Hello world (education).

Grade School

I attended Lugonia Elementary until the third grade, and switched to Mentone Elementary (Go Colts!). I assume this was due to not needing a (free) baby sitter from third grade onward. My middle school (which is considered grades 6th-8th in my area) was Moore Middle School, and high school Redlands East Valley. I was a great student in elementary, then not so great in middle, and by high school I was terrible. I failed almost an entire year of high school, which required me to attend summer school every year, and attend credit recovery courses, but in the end, I still graduated with the rest of the class.

Higher Education

Community College

I did not attend college directly after high school. In fact, I did not realize the importance of higher education. I am a first generation college graduate, so I did not really have a support system to guide me through the processes, and didn’t even take the SAT. However, I obtained an associates degree in business from Crafton Hills College, the local community college to Mentone. It took me about twice as long as other students because I went half time, changed my major about 3 times, and had to pay myself. I was given the option of attending college or paying rent, so I chose to do the former.

I was still a mediocre student (at best) in the first half of my stint in community college. My professor for college algebra once told me something that changed my attitude about education by telling me one simple thing. After class one day, I was walking and ran into him walking to his car. He asked how I was enjoying the class. I let him know he was a great professor and explained the material well, but I was so excited for this to be my last math course EVER (in community college, I started from the lowest class offered, arithmetic, so this was my 5th or 6th math course). He then said, “Why do you feel that way? You should be getting the best of college, not letting it get the best of you.” and continued to his car. This resonated with me greatly, and changed my perspective for the rest of my academic career.

University

When I graduated from community college, I was going to transfer to the university that had an agreement with the community college, California State University of San Bernardino (CSUSB). Before transferring, I was still interested in math and computer science, so between my Spring graduation and Fall transfer, I decided to take the next math course, and computer science 1 at the community college. I fell in love with both.

Before I even started at CSUSB, I changed majors to Computer Science, knowing I would have a lot of prerequisite courses to catch up on. the Bachelors of Science in Computer Science at CSUSB only required Calculus 1, but I wanted more. So I declared a minor in Applied Mathematics (focused in statistics). During my time at CSUSB I made great lifelong friends, got experience as a student instructor, and even an internship. I graduated right in December 2019, right before COVID-19.