Welcome to my class! Go Tigers!

I am excited to be teaching math at Wilson this year and feel honored to be a part of the International Baccalaureate Program!

I am originally from Houston, Texas where we lived close to NASA, so I saw the space and aerospace industry's most recent projects first-hand. That sparked my interest to study Aerospace Engineering at Texas A&M. With a junior in status towards my degree program, a change of direction led me to Bible college where I obtained a BA in Pastoral Theology and Missions. It was there that I met my beautiful wife and we began a wonderful journey together. We have four (now grown) children.

We spent ten years doing overseas church planting mission work in Taiwan. (Yes, I can speak Mandarin Chinese!) From there I served churches through pastoring and working in various ministry capacities in Vancouver, British Columbia, Washington State, Oklahoma, Oregon, Virginia, and now South Carolina.

Teaching comes naturally for me. I have taught English and math in Taiwan and here in the US. After teaching math and science at a private school I went back to college to get my teaching license credentials. I obtained my BS in Mathematics from Southern Oregon University (dual degree also in Buisiness Administration) and my Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT) from Western Oregon University. These degrees allowed me to successfully navigate the process of being licensed to teach advanced mathematics. I have had the honor of teaching in Oregon, Virginia, and now in South Carolina!

Learning is fun and I consider myself a life-long learner. Through life I have held job positions that allowed me to use engineering to build trusses, to use the laws of physics to refract light in lens design, to use higher levels of math to predict business outcomes, and to do formal designs of experiment. I have also gotten to fly to China a few times to translate for high stakes busininess negotiations. These experiences help me teach math in practical ways. My wife is also a life-long learner and that is how we came to Florence. She also went back to college later in life and graduated four years ago with her bachelor's in chemistry and health sciences. She then tackled medical school, and this past May graduated with her degree as a doctor! The same kind of ambition that I have sought in my life is how I hope to promote the mathematics courses that I teach with all the open doors that every student has before them.