social Studies and a minor in Coaching from Millersville University. Prior to her work at Grayson, her experience includes teaching, writing curriculum, mentoring coaches and teachers, and handling the daily operations of a local children’s athletic facility. She also served as Site Director for the Episcopal Academy location of ESF Camp, where she managed year-round enrollment for over 1,000 families.

From leading the planning and execution of over 30 bespoke school events, Coach Curtiss is well known across our community, making each event special and engaging for our families and students, and seamless for our faculty. She also treasures her time on the field and in the gym, teaching physical education to our PreK and Kindergarten students. Her belief that the development of strong and healthy bodies as well as minds begins with our youngest students.

Briana Cuthbertson brings a blend of educational expertise and strategic relationship management to her role as Advancement Associate.

Ms. Cuthbertson earned her B.S. in Education with a dual major in Early Childhood Education and Special Education from West Chester University. A passionate advocate for high-quality, research-backed individualized instruction and social-emotional learning, she taught across multiple elementary grade levels, helped develop early childhood curriculum, and served on the admissions committee at The Episcopal Academy prior to joining the Grayson team. Her background in education includes running a private tutoring practice, leading student-centered summer programs, and designing enrichment courses—experiences that fueled her passion for serving educational communities holistically. Ms. Cuthbertson also brings valuable business and financial acumen from her experience as a Client Relationship Senior Associate at Vanguard, where she focused on client engagement and adult learning.

Ms. Cuthbertson is thrilled to unite her backgrounds in education and business to champion Grayson's mission.

Nancy De Bellis brings a deep and robust expertise in marketing and communications, business development and general management to The Grayson School. Her commitment to data-driven decision making allows the school to refine and grow its programming, internal and external messaging, and web presence through content marketing.

Ms. De Bellis holds a B.S. degree in Business Administration from Bryant University, with multiple executive leadership certificates from the University of Michigan Ross School of Business. She has led award-winning product and program development under the Crayola and Liquitex brands, as well as licensing and strategic alliances with other top brands such as IBM, Benjamin Moore, Hallmark, Mattel, and Disney. Her experience spans both the consumer and educational markets, international general management, and new business development for online and experiential retail environments. Ms. De Bellis is the joint owner of four design patents in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Skilled at translating strategic thinking into action-oriented plans, Ms. De Bellis is a thought leader who is equal parts analytical and creative. She is an agile professional whose skills have powered successful and ongoing efforts to widen the reach of the school’s admissions capabilities and development prospects.

Kimm Doherty is a founding member of the Grayson team, and brings a strong commitment and deep passion for gifted education to Grayson. She leads our Lower School faculty through mentoring, planning and adapting units, guiding professional development, and individualizing each student’s learning experience.

Mrs. Doherty holds a M.Ed. in Gifted Education from the University of Connecticut, home of the National Center for Research on Gifted Education. Certified in both Elementary and Middle School education, her experience spans both public and private school classrooms.

Her enthusiasm for creating rich, engaging content for young students has led her beyond the classroom too. She worked at the Franklin Institute Science Museum, where she used a National Science Foundation grant to design innovative hands-on science units for Philadelphia public schools. She started the local Radnor chapter of PAGE (Pennsylvania Association for Gifted Education) and later became the State Affiliate Director for PAGE, helping parents across the state to improve gifted education in their communities. Along the way, she was also elected to serve on the Radnor Township School Board for a 4-year term.

Mrs. Doherty brings her multifaceted educational background, her love of educating elementary students, and her expertise with professional development to help grow Grayson.

Zakiya Garland is a detail-oriented and customer-focused end user specialist who is excited to be back in a school environment and supporting the hardware, software, and network needs of our students and faculty with top-notch customer service.

Ms. Garland earned a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Delaware.

Derek Graves shares his multidisciplinary expertise and background in the development of curriculum that builds computational thinking and delivers complex science, engineering, and mathematics courses and electives for our gifted students.

