Ever since I was a little girl growing up in southern California, I dreamed of being a Top Fuel Funny Car racer in the National Hot Rod Association. Obviously, God had other plans. I accepted Christ as my Lord and Savior my junior year in high school, and that put my life on a new trajectory. In 1987 I started attending Pacific Coast Baptist Bible College. At the beginning of my third year, the dean asked me if I was going to do church education (doing ministry within the church, Sunday school director, etc.) or elementary education. I looked at him with fear in my eyes and said that I was afraid to be a teacher because I didn’t believe I could do it. The dean looked me straight in the eyes and said, “You need to teach.” The rest is history.
Once I got into the classroom, I knew that was where God put me. He gave me an undeniable desire to minister to my students and give them what I did not get when I was in school: A teacher invested in them, a teacher willing to meet them where they were at, and a teacher who involved them in the learning process.
Being a teacher is not about me. Being a teacher is about my students, whom I refer to as my kids. It’s about me adjusting my teaching to meet their needs, not them adjusting to my teaching style. My students are my ministry. My goal is for them to see Christ teaching, living, and loving through me. I taught 2nd grade in San Jose for eight years. In 1999, my husband and I moved to Tucson. Growing up in California, Tucson was not a welcomed experience at first. However, this was where God had now planted us. When the time came for me to return to teaching, I learned that the degree I got in Bible college was not accredited, so I had to start all over again.
In 2010, I graduated from University of Phoenix with a degree in Elementary Education. I have been teaching a FLA ever since. My husband and I have a daughter, with whom we are very proud of and blessed to have. Looking back at where I came from to where I am now it is overwhelmingly evident that God was behind it all. He has used every aspect in my life, and still is, to make me that wife, mom, and teacher He has designed me to be.