I was a Pre-med/sport medicine major in my undergrad wanting to become a surgeon. Entering my junior year my mom got diagnosed with stage 4 advanced colon and liver cancer and passed away halfway through my senior year. Dealing with that and not ready for med school, I took a job not knowing what to do. Growing up all I ever wanted to do was play teacher with friends. Math and science were strong areas and I decided to use my knowledge and humor to get kids to enjoy them!

It came about 7 years after I started teaching, one of my former students reached out via Facebook Messenger. He was a low income student who was in my Algebra I Honors class and he was top of the class, but would say I'm never going to college because it costs so much, he ended up joining the Marines. He reached out to let me know that kids in his math class couldn't remember the quadratic formula, so he stood on his chair and sang it! His teacher loved it and made him a teacher assistant.

I would pay some of my grad school off, put some away in my kid's college 529's, give to our math and science departments for equipment and manipulatives and finally donate to my after-school "Green Eagles" gardening program that grows and harvests vegetables for our food insecure students and their families to take home on weekends and over the summer.