I grew up in Wheaton and attended Glen Ellyn schools: Briar Glen, Glen Crest and Glenbard South. In 1993 I graduated with an English degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. After I had worked for some years in desktop publishing and sales, my wife Julie and I adopted our first child, a boy, and I became a stay-at-home dad. We now have four boys (ages seventeen, sixteen, fourteen, and eleven), two adopted locally from infancy and two adopted from Ethiopia in 2006.
While rearing our children, I spent a number of years studying screenwriting, novel writing and copywriting, and starting and running two home-based businesses. In 2007 I began taking courses toward a Master in the Art of Teaching degree at National Louis University in Lisle. I student taught 8th grade Language Arts at Hubble Middle School, formerly in Wheaton. In 2008 I began my teaching career at Hadley. The following year I completed my Master's degree.
My passions include long-distance running and novel writing. I recently completed my first Young Adult novel, which I am now submitting to agents in hopes of representation and publication. I am also midway through the rough draft of my second novel.
I'm excited for this new school year: to get to know your children, to teach them, to share with them my passion for reading, writing, thinking, learning and speaking.