I grew up in the frozen tundra of Wisconsin, eating cheese, drinking beer, and doing what Wisconsinites do. At 18 years old, I moved to Arkansas and Florida and worked odd jobs. The most rewarding job around that time was teaching a GED class. I didn’t get paid for it, but I found it the most rewarding because I could tell that I was making a difference in their lives. Throughout about 10 years, I worked as a law clerk, farm hand, sheet metal worker, electrical construction, baker, vocational teacher’s assistant, and GED teacher. My professional profile can be viewed at My LinkedIn profile or on My Google+ profile.
In electrical construction, 20 feet in the air, I got shocked a few too many times and decided to go back to school.
I started as an English major because I had always struggled with writting and wanted to prove to myself that I could do it. After about a year of composition, creative writing, and poetry classes, I decided to change majors to something more practical. I aced all the english classes, but I had to work hard for those A’s because writing creatively did not come naturally.
What did come naturally was math. Learning new mathematical concepts felt easy to me, and it gets a bit nerdy when instead of reading Sci-Fi, I’d read about accounting and algebra. I decided to switch to an Engineering degree, but did not know what. I had wanted to get into computer engineering or computer science, but I had a late start with learning about computers. I didn’t own my first computer or even get on the internet until 2005. A co-worker encouraged me by saying that, and I’m paraphrasing, “They will teach you everything you need to know. You have an advantage because most people learn the wrong way, then go to school and have to unlearn the wrong way and learn the right way. You have a clean slate, so you can learn the right way.” Four years later, I graduated Suma Cumm Laude with a Computer Science degree from UNT’s Engineering school.
Check out my blog dedicated to data science, machine learning, and big data.
You can check out my graduation pictures at My photos on Flicker. I setup a facebook profile at My Facebook profile, or if you are still a MySpace fan, you can visit My old Myspace.
You can follow me on twitter at My Twitter Account.