I was born and raised in the Valley, graduating from Clovis High in 1986, and from CSU, Fresno in 1990 with a BA in English and a Minor in Humanities. After four years as a CTI2 in the US Navy (including a year at DLI in Monterey in Russian and another course in Croatian in Augsburg, Germany), I returned to CSUF to get my MA in Linguistics. This led to a five-year stint teaching university-level English classes and conducting teacher training courses in Russia and Croatia, with frequent excursions around Eastern Europe and Central Asia. With my Russian wife, Nailya, I settled back in the Valley to raise a few kids (Ethan and Leah) and teach English. After three years at Buchanan High School in Clovis, I took a year off to run a marketing firm in Boston, where I discovered that I enjoyed teaching much more than marketing, so I have planted myself firmly in the Visalia soil, where I've spent been teaching English, Yearbook, and Journalism ever since, first at Redwood and then at El Diamante. My wife and I are currently ABD, and we intend to finish our doctorates by May of 2016 through Brandman University.