Mr. Graves holds a double degree from Swarthmore College in mathematics and philosophy, and pursued additional mathematics pedagogy coursework at Brown University. Prior to that, he earned an I.B. diploma from a United World College school in Mbabane, Swaziland. Prior to taking on this role, Mr. Graves taught Advanced Mathematics, Computer Science at Grayson.

Meredith Hafer adds specialized expertise in gifted adolescents, acceleration, enrichment, curriculum development, and independent school leadership to The Grayson School.

Ms. Hafer holds a M.A. in Philosophy from Harvard University and a M.A. in Educational Psychology with an emphasis in Gifted Education from the Neag School of Education at the University of Connecticut. Before joining Grayson’s team in 2017, Meredith served as Head of School at The Beacon School in Connecticut. As an educator and school leader, she has provided professional development and presented on gifted education across the nation, including at the National Association for Gifted Children (NAGC), the Connecticut Association for the Gifted (CAG), Supporting Emotional Needs of the Gifted (SENG), the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS), and ArkansasIDEAS in conjunction with PBS.

Ms. Hafer is most passionate about spending her days counseling students, advising families, and guiding our Middle and Upper School faculty on meeting the needs of gifted students.

Cheryl Hunsberger is dedicated to providing exceptional support and enhancing organizational efficiency.

Ms. Hunsberger has experience across all facets of school office operations, taking on increasingly deeper responsibilities for digital communications, budget and expense tracking, staff leadership and training, and compliance and safety in her career.

Elizabeth Kenepp brings a love of learning to her teaching, and strong organizational, leadership, and event coordination experience to her role at Grayson.

Ms. Kenepp holds a M.Ed. degree from Cabrini College and a B.A. degree in History and Classics from Randolph-Macon College. She has both teaching and professional experience in event coordination and promotion, customer service, and leading employee training programs in the restaurant industry prior to joining our team.

Ms. Kenepp develops and coordinates a range of extended program scheduling, classroom substitute schedules, and car line procedures. During the school day, she can be found tutoring, substituting a class, or assisting in test preparation where she emphasizes and supports executive function-building skills with her students.

Drae McComas provides The Grayson School with responsible, thorough, and sound financial practices in her role as Finance Director.

Ms. McComas holds her bachelor's and master's degrees from the University of Pennsylvania. She brings over 10 years of experience in finance, budgeting, treasury, debt management and financial systems in both the private and public sectors handling Fortune 500 companies as well as state and local governments.

Ms. McComas believes that the trajectory of education should be geared towards the creation of a safe space for students on an individual basis.

Jennifer Nance, Esq. is a Founding Trustee at The Grayson School, and has spent most of her professional career advocating for the rights of special education and gifted education students and their families.

Ms. Nance earned her J.D. from Temple University’s Beasley School of Law and holds an undergraduate B.A. degree in English from Hendrix College. Ms. Nance has also presented nationally on gifted education, including at the National Association for Gifted Children (NAGC) Annual Convention and the Supporting Emotional Needs of the Gifted (SENG) Annual Conference. Her recent work includes co-authoring a chapter on legal issues in gifted education in the University of Denver’s Perspectives in Gifted Education: Legal Issues (Vol. 7), as well as a chapter in NAGC’s Guide to State Policies in Gifted Education (2nd ed.). In her prior work with AmeriCorps, she supervised and trained members delivering after-school services and civics-based curriculum to more than 600 students across 16 different schools in the Philadelphia area.

Ms. Nance is privileged to have served in various roles at Grayson, including In-House Counsel, Director of Admissions, and Founding Co-Director. Her leadership and experience across functions is instrumental in developing the organizational processes that enable continued growth and development of our school.

Our students and families are very familiar with Susan Pedersen’s voice in some capacity as she coordinates many facets of The Grayson School’s enrollment and academic administration as our Registrar. She liaises between student, families, and senior administration on all student records and is also the editor-in-chief of Grayson’s weekly newsletter, The Gryphon-gram.

