I came from a family of preachers and teachers, so it was a tad rebellious of me to start my worklife in journalism. First at the Victoria TV station in the 1980s, then later at The Victoria Advocate. But one spring day in 2001, a high school student job shadowed me at the paper.
Sitting side by side in front of the computer and designing the entertainment section, she wistfully longed for a journalism teacher to help with her publications. All my latent educator genes kicked in.
I signed up for the Alternative Teacher Certification at Region 3, and by the fall of that year, I was teaching 7th grade English. Somehow I survived and eventually got to a school where I taught journalism as well as English. (Tip to principals: wherever you have a teacher shortage, send students to job shadow people in a related industry. Devious, but effective!)
