Except for my college years, I have lived in Arkansas my entire life.  I was born in Fayetteville and moved to Fort Smith when I was five.  I went to school in Fort Smith until my junior year in high school when we moved to Russellville where I finished high school.

 Leaving Arkansas for college, I attended Randolph-Macon Woman’s College in Lynchburg, VA and earned my BA in English from that school.  I entertained thoughts of attending veterinarian school briefly after college, but chose instead to enter the master’s program in English at the University of Arkansas, where I enjoyed teaching as a graduate assistant.  I loved the graduate program at Arkansas so much ( and I had a husband who was employed in Fayetteville) that I decided to stay to complete my Ph.D. in English.  My area of major concentration was medieval English literature, my dissertation being a structural analysis of Layamon’s Brut (the first poem in English to mention Arthur!). 

 When I finished my Ph.D., I earned my teaching certificate and taught English at Woodland Junior High School in Fayetteville for two years.  Teaching junior high aged children is mighty hard, and so I decided to return to teaching adults.  I commuted to Missouri Southern State College for the next year.  While the more mature student matched my teaching styles the commute was hard. 

 Because NorthWest Arkansas Community College is much closer to my home in Fayetteville than Missouri Southern; I began teaching at NWACC part-time too many years ago for me to remember exactly when.  Fortunately I was hired full time…and so I am here now---and I am loving every minute of working here.  I tell people that I have the best job in the world:  good students, good colleagues and good administrators!  No one could ask for more!