Our People
Holding space for community, care, and growth.
Emily Wright-Magoon
She/Her
Mission Circle & Coordinator
Emily has always felt the pull to chart new paths with fellow seekers of deep community. With a background in Environmental Studies, Religion, Education, and Equity & Inclusion work, Emily has been passionate about supporting people and groups in their search for authenticity and holistic learning, as well as creating spaces that privilege autonomy, trust, collaboration, and deep community. She’s an unschooling mom of two and married to Ethan, a creative outdoor enthusiast and nature lover. Part of her Masters degree included a focus on liberatory education. She obtained her teaching certificate and taught in a Boston public school for one semester, quickly concluding that the system was built to mold and discipline kids when she believed kids instead need trusting, engaged accompaniment to grow in their own wondrous ways. She became a credentialed Unitarian Universalist minister, working eight years as a College Multifaith Chaplain at Bates College and five years as a Unitarian Universalist minister in Midland TX. These communities were people of all faiths, including atheists and agnostics. (Covey is thoroughly secular.) Through these experiences, Emily deepened her skills in community building, small group facilitation, and justice/equity work. Since 2020, Emily has been volunteering with local homeschool co-ops and communities. She loves being outside, especially learning the names of plant kin, gardening with native plants, and trying to grow veggies.
Zoë Cooper
She/They
Mission Circle
Zoë is a deeply expansive person, who loves discovering new curiosities, and exploring new ways of being and learning. While Zoë has a background in Latin American Studies, International Relations, Conflict Mediation and Resolution, Outdoor and Environmental Education, and is a Doctor of Physical Therapy, Zoë has always been most magnetized by experiential and life learning, and adventuring through a variety of colorful curiosities and passions. Zoë also greatly values and appreciates growth through community connection where there are opportunities for reciprocity in sharing and receiving, both as educators and learners. Much of Zoë’s own growth has come as a parent, and evolved from questioning how to best support, nourish, care for, empower, and be in relationship with fantastic young humans. After years of navigating the traditional school system, expending extensive energy in attempts to access needed support, and experiencing burnout, together Zoë’s family arrived at unschooling as a way of life, a way of healing, and a lens through which to view the world. They are actively and continually deschooling, and growing from a place rooted in connection, consent, communication, trust, agency, liberation, and autonomy. Zoë is grateful for the opportunity for continued growth and connection as part of the Covey Board and Community.
Katy Purviance
She/Her
Mission Circle
Katy is the founder of Washington’s only outdoor Self-Directed Education center, the Spokane Learning Co-op. Her dream began in 2005: a school in the woods where kids who didn’t fit the mold could run free, follow their curiosity, and feel whole. A few years later, while studying architecture at Harvard and struggling through a rigid, joyless curriculum, Katy discovered the writings of John Taylor Gatto — and everything changes. She dropped out, immersed herself in alternative education, and went on to teach in five countries. Everywhere she saw the same pattern: schools prioritizing obedience over real learning. Katy realized she couldn’t reform a system designed to suppress curiosity — so she built something radically different, a place where kids lead, freedom fuels growth, and learning is rooted in trust.
Ethan Wright-Magoon
He/Him
Official Volunteer, Branding & Design
Ethan is a designer, visual storyteller, and longtime advocate for learning that honors the whole person. With a background in creative strategy and nonprofit work, he’s spent over two decades helping mission-driven organizations bring their visions to life. As an unschooling dad, he’s drawn to spaces where kids are trusted, nature is a teacher, and curiosity is a compass. He’s most at ease trail running, mountain biking or alongside Emily and family watching the world unfold—slowly, beautifully, and on its own terms.
Our very first Covey meeting—held over Zoom, full of laughter, connection, and a little foot-powered joy. The beginning of something beautiful.
There’s room for you
in this story
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