The Nomadic Team
Blending history with real adventure
The Makings of Nomadic History
In 2016, Dr. Jackson was on a trip to the United Arab Emirates, Nepal, and Iceland when he began filming on-location, historical “mini-lectures.” He subsequently posted them on YouTube. Several years and tens of thousands of subscribers later, he determined to incorporate those video lectures into the best history courses for the online environment ever made. But he’d need a skilled educator who could make his rigorous content (hundreds of videos, thousands of pages of text, scores of hours of audio) accessible to a wide variety of learners. Enter high school teacher and writer Nate Noorlander–who had accompanied the Professor on that original 2016 trip! Little could they have known that their initial brainstorming in the warm waters of the Persian Gulf, across high Himalayan passes, and along erstwhile Viking coasts would produce an entirely unique sort of online education.
Dr. W. Kesler Jackson
Founder
Take a course designed by one of YouTube’s most innovative professors. To go along with graduate degrees from Penn State (MA Humanities) and Syracuse (PhD History), plus 180+ university-level classes (and counting) taught, he’s lived on five continents, run halfway across America, learned five languages, traveled as a nomad with his family across 45+ countries…and he’s just getting started. Next up: para-lecturing over Africa?
The NP filming on-location in Iceland
Nate Noorlander
Co-Founder
In college Nate Noorlander double-majored in philosophy and history teaching. After a stint as a project manager with a disaster repair company, he moved to Beijing, China, where he taught IGCSE and A Level history at the Cambridge International Curriculum Center of Beijing Normal University. He also spent time touring in India and trekking in Nepal. After a stint back in the U.S. teaching English and history at Mountainville Academy, and then the American International School of Utah, he returned to Beijing, where he taught IB history, IB English, and Theory of Knowledge at the Yew Chung International School of Beijing. When Covid-19 hit he was coaching the boys basketball team and gearing up for an end-of-season tournament in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. The trip was canceled, his family just made it out of Beijing on a flight three times its usual cost, and he stuck it out in the shuttered city for another six weeks. When life didn’t change, he left too. Since then it’s been all history with The Nomadic Professor.
Nate Noorlander in Nepal
Jacob Harlan
Marketing Director
With decades of experience in the education sector, Jacob brings a deep passion for learning and a strong commitment to helping parents and students achieve academic success. After founding a volunteer English-teaching program, he spent 15 years teaching and building meaningful relationships while living and working in China. In 2019, Jacob was on a ten-day tour to China with his eight-year old daughter when, amidst rising political tensions, he was arrested by Chinese authorities and imprisoned for five years on trumped-up charges of visa violations related to his group of volunteer teachers. This life-altering, jarring, yet profound experience deepened his appreciation for the free flow of information and the importance of presenting and teaching history in an open, non-partisan manner.
Jacob Harlan in China
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In the Media
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