Alicia Estes, Director — Creative Writing and English
Alicia Estes has teaching experience at both the middle school and high school levels. She graduated from Bob Jones University in 2000 with a B.S. in English Education and a minor in Interpretative Speech and in 2004 with a M.Ed. in Secondary Education specializing in English.
Her experience in the classroom has been at Germantown Public High School (WI), Suburban Christian School (IN), and Burge Terrace Home Educators. She has directed multiple dramas and musicals and runs an elementary drama camp.
She and her husband work as youth sponsors with the Burge Terrace Youth group where the Lord has continued to grow her love for teenagers. Alicia has a college student and homeschools her other two children.
Todd Curtis, Lead Pastor — Burge Terrace
Todd’s parents faithfully modeled and instilled in him the truths of God’s Word, and he personally trusted Jesus Christ as his Savior at the age of nine. He attended Bob Jones University where he completed undergraduate and graduate degrees in Bible and pastoral ministry.
Todd has served on the pastoral staff at Burge Terrace since 2000, and became the lead pastor in June of 2010. Todd seeks to faithfully and accurately preach God’s Word to help us learn and live the gospel, and he has a passion to give the gospel of Jesus Christ out of a heart of love for all Christ has done for us!
Melissa Alexander, Secretary — American Sign Language I (4th-7th Grade) and American Sign Language II (5th-8th Grade)
Melissa Alexander has close to 40 years of contact/experience with the deaf community and American Sign Language (ASL).
It was once said, “a deaf person’s greatest treasure was a hearing friend”. Melissa was in junior high when her family moved into an apartment complex where a deaf girl lived. Befriending the girl, Melissa learned how to fingerspell the alphabet and learn basic words. Melissa attended Tennessee Temple University which had a deaf school within the university, thus all chapels, student body meetings, and church services were interpreted for deaf students. She was exposed over and over to ASL & began learning more through interaction with deaf students.
Melissa made several deaf friends, took some beginning sign language classes, and began accompanying deaf students to the infirmary & doctors’ offices to interpret for them. She continues to use her abilities whenever possible and would love the opportunity to share her knowledge with young people and see them come to love the beauty of the “silent” language.
Debbye Biermann — Art
Debbye is a native of Indianapolis and was home-schooled throughout her educational years in Indiana and Kenya, East Africa. She graduated from Indiana Wesleyan University in April, 2006 with a BS in Art Education. She taught painting and drawing for one year at Zionsville Community High School and at Northpoint for 13 years. She has always loved art and is very excited she can use it in her career. Debbye has had a chance to travel many places in the world including South America, Europe, Japan, and mostly Kenya, Africa. Through her experiences, she has learned more about the Almighty God, art, different cultures, and the value of education. Mrs. Biermann is very excited to be working with the home school community! Debbye and her husband, Aaron- a graphic designer, have 4 sons and live in Fishers.
Amanda Brown — Literacy Intervention
After teaching in public schools for ten years, God opened the door for Amanda to be able to home school her three children. Amanda taught first grade before becoming an early literacy interventionist. In this position she works with students reading below grade level. Students are assessed using a Rigby Benchmark kit to determine their current reading level. Amanda delights in helping students make reading connections, gain confidence, and increase their reading level and comprehension.
Dr. Steve Carver — Programming/Information Fundamentals
Dr. Carver has twenty years of collegiate teaching in traditional face-to-face and on-line computer science courses. He has sixteen years of experience in both IBM mainframe and PC software development in the Manufacturing and Insurance industries. He has been employed by Haynes International, Inc., American United Life, and Rexnord Corporation. Having both technical and analytical skills, he has written applications in programming languages of Cobol, Mantis, C++, C#, Java, and Python while in the IT field and teaching in academics.
Daniel Coblentz — PE (Physical Education)
Daniel Coblentz is a World Certified 8th Degree Black Belt in the art of Taekwondo. He has been teaching since 1985 and is also an Ordained Minister of the Gospel since 1998.
Kerri Dilling — Elementary Choir (3rd-5th Grade) and Ensemble (6th-8th Grade)
Kerri Dilling earned her Bachelor of Arts degree in Voice Performance from Maranatha Baptist University. Having developed a love for music at an early age, her desire going into college was to learn the pedagogical side of singing so that she could help others cultivate that same love with sustainable results. Her experience of teaching private voice lessons goes back to her college days, and the music classes as well as the voice pedagogy classes she took have allowed her to successfully teach elementary choir.
Kerri’s passion in teaching students in a choir setting is for students to learn proper vocal technique. First, when an elementary aged child learns to sing correctly, he is learning a skill that can take his talent to its full potential and be sustainable for the rest of his life, rather than damaging his vocal chords and never being able to come to the full potential he has. Second, proper vocal technique is extremely important to the overall sound and tone of the choir. Many people have low expectations when it comes to what an elementary choir can sound like, but Kerri believes and has experienced first hand that an elementary choir can rise to the level that you expect from them, and an important part of that is teaching how to get that sound and tone.
Kerri’s goal is to teach children the joy that can come from making beautiful music and to ignite within them their own love for singing and music.
