Isabel Spitalney, Programs & Personnel Coordinator
A musician and metalsmith, Isabel is passionate about the arts and integrating art and music into early education.
Isabel spent her childhood romping through creeks, painting with berries, creature-spotting, and joyously collecting earth’s many treasures (rocks, shells, cicada exoskeletons, etc.). Her first word was “buh” (bug), which appropriately set the stage for a lifelong love and appreciation for the natural world!
Isabel spent two years as a Lead Teacher at the Arboretum, guiding both toddlers and preschoolers in joyful discovery and exploration. She is excited to now join the administration team full-time, using her background as a BOPN teacher to inform her work processing family enrollments, onboarding new staff, and coordinating volunteers and youth workers.
A musician and metalsmith, Isabel is passionate about the arts and integrating art and music into early education. Isabel is a songwriter, guitar player, and clarinetist and obtained her degree in Music, with a focus in Theater for Young Audiences. She has enjoyed bringing music into classrooms, music directing, performing in pit orchestras, and developing new theater work for children. After a (brief) period of metalsmithing professionally, Isabel has also enjoyed leading jewelry-making classes for children and now makes jewelry in her spare time.
Prior to BOPN, Isabel worked with children for many years as a music teacher, art teacher, camp counselor, children’s theater maker, and babysitter. She obtained her Child Development Associate’s degree in 2025.
Isabel feels strongly that all children benefit from being outside and cultivating close relationships with the natural world. She is constantly inspired by children’s curiosity, delight, and openness for the world, especially outside in nature.
She hopes BOPN’s programs foster in every child their already innate sense of wonder, belonging, and appreciation for the environment that they will be able to carry with them for the rest of their lives.
