Our Coaches
Samantha is a lifelong skier and winter enthusiast. She loves sliding on snow! She grew up in Bethel and, after stints out West and on the Maine coast, recently moved back to the area with her family. Sam is a runner and running coach and can often be found enjoying the many trails in the Bethel area, usually with one of her dogs. She is the Program Coordinator for Maine West Project Play and coaches the Middle School Nordic team. She is a USSS L100 certified cross-country ski coach, a UESCA certified running coach, ultrarunning coach, and endurance sports nutrition coach, as well as an ISSA certified strength and conditioning coach.
Katy loves coaching sports and spending time with kids. She has been involved in the Maine West/Bethel area youth Nordic ski programming since 2020. She’s currently the Telstar girls’ high school soccer coach and has coached many levels of soccer, Nordic skiing, softball, and running over the years. Katy works for Child Development Services in early intervention as an occupational therapist during the day. In 2024/5, both her children will be skiing on the Maine West middle school team.
Colleen is a lifelong runner, preferring distance and the woods to most anything. She can be found on the trails in and around Bethel and, more recently, in Grafton Notch, getting in some long miles in the company of her two labs, Monty and Timber. Colleen retired to Bethel in 2019 and coached Telstar MS track and cross country. She has volunteered regularly with Bethel Rec ummer track program. The Raymond Family added Nordic to their list of interests in 2020. Colleen coached almost two seasons of Middle School Nordic, now preferring to volunteer with Mahoosuc Kids Association. She is a big fan of getting kids outside and moving, whether it be running, skiing, biking, or just playing games. When not running or playing with the kids, she and her husband, Rob, follow their daughter around the northeast to her Nordic races, where she represents Gould Academy.
Andrea started Nordic skiing to try and keep up with Sean, and their daughter Eliot (7). She is excited to jump into the world of BKL. Andrea has been a parent volunteer previously with both the MKA afterschool program and the Oxford Hills BKL program.
Sean has been skiing since he could walk and participated in BKL as a youth. Sean has been a parent volunteer with the MKA program for the past 2 ski seasons and is excited to take the lead as a BKL coach this winter.
Sarah Southam loves kids and the outdoors. She learned to cross-country ski and mountain bike alongside her own children, Samantha and Max (now grown), as they learned. She taught chemistry, physics, and math for 31 years at several New England boarding schools and then at Telstar, when she and her family moved to Bethel full-time in 2002. While at Telstar, she coached the high school cross-country ski team and the middle school cross-country running team for 6 years. Since 2018, she has worked as the manager of The Gem Theater and continues to stay involved with kids and biking and skiing by helping with the MKA afterschool program. The hope is to stay young by trying to keep up with the kids in the community! She also loves to travel, bike, and hike with her husband, Peter, who was also a science teacher for many years. Most excitingly, she and Peter have recently become grandparents!