Robert Schaecher was born and raised on a farm in Nebraska. He spent 8 years of high school and undergraduate college in Catholic seminaries, training for the diocesan priesthood, before deciding to take a different path. Mr. Schaecher has been a teacher of middle and high school students for almost forty years, in subjects including world and European history, psychology, and sex education, and has run community service and peer leadership programs. Since 1998, he has been Chair of the Ethics Department at Ethical Culture Fieldston School (oversight of grades 6 - 12).
Mr. Schaecher holds an undergraduate degree in philosophy and graduate degrees in liberal studies from The New School and in clinical social work from New York University. He has lived in New York City for forty years.