Sherry Hill — Music (K5-2nd Grade)
Sherry’s love for music led her to pursue a career in teaching music. Sherry graduated cum laude from Southwest Baptist University with a bachelor’s degree in Music Education, K-12, Instrumental and Vocal. She has taught in the Indianapolis Public and Wayne Township School systems. She has been blessed to teach at Southport Presbyterian School and Burge Terrace Christian School.
Currently, Sherry teaches Kindermusik and private piano for Burge Terrace Christian School, Burge Terrace Home Educators, in her private studio, as well as accompanying the Burge Terrace Christian School choir.
Her passion is to honor the Lord through teaching music and inspire children to discover the joys of music. In 1996 Sherry married her husband, Tim, and they have four children.
Josh and Erica Johnson — Robotics
Josh holds a Bachelors of Science in Engineering from Bob Jones University and a Masters of Science in Electrical and Computer Engineering from IUPUI. He is currently employed at Viavi Solutions as a Hardware Engineer, designing, testing and sometimes programming circuit boards. His fascination with robotics stems from the unique blend of engineering disciplines it offers, combining electrical, mechanical, computer, software, and systems engineering into a single package. His role on the robotics team is to help teach engineering concepts required to create the robots. His goal is to help students to appreciate engineering and inspire them to become engineers themselves.
Erica holds a Bachelors of Science in Chemistry from Bob Jones University. While she is relatively new to the world of robotics, Erica is a master of proper scientific discipline. Her role on the robotics team is to promote/enforce good lab practices such as documentation, safety, and researched decision-making. She turns the robot club from a mad-house into an efficient laboratory of robotics development! Her goal is to help students appreciate science and inspire them to become scientists themselves.
Erica Johnson — Science
Erica graduated from Bob Jones University in 2015 with a Bachelor of Science in Chemistry. After marrying her favorite person (Josh) in May of 2016, she moved from the Chicagoland area to Indianapolis, and is now updating their farmhouse. The Johnsons have a Shepherd mix dog named Faraday.
For four years, Erica worked at PTS Diagnostics, a medical device company, in the Product Support department. She volunteers with the Burge Terrace kids’ ministry and BTHE Robotics. She is incredibly excited to teach science, and to see students grow in their appreciation for both creation and the Creator!
Tony Lucas — Archery
Tony is an IT Analyst and Team Lead currently employed as a Data Administration Lead for the Regal Rexnord Corporation. He is a certified NASP (National Archery in the Schools Program) Archery Instructor with over 11 years of coaching and instruction experience, working with children in grades 3 through 12.
“A unique aspect of archery is that it does not discriminate based on gender or athletic ability. Any child can achieve excellence in the Torches program while learning focus, self-control, discipline, and patience necessary to be successful in the classroom and in life. Above all, our archery program is a ministry focused on giving glory to God. BTHE students are not just archers, but servants of Christ taking the love of Jesus with us to schools all over the state. I’m truly blessed to work with such talented young athletes–this is the joy that feeds my passion.”
Scott Mayer — High School Choir
Scott holds a bachelor’s and master’s degree in Church Music from Bob Jones University with proficiencies in piano and choral conducting. He has taught private keyboard and vocal lessons at Schaumburg (IL) Christian School from 1993-2020, where he also served as music director. His choirs, ensembles, and private students have won on the national level numerous times throughout his tenure.
In 1999, Scott was named Music Pastor at Bethel Baptist Church of Schaumburg where he led a vast and varied music department of over 100 volunteer musicians. In 2023, he began his tenure as Assistant Pastor for Worship and Outreach at Burge Terrace. Scott is passionate about reaching this generation with the gospel, as well as seeing congregants become passionate worshipers of Christ.
Scott is an active member of the American Choral Directors Association, the American College of Musicians, and the National Association for Music Education. He and his wife, Kathryn, married in 1994 and have four adult sons.
Julie Mellon — American Sign Language (9th-12th Grade)
Julie has been a teacher and administrator for 20 years. She received her teaching license from Ball State University in both Deaf Education and American Sign Language (ASL). Julie earned her master’s degree in Educational Leadership and Principal’s License from the University of Texas.
Julie is married to her wonderful husband, Brett, who is profoundly deaf. Julie and Brett have five children between the ages of 8 and 18. Their golden retriever, Jasper, rounds out the family. Julie enjoys her “free” time doing activities with her children including Boy Scouts, gymnastics, Bible Bowl, and cross country. When she can grab a moment to herself she enjoys reading and doing puzzles.
Jon Streeter — Game Theory, History, World Cultures, and World Religions
Jon Streeter was born and raised in Indianapolis and was active in his local community throughout his high school years. He has been involved involved in youth ministry for many years and has developed a passion for youth education. He attended Hillsdale College and Oxford University and has degrees in History, Political Science and Economics. He also holds a Master’s Degree in History from Indiana University.
Since 2006 he has taught classes in American and World History, Military History, Government, Economics, Critical Thinking with Debate, and German. In what little free time he has, he runs a travel company called AET, which organizes educational trips in the United States and Europe and raises money to allow underprivileged high school students the opportunity to travel and “walk in the footsteps of history”. Mr. Streeter attends Harvest Bible Church.