I was really impressed with the program and the focus on different aspects of internationalization.

Hometown

Boston, Massachusetts

Department

Educational Foundations

Related Degrees

• PhD, Education: Global & International Education

Where do you work?
I am a graduate assistant in Student Athlete Academic Services.

Briefly describe your road to college.
I went to high school outside of Washington, D.C. and did my undergraduate and graduate work at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. I then worked in mainland China for seven years in Tianjin, working in the Chinese study abroad industry, and for two years in rural Liaoning, working on and studying the internationalization of higher education in mainland China.

How did you become interested in the field of educational foundations?
I knew after my experiences in mainland China that I wanted to continue my education and focus on globalization and the internationalization of higher education. There were many different experiences that I wanted to spend more time thinking about and examining more closely.

Why did you select the UHM COE?
I was really impressed with the program and the focus on different aspects of internationalization. The Educational Foundations program seemed diverse and the unique location and proximity to East Asia and the mainland United States offered a great opportunity to focus on different areas of East Asia that I am interested in.

Would you recommend this program?
I would definitely recommend the program. All of the professors and classmates that I’ve had the honor of working with have been wonderful. People have been hard-working, open-minded, and intellectually rigorous. Above all else, though, they have been kind and really created a sense of ohana. Graduate school can be a difficult time, and feeling like I’m part of a family has really helped in that regard.

Is there anyone in particular who inspired you to pursue a career in this field?
I’d have to say my family. My wife is a Japanese school teacher, my father did his PhD in education, my mother was a high school teacher, and my brother and sister both work in education.

What are your future plans?
I have no idea what the future holds and am trying to be open-minded about future plans. Just trying to make a difference every day and working to understand the world around me while working to improve the things I can seems like enough of a plan for the foreseeable future. Hopefully the rest will fall into place around that!