My teaching career began in Albuquerque, New Mexico where I taught for several years until I met my wife, a fellow teacher. Our first years of marriage were spent teaching in American and international schools in Singapore, Taiwan, and India. Since 2003 I have taught Humanities at a high-achieving urban lottery school.
Throughout my career I have taught a wide range of courses in both Social Studies and Language Arts. In our distinguished Humanities Dept I am the only teacher who is...
My teaching career began in Albuquerque, New Mexico where I taught for several years until I met my wife, a fellow teacher. Our first years of marriage were spent teaching in American and international schools in Singapore, Taiwan, and India. Since 2003 I have taught Humanities at a high-achieving urban lottery school.
Throughout my career I have taught a wide range of courses in both Social Studies and Language Arts. In our distinguished Humanities Dept I am the only teacher who is dually licensed in Comprehensive Social Studies and Language Arts. This has afforded me a wide range of instructional experience. Moreover, my teaching experiences overseas meant I taught and was colleagues with students and teachers from dozens of countries.
A strength I bring to teaching is my empathy for students who might be struggling or who are experiencing frustration. My father was an autoworker and my mother a full-time mom to six kids. My dad never went to high school and my mom did not have formal education beyond high school. I was an average student-athlete in high school; this was obvious in my initial experiences with college. I was the first in my family to finish college. Following my early attempts at college I worked various jobs: truck driver, whitewater rafting guide, salmon fisherman, and bartender. But I believed that I could be more than what I was doing and that I needed to return to finish my Bachelor's Degree. Fortunately, I met caring, available professors who met with me to help me to improve my study habits (which were poor, to say the least) and my writing abilities.
Reflecting on where I began, no one was more surprised (or proud) than I was when I completed my doctorate. And I have been teaching long enough to know that even those young people who are convinced they are not meant for academic success are capable of great things. I have seen the proof in my own life and in the countless students who have proudly returned over the years to tell me about their journeys.
