This is a sampling of instructors featured in the 2012 print catalog
You may search courses by our other instructors by viewing the Ghost Ranch online catalog. Or by using the Course Search on the left side of the site.
 Helen Byers
She lives near Boston, but she's been coming to the ranch for 28 years. In fact, all her
family members have worked here, at one time or another. In 1985 her father, Dr. Laurence Byers, served as staff photographer, recording events from farming experiments to a dinosaur excavation for the Ghost Ranch archives.
Helen Byers is an artist, writer, and educator. Whether she's using a pencil or a paintbrush, discussing a sonnet or shaping a mask, students praise Helen's courses as "inspiring," "informative," and "so much fun." She's the illustrator of six children's books and another six literary book covers. As an educational author, she has published Kidding Around Boston (an interactive travel book), numerous practice readers and instructional handbooks, and more than 100 short stories and articles. Also an arts journalist, Helen has written gallery reviews and magazine feature articles on the work of other artists. After pursuing doctoral studies in English at the University of California, Santa Barbara, she taught literature and writing at the college level. This year Helen Byers is teaching Field Sketching, Still Life Drawing and Celebrations for Days of the Dead at Casa del Sol. Visit her website: www.helenbyers.com.
Barbara Campbell 
She intended to become a foreign diplomat but took a pottery elective in her first year of college and everything changed. Fascinated, Barbara transferred to the Fine Arts department and got her degree in ceramics from CCA in Northern California. She’s been exploring the infinite facets of pottery making ever since. Over thirty years ago Barbara moved to the village of El Rito, NM where she explores her life passion as a potter, spending part of each summer and a month in the winter teaching at Ghost Ranch. "My newest work, which includes sculpture and functional Stoneware pieces, is inspired by primitive methods coupled with contemporary materials and alternative firing techniques. I love playing with fire and experimenting with the effects it has on the clay. " Build a Kiln or Sign up for Playing with Fire.
 Brian McLaren
Author, speaker, pastor and networker among innovative Christian leaders, thinkers and activists, Brian McLaren is a frequent guest on television, radio and news media programs. His work has been covered in Time magazine (where he was listed as one of Americas 25 most influential evangelicals), Christianity Today, Christian Century, The Washington Post and many other print media. His 2004 release, "A Generous Orthodoxy," has been called a "manifesto" of the emerging church conversation.
Brian is a popular conference speaker and guest lecturer across the U.S., Canada, Latin America, Europe, Africa and Asia. His public speaking covers topics including postmodern thought and culture, Biblical studies, evangelism, leadership, global mission, spiritual formation, worship, pastoral survival and burnout, inter-religious dialogue, ecology and social justice. In "A New Kind of Christianity" (HarperOne, 2010), Brian articulated ten questions that are central to the emergence of a postmodern, postcolonial Christian faith. His 2011 HarperOne release, "Naked Spirituality," offers "simple, doable and durable" practices to help people deepen their life with God. Visit his website: www.brianmclaren.net. Enneagram & Emerging Christianity is his 2012 Ghost Ranch offering.
Tom Nichols 
What does a retired recycling executive and business owner get out of teaching sculpture classes at Ghost Ranch for ten years? PURE PLEASURE! After decades of buying and selling mountains of scrap metal and seeing fantastic potential art pieces being lost to foundries, Tom started collecting interesting pieces and building diverse sculptures as a hobby. Taught by his employees to weld, he started creating metal sculptures and birdhouses. For the past ten years Tom has passed on his enthusiasm for seeing old things in new ways. One student said, "Tom freed our creative spirit and made us feel there were no boundaries to the creative process."
Explore and expand your creativity in one of Tom's multi-media “Fire It Up” art welding or “Fantasy Birdhouse Building” classes offered both spring and summer at Ghost Ranch.
Visit his website: www.sites.google.com/site/recyclertomnichols
 John Philip Newell
John Philip Newell is a poet, a scholar and a teacher. Formerly Warden of Iona Abbey in the Western Isles of Scotland, he is currently Companion Theologian for Casa del Sol at Ghost Ranch. He is internationally acclaimed for his work in the field of Celtic spirituality, including his best known titles Listening for the Heartbeat of God and Christ of the Celts, as well as his poetic book of prayer Sounds of the Eternal. He is a Church of Scotland minister with a passion for peace in the world and a fresh vision for harmony between the great spiritual traditions of humanity. Canadian by birth, he lives in Edinburgh with his family where he undertook his doctoral research in Celtic Christianity. Since then he has played a leading role on both sides of the Atlantic in the re-birthing of a creation spirituality for today.
There is no better place in the world than the high desert of northern New Mexico, in the thin place of Ghost Ranch, and the spiritually infused environs of Casa del Sol to immerse yourself in the inspiration offered by John Philip Newell.To the Home of Peace: A Spirituality For Change will be offered three times each with different co-instructors and wiht a slightly different emphasis. The session beginning July 7 will be tailored to young adults, but all are welcome.
Kyle Gott
Preacher, songwriter and producer Kyle Gott is dedicated to living the creative life and helping others do the same. Seeing the creative life and spiritual life as one, the Reverend Gott is pastor of 1st Presbyterian Church of Gallatin just north of Nashville, Tennessee. Kyle is deeply dedicated to seeing the creative liberation of people used as a catalyst for bringing about social righteousness. As an aspiring Christian activist, Kyle sees music as a metaphor for what God is doing in the world.
A surfer raised in La Jolla, Calif., Kyle is now a converted southerner who still thirsts for the ocean. He co-writes with his wife for his company, Carousel Creative Services.
Kyle envisioned and co-produced Merging Blue, a blues/bluegrass vocal group. Kyle has published or written songs used by The Gilmore Girls, Everwood and Charmed (Time Warner), Recently, his Indy song "Comforting to Know" reached #5 on Ascap's Broadjam radio pop chart. Join us for the 2012 Ghost Ranch Songwriting Conference.
 Jessica Maxwell
Jessica Maxwell is a graduate of the University of Oregon School of Journalism, is the author of books on flyfishing, adventure travel and golf. Roll Around Heaven is her unbidden debut into the spiritual genre and the foundation for her teachings at Ghost Ranch. Jessica was the youngest regular contributor to Esquire’s Travel column, created and wrote Audubon’s in-the-field conservation column, True Nature and wrote a definitive cover story for Natural History magazine on the plight of Pacific Northwest salmon. She has published adventure travel narratives for AARP the Magazine, Audubon, Esquire, Forbes, Gourmet, Islands, Lexus, More, Outside, The Discovery Channel Magazine, Town & Country Travel and Travel & Leisure Golf. In 2008 she was nominated for a James Beard food writing award.
Jessica co-leads a special February Valentine's Day course, Love as a Spiritual Practice for couples and a Roll Around Heaven: (RAH!) at Ghost Ranch in 2012.
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