About Becca Block

Becca Block is an executive function & motivation coach, educator, and author/researcher

Becca Block is a coach and educator working at the intersection of motivation science, positive youth development, and executive functioning skills. She brings her expertise in teaching, facilitation, and research to craft empowering experiences for young people, families, and educators. She is an author of both academic articles on educational best practices and a book for families and educators, Can You Help Me Give a Sh*t? Unlocking Teen Motivation in School and Life, which was co-created with a young person and features stories from high school and college students across the U.S.

Becca earned her PhD in Rhetoric and Composition (a fancy name for the teaching and study of writing, with a heavy dose of social science research methods and education). Prior to graduate school, she had worked as a private tutor for middle and high school students, and as a GTA she began teaching and tutoring university students as well.

Upon completing her PhD in 2010, she took a faculty position at Daytona State College, where she opened and managed the college's first writing center, hiring and training student and professional tutors while also continuing to teach writing classes. In the process, she discovered that for many students, it wasn't a lack of writing skills that was hampering their success so much as underdeveloped executive functioning skills: many students became overwhelmed with the multi-step process of research and writing because they weren't sure how to manage their time and energy effectively, resulting in rushed work, poor grades, lowered confidence, and decreased academic motivation overall.

This led Becca into delving more deeply into the fields of positive youth development, positive psychology, and executive functioning. She began incorporating what she learned into her classroom and tutor training, as well as consulting with a positive youth development focused nonprofit that worked with high schoolers all over the country. This organization eventually asked her if she'd be willing to leave her tenured faculty position to help them establish stronger evaluation and learning practices and, eager to help more young people than she could as a single faculty member, she left higher education to delve more deeply into supporting high school students.

Over the next 9 years, she served as an executive at two youth focused nonprofits, consulted with several more, and cofounded Phare LLC, an educational consultancy group. During that time, she maintained her direct connection with high school and college students through volunteering, private coaching, and collaborative research projects, and she has recently stepped away from serving as a nonprofit executive so she can dedicate more time to working directly with young people, families, and schools.