Samantha Groess is a graduate of the University of California, Berkeley. She is currently a high school English teacher in the San Francisco Bay Area. Mrs. Groess has taught at the middle and high school levels for over two decades and also spent years as an instructional coach for TK-12 teachers and administrators. She continues to share her expertise through by serving as a mentor to preservice teachers, and also contributed the article Unconditional Belief to the original From Risk to Promise, providing concrete, strategies for educators to project belief onto students and reminding them to treat every day as a new day. Mrs. Groess has created, facilitated, and delivered professional learning on educational technology and standards-based instruction to educators across California.