Confidence
Confidence isn’t a personality type. It’s something a student builds when an adult takes them seriously and a room makes space for them.
About
Meet Jonathan
Educator. National presenter. Motivational speaker. Twenty-one years of showing up for students — and one message that has never changed.
The Short Version
A teacher who never
stopped being one
Jonathan Chiaramonte is a history and social/emotional learning educator with 21 years in the classroom. Everything he does on a stage started in a room with 30 desks in it.
That matters more than it sounds. He isn’t a speaker who visits schools — he’s a teacher who knows exactly what a Tuesday in November feels like, what a student looks like when they’ve decided to disappear, and how little time a staff has between periods.
Online he’s known as The You Matter Guy. In person, he’s the one making sure every student in the room hears the thing they didn’t know they needed to hear.
You
Matter
Experience • Est. 2012
The Story
How the You Matter
Experience started
In 2012, Jonathan built something that didn’t exist on any curriculum map: the You Matter Experience.
It began as a way to give students the part of school nobody schedules — the conversations about confidence, identity, pressure and belonging that shape a kid far more than any unit test. Students led. Students spoke. Students figured out that the room got better when they were in it.
Since then, the You Matter Experience has empowered more than 3,000 students, and it has grown from one classroom into a full set of programs schools can bring in: assemblies, You Matter Days, peer leadership, small-group workshops and professional development for the adults in the building.
Along the way, Jonathan’s approach to teaching was featured on The Ellen DeGeneres Show — recognition for the kind of innovative classroom work that most people never get to see.
What He Believes
The mission
Connection
The single biggest protective factor a young person can have is one real relationship. Programs should create those on purpose, not by accident.
Purpose
Students who believe they matter make different choices — about school, about each other, and about themselves.
Credentials
The record
- 21 years as a history and social/emotional learning educator
- Founder of the You Matter Experience, launched in 2012
- 3,000+ students empowered through the program
- Featured on The Ellen DeGeneres Show for innovative teaching
- National presenter and motivational speaker
What a Booking Feels Like
Not a lecture
- Students talk — to him, and to each other
- Energy that fits a gym, honesty that fits a small group
- Content shaped around your school, not a stock deck
- Staff leave with something for themselves, too