Language study has been my foremost passion since I first began learning Spanish at the age of 15. Studying abroad in Spain and Chile during my undergrad at Eastern Washington University enriched my B.A. in Spanish not only by helping me achieve fluency, but also by developing my knowledge of the cultures that surround the language. My interest in language and culture gained even more traction in the years following my B.A., during which time I obtained an M.A. in linguistics from San Jos State University and spent a collective nine months in Mexico. This longterm exposure to Spanish, supplemented by daily conversations in Spanish with my current coworkers, is how I have achieved and maintained fluency in the language.

Teaching has always been my career path of choice, whether it be as a professor, K-12 teacher, or tutor. I currently aspire to teach high school Spanish. In my second year of grad school I was offered the position of tutor for the department of Linguistics and Language Development and held this position until graduating. Apart from this, I have enjoyed casually helping friends, family members, and coworkers learn and practice Spanish. During both of my degrees I took classes in language pedagogy and am therefore well-versed in effective teaching methods, such as those employed by Communicative Language Teaching (CLT). Lastly, I believe that I have a good personality for teaching. I am friendly and energetic as well as perceptive and patient. Language teaching demands that a teacher have social prowess, as language itself is a social, interactive phenomenon, and must be tought as such.

I believe teaching Spanish is the greatest purpose that I can give to my life. Upon learning a second language and spending so much time abroad, it has become clear to me how necessary it is for us to know something about the world outside of our own. The best contribution I can make in this society is to help provide others with the tools to learn about this other world!