Goodbye Snow Canyon High School...Again :'(

I am officially resigned from my employment at the Home of the Warriors, Snow Canyon High. Working here has been one of the greatest experiences of my life. There are obvious things that came out of this job such as experience towards my major as a Severe Special Education Teacher, developing great relationships with other teachers and coaches, and lots of learned lessons that made be a better person.

One thing that made this experience amazing was I feel I got to see a glimpse of my career goal from working with the severe students as well as coaching basketball. I feel very lucky that I got to do this during college.

I already knew going in that I was going to have a great work relationship with Principle Brooks and Mr. Linford, but they turned out to be fully supportive of my goals and were willing to allow me to do anything I needed to do to get there. If I needed work hours cut, they had no problem with that. If I wanted to help out with the sports, they didn't have a problem with that either. Besides that, we were able to view each other as more than fellow co-workers. We became friends through the experience.

I was also able to develop good friendships with some of the coaches and teachers. Mike Esplin, Justin Redfearn, LeFan Tufuga, Ryan Rarick, and quite a few more were people I sure was glad to work with. I have to admit how ever that when you openly admit you are a San Antonio Spurs, you become quite a good target to tease and make fun of which those coaches did plenty of times to me. Eventually, they began teasing me about more than just the spurs, but later, my habit of drinking Rock Stars, "betraying" them by moving to Salt Lake, Etc. I will miss that about these guys. They always gave me a hard time in a way that made me feel respected. I do hope to stay in contact with these guys down the road towards my career.

Besides the fellow workers, I was able to bond well with many students. The severe students were so great to work with and I tried hard to help them feel loved and cared for and eventually they gave back that respect toward me.

I asked one to let me see there yearbook and as soon as I viewed the page about the Girls Basketball Team, I could not help but get tears in my eyes. Every one of them, I hope to see them sometime down the road. Coach Roden better not feel surprised if I decide to text or call him sometime just to say hello to the team during next years season.

All in all, I am really going to miss these experiences. They have made me better and smarter, and I am forever grateful to be apart of it. Many have asked me if I would be interested in returning once I have completed my degree requirements at the University of Utah and I have responded to many of them that I am not saying yes but I am not saying no either. It may turn out I love Salt Lake City and may just want to teach up there, but maybe I will miss the red rocks and people of St. George that I will just have to come back. As I have learned many times in the past few years, Never say Never!!!! What ever my choice ends up being, I am eternally grateful for all the people I worked with and I hope to stay in contact with many if not all of you. Thanks for everything!! No matter what, I am always a Warrior!!!

My College Summary: Spring 2015

Spring of 2015 was easily the most difficult semester I have experienced. I knew it would be hard coming into it due to a couple factors such as being my last semester at Dixie State so the urge to just wanting to get it over with made it more difficult than it should have been. I also was taking classes that were a little difficult for me such as Math 1050(College Algebra and Pre-Calculus), Music 1010(Introduction to Music), and Hist 1700(American Civilization).

I had to make some difficult choices in the semester. Doing this along with my job at Snow Canyon High School ended up being even harder than I thought. I was able to get through coaching the Lady Warriors Basketball team but when track and field came up, I had to tell Coach Esplin I could not do it this year because my Midterm Grades were already questionable. My Math 1050 was marked with an "X" which is a professors warning, and my Music 1010 class was a D-. I went and talked to my math professor, Costel Ionita, and he was very blunt about it that I was just not leaving enough room in my day to study math at the rate he recommended. I then talked to one of my counselors in Student Support Services and they offered to let me work with a one on one tutor. In order to do that though, I also needed to cut my work hours a bit shorter. I was able to do that and thank goodness I did.

Working with my tutor, Paige, she was able to assist me even better than I first imagined. With my Math class being an online course, she was in a sense also my teacher. We would push to get 100 percent on each homework assignment. I won't go into too many details, but at the end working with her, I was able to finish my math class with a C!! I was very happy because that means I wouldn't have to take another math class at the University of Utah where I will be transferred to next semester.

My Music 1010 class ended up being a D+. I ended up studying with my mother who helped me out a whole lot. Professor Dean was very passionate about teaching Music but his tests were the kind that if I did not basically memorize my whole entire notes, I would feel lucky to get higher than 70. Luckily I was not the only one. A majority of the class admitted they struggled in it. It was the one class I wished there was more homework to at least help me absorb more of the information. Just writing notes and then taking an occasional test in the testing center did not really help me learn too much. Overall though, I am still glad I passed the class. That D+ was not due to wasted effort so I am not too disappointed.

Overall, I felt very accomplished to have finished this semester. I now will be receiving my Associates of Science degree and will began next semester at the U in good terms. The biggest challenge coming up will be pushing to get all A's and B's for the next year so I could push my GPA from a 2.79 to a 3.0 or higher which is required to get admitted into the Education school at the U. I will also need to take a Praxxis exam which I plan to take in Spring of next year. I plan to take practice portions and whatever else I need to do to get comfortable with that exam.

I would like to finish this summary on my social interactions. I was living in the Shiloh Dorms with my friend Chris Cleveland living on the other side of me. Having him there ended up being one of the greatest social times of my life. We would help each other out, go eat together and have movie marathons. I think we rarely had a day where we didn't talk at least a few minutes to each other. He is going to be who I miss most moving up to Salt Lake City. I only wish he could have joined me but we will still interact through skyping or messaging on Facebook. I thank him big time for helping make Dixie State a good experience in more ways than just going to class and learning information.