Frank Tipton is a new teacher in the Social Studies department this school year. He teaches Middle Eastern studies to sophomores and AP US history to juniors. Mia El Abd ‘25 says that “I enjoy his class. He’s very passionate about what he’s teaching.”

Mr. Tipton comes to Dana Hall with lots of experience, having worked as a teacher and an administrator since 1999. He has taught classes such as economics, world history, political science, and Middle Eastern studies at a variety of schools across the US, ranging from a private school in Cincinnati, Ohio, to Wellesley High School.

Mr. Tipton said he wanted to come work at Dana Hall because he was “really interested in getting back into an environment which had a boarding school component. I was enthusiastic about working at a girls’ school [and] I was interested in working in an area that was within a commute from my home in Southborough, and all the stars aligned.”

Mr. Tipton was born in Dalton, Georgia, and lived in Hawaii and Colorado as a child. He went to college at Columbia University and got a masters degree in Arab studies at Georgetown University. He then started but did not complete a PhD program at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Mary Cameron, head of the Social Studies department, says that “It’s really fun to have him slip right into the classroom and feel totally comfortable in that environment and get students excited about what he’s teaching.”

Mr. Tipton loves to jog, explore, and hike around his neighborhood with his family. He has also been a coxswain on a crew team and is interested in getting back into it. Because of the construction on campus, Mr. Tipton is working in four different buildings and says that “My watch tells me mid-morning that I’ve achieved all my fitness goals for the day, so that’s a positive thing! I also get to know the campus a lot faster.”

Erin Kennedy ‘26, an advisee of Mr. Tipton, says that “I think he’s really cool… He tries to integrate our advisory so we can get to know each other better as freshmen because most of us have never met each other before.”