Ms. Pedersen earned her M.A. degree in English from Villanova. She has taught at the University of Delaware and for The Princeton Review. While she has held many other positions in fields unrelated to education, she has always managed to find opportunities to help others, and herself, learn. These ventures include developing bilingual training materials for a food processing facility; showing cafe employees how to make the perfect omelet; and helping coordinate Villanova’s annual literary festival.

Ms. Pedersen’s extensive experience as a writer lends itself well to a vibrant community that has much to say.

Curating a positive school culture that promotes an effective learning environment based on cooperation and respect for others exemplifies Trevor Risk's life work and passion.

Mr. Risk holds an M.Ed. from Cabrini College and a B.A. in History from Randolph Macon College. He brings over 20 years of teaching and administrative experience in private and public K-12 schools to our team. Mr. Risk has successfully designed and implemented classroom management processes and training programs for teachers, all with the goal of cultivating an environment conducive to academic excellence and strengthening school culture and community.

Samantha Soprano encourages her students and athletes to lead a healthy lifestyle and strives to help them develop their natural abilities and interests to prepare them for their future, and to help to make a difference in their community.

Coach Soprano earned a B.A. in Health and Physical Education from West Chester University, and has nearly 10 years of experience teaching Health and Physical Education in the greater Philadelphia area. She is excited to build on the growing athletics program at Grayson with new athletic teams being added to our roster each year.

Amy Stoios is a staunch advocate for students who require accommodation in the classroom. Her strong experience and academic background has always centered around maximizing the educational experience for students whose needs fall outside typical learning styles.

Ms. Stoios holds a M.Ed. from Eastern University in Multicultural Education with a focus in reading, and a B.S. degree in Psychology from The Pennsylvania State University in State College, Pennsylvania. During her graduate study, she was awarded membership in Kappa Delta Pi, an international honor society in the field of education. Ms. Stoios has also earned graduate-level certification from the Pennsylvania Department of Education as a Supervisor of Special Education as a capstone to her additional certifications as a Reading Specialist, Elementary Education (K-6), and Mentally and/or Physically Handicapped Students. She has over 100 hours of professional development in gifted education.

Most recently, she has taught both graduate and undergraduate courses at Eastern University’s School of Education where her classes emphasized children who need special support in their learning, including key components of teaching gifted students. She has also worked as an Elementary Special Education Liaison for the West Chester Area School District, where she acted as a Local Education Agency (LEA) in meetings for students identified as special education and/or gifted learners. Her career prior to her LEA work also reflects her lifelong commitment to helping children with special educational needs. She worked as an early intervention specialist for children in the Philadelphia area. She has been part of a therapeutic support team for Central Montgomery County and has acted as a behavioral health worker in Flourtown, Pennsylvania.

Ms. Stoios’s educational philosophy is that each student should have the opportunity to develop his or her unique potential through access to a quality educational program in a supportive learning environment.

Susan Sullivan brings experience in recruitment from both the private sector and higher education to her role at Grayson, and is happy to return to school admissions.

Ms. Sullivan earned her M.B.A. in Finance from Keller Graduate School of Management and a B.S. in Business Administration from Millersville University. She has a collaborative approach and believes in exercising the highest levels of integrity in her role, guiding students and their families from inquiry to orientation.

Ms. Sullivan enjoys forming close connections with our families and students, and introducing our school to the greater community.

Shana Teitelbaum is dedicated to strengthening the connection between our school and its families. She serves as a key ambassador and resource for Grayson, drawing on her experience as a parent.

An energetic connector with proven expertise in communication, project management, and relationship-building, Ms. Teitelbaum ensures that both prospective and current families have clear, consistent access to information and opportunities for engagement. She leads all outreach for Pennsylvania Tax Credit Programs (EITC/OSTC) and helps families through the process of converting their tax dollars to scholarships for Grayson students. Before joining our team, Ms. Teitelbaum held executive positions in media and advertising in New York City, including roles at A&E Networks, Time Warner Cable, Turner Broadcasting, and M/K Advertising. She holds a B.A. in Communication and Media Studies, Journalism from The University of Delaware.