Meet the team
Erica
ceo, co-founder
Erica Crane, EdD (she/her) wants you to feel like you’re on the best team there ever was so you can learn audaciously. She and an incredible team created a school that was centered on deeper learning for equity with a competency-based, student-centered approach. She started her career teaching in the South Bronx and has coached, consulted, professored, and supported educational systems across the US and in international graduate programs. She’s wildly passionate about developing classrooms for liberation and educators for a future we can (RE)Imagine together.
Mike
cto, co-founder
Mike Mendelson (he/him) wants you to fail really fast. He’s taught, launched and led companies, been tasked with transitioning a large school district to a competency-based approach, and believes in partnering educators for meaningful conversations to accelerate learning. He’s dedicated his life to making this possible and scalable. He’s also the first person to say “yes you should do that” anytime you’re not sure if you should but you really, really should.
Kippy
senior vice president of learning
Kippy (she/her) wants you to be nicer to yourself when you make a mistake or don't know something yet. Some of Kippy's most important learning and growth happened outside of school, so she's focused most of her career on making classroom learning more powerful. She's also founded an ed-tech start up and instructed wilderness courses for adjudicated youth. Kippy really wants schools to become true learning organizations for the educators, in which learning together is a central way of working together.
Why we exist
We believe educators are the most under-tapped experts in designing the future of learning. They’re systems thinkers, learning nerds, and architects of trust. In 2014, Mike and Erica met creating a high school focused on deeper learning, with adult professional development that mirrored this approach. We embedded exceptional, peer-driven PD within our program. We now want to scale that type of transformative adult learning for all.
At sideby, we don’t just help educators keep up. We work alongside them to shape what’s next. Our open learning community is currently focused on AI, not because it’s trendy, but because it’s a lever for educator-driven innovation. Our technology can be pointed toward accelerating any educator-led innovation.
We want to put educators at the center of innovation by amplifying their voices, elevating their expertise, and building the future of learning with those who know it best. We exist to break down silos in the field and offer an alternative to transactional, one-size-fits-all professional learning. At the heart of our theory of action is the belief that durable change begins with peer connection, critical reflection, and practice-based inquiry.
Our Values
Learning is progress.
Transparent communication makes us better.
Embrace sustainable innovation thoughtfully.
Equitable impact is our measure of success.
Our Consultants
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Cass Marketos
PRODUCT MANAGEMENT & EXECUTIVE CONSULTANT
Cass Marketos's friends like to joke that she has had "every single job that exists." Which is sort of true. She has worked in tech, the arts, nonprofits, and government, in addition to running the community compost in her neighborhood, and regularly moonlighting as a teacher about dirt. She has been on the founding team of several startups, specializing in mission-driven organizations that strive to make the world a better place. She has built and nurtured communities all across the digital landscape, as well as IRL in her own neighborhood.
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Devin Brinkley - Creative Gravity
SOCIAL MEDIA MANAGER - instagram, tik tok
Devin Brinkley, MBA (she/her), wants you to feel like your voice actually matters online. As Sideby's social media manager, she blends equal parts heart and strategy to grow an authentic, educator-centered community. With a background in creative direction and inclusive marketing, she believes in storytelling that builds trust, not just clicks.
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Diego Gonzalez Cruz
AI ENABLED SOFTWARE DEVELOPER
Diego Gonzalez Cruz (he/him) wants you to make experiments. To prototype. To make slime and code computers. A scientist turned educator turned software developer, he believes in a human-centered approach—where technology and AI exist to enhance human potential. He founded a startup in Chile to promote STEAM learning in schools because he knows education expands the horizon of possibilities. His flow states? Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and making music.
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Michelle O'Shea
Currently hiring: Head of Engineering
Our Scholars in Residence
Launched in summer 2025, the Scholar-in-Residence Fellowship is designed to support independent learning, exploration, and professional development, particularly in areas like product management, user experience, and data-informed innovation in education technology. This experience also includes a learning grant component.
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SCHOLAR - Summer 2025Rohan wants to learn how to plant trees, the kind that helps ideas take root and people grow. He's studying computer science and economics, curious about how thoughtful product design can break down barriers to learning. His passion for edtech started with volunteer teaching and language learning in his free time, where he saw firsthand how the right tools can change everything. Now he’s focused on building simple, meaningful ways for people to connect, share what they know, and step forward together.
sideby + Small Wins Dashboard: Empowering Educators Together
sideby labs is where we explore, prototype, and share the tools and ideas shaping the future of educator-led innovation. It’s the experimental heart of sideby that acts as a space for testing what’s next, rooted in what’s real. In 2025, the Small Wins Dashboard joined sideby labs, grounded in shared beliefs between longtime collaborators. Together, we’re building tools that surface what’s working in schools, support educator learning communities, and make progress more visible, trustworthy, and actionable. Our commitment to learning AS progress is fundamental to our partnership. As sideby grows, we're actively weaving together two proven approaches -- Small Wins storytelling and sideby's peer learning -- into one powerful, educator-centered platform for professional learning and collective progress.
Transformational Learning Advisory Council
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Erika Nielson Andrew
Erika, EdD (she/her), wants you to be known and know you matter. Growing up in California’s Central Valley, she got her first taste of this truth at age eight while volunteering at a Jerry Lewis Telethon, where she fell in love with the power of teamwork and leaders who make others feel seen and efficacious. Since then, Erika has devoted her career to creating joyful, thriving, inventive classrooms, organizations, teams, gatherings and communities, where teachers and leaders feel valued and supported — because when educators flourish, students do too.
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Monique Pollitt
Bio and pic coming soon!
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John Edwards, EdD
John (he/him) wants you to see what’s possible when learning is designed to unlock potential, not just check boxes. He’s built educator pipelines, designed programs that center equity and wellness, and helped organizations turn big ideas into real, actionable change. John partners with teams to remove barriers, amplify voices, and create learning experiences that empower educators, leaders, and communities to dream audaciously—and do the work to make it happen. He’s wildly passionate about building systems and spaces where people can grow, lead, and reimagine the future of learning.
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Janine Gomez
Bio and pic coming soon!
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Meg Riordan, Ph.D.
Meg Riordan, Ph.D., is the Chief Learning Officer at The Possible Zone, and designs learning ecosystems that ignite curiosity, agency, and position young people for careers of the future & contributions to communities. Her career in education spans over 25 years - as a teacher, researcher, professor, and leader. Her research focuses on teacher learning, scaling innovation, and experiential education. She holds a Ph.D. from NYU and an MBA from LSU, and in her free time, she’s an ultramarathoner and aerial artist.
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Nicole Bandy
Bio and pic coming soon!
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Adam Krüsi-Thom
Bio and pic coming soon!
Ready to learn?
sideby is a global, remote company. Our founders lived on Ho-Chunk and Washoe Tribal land in our launch.