Benjamin Hendren

Background

About Benjamin Hendren

After years of grueling charter school teaching all over the city of Chicago and Northwest Indiana, I've settled into a position as a Director of 1-on-1 Tutoring for Academic Approach, one of the premier SAT and ACT prep companies in Chicagoland. In this role, I guide families through the tutoring process, support tutors professionally, and work with the 1-on-1 tutoring team to best serve our clients. I am also Co-Coordinator of the Dungeons and Dragons Adventurers' League at my Friendly Local Gaming Store: Chicagoland Games. Our weekly game night routinely features 50-100 people playing D&D at upwards of a dozen different tables. It's a place for people to gather to tell stories, build characters, roll dice, and kill monsters. I'm passionate about D&D, all tabletop RPGs and board games. Collaborative storytelling and cooperative play are two key ingredients for healthy social development. I've seen it in my students as a teacher and in my players as a Dungeon Master. I also produce and GM an actual-play podcast called Variant Rules. In it, we play through a brand new roleplaying system, Arcane and Iron, as it's being developed and revised. It's a fascinating look not just at the story, but at the game development process itself. We alternate episodes between playing the game and advancing the story, and dissecting the game itself with its creator. I'm passionate about gaming in all its forms. Telling stories with friends and strangers and designing new ways to tell those stories, this is where I find meaning for myself.