Benzaquin, Paul 

Music teacher

Pbenzaquin

Paul joined the San Francisco Friends School performing arts staff after teaching music for thirteen years at the Shady Hill School in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Prior to working in the Boston vicinity he taught elementary music for five years in a New York City public school and helped run a summer music program at Fieldston Outdoors, an environmental camp in the Bronx. During his time as a teacher, Paul has directed musicals, instrumental and vocal ensembles, world percussion classes and created integrated music curriculum. Paul received a Special Honors degree in humanities from Hunter College and a second BA in music education from the Aaron Copland School of Music in New York, where he also did graduate work. Over the years, he has furthered his teaching skills through Kodaly, Orff, vocal pedagogy, and choral conducting training, including a “Choral Music Education” course in Ireland. Paul is grateful that Quaker friends played a significant positive role in his youth, when he was fortunate to attend Farm and Wilderness Camps in Vermont.  Paul’s wife Rebecca is an art teacher in the Bay Area and their daughter Amaya will be in second grade at San Francisco Friends School in the fall of 2010.