My Education

I was very fortunate when it comes to my education.  I am the third of four children, raised by an uneducated, single mother who only ever held blue collar jobs.  In spite of coming from a working class family, I believe I got at least a middle class education.

Looking back, one of the first people to make an impact on my life was my fourth grade teacher at Shull-David Elementary School.  Most of the kids I went to school with grew up in homes very different from mine and boy, did they know it.  I didn't fit in.  I didn't have many friends.  I was one of the few ‘less fortunate’ kids in our school.  Mrs. P. is what we called her and honestly, it's all I can remember today.  With a smile, she sat me down one day encouraged me to focus on schoolwork and not get caught up with what the other kids thought.  I realize now that she recognized potential that I didn't know existed until many years later.  But I stuck my head in my books and I concentrated on my work from that day forward.

Up until high school, I studied, worked hard and applied myself because I thought that’s what I was supposed to do.  It wasn’t until I reached high school at Lehighton Area High School that the teachers’ goals were more apparent.  I realized that it was almost expected that most of us would be going to college.  That's what we were being prepared for.

My school career was challenging, but easier than it appeared to be.  What the teachers were offering was only limited by what I was open to receiving from them.  The exceptional education I received was not only a result of my efforts.  It was the teachers and the tools and recourses offered by my school district that allowed me to reach my full potential.