The Beginning
First, I was born in 1985 at Womack Army Medical Center at Fort Liberty, North Carolina – the former Fort Bragg. I graduated from Mogadore High School in Mogadore, OH, as part of the class of 2003 and attended Maplewood Career Center in Ravenna, OH, for Information Technology during my Junior and Senior Years of High School. I then went to Youngstown State University from August 2003 through December 2010, having many declared majors ranging from Integrated Language Arts Education, Theater Arts, and Information Technology. I had to stop taking classes because I was failing due to my mental health, having to be placed in Crisis Intervention Units at least once during my last four terms at Youngstown State (Spring 2009, Fall 2009, Spring 2010, and Fall 2010). Fall 2010 was the final straw because I was still placed in a CIU despite having one class to take. So, I entered the workforce.
After being in the business world for a year, working for PNC Bank, and being let go due to attendance and performance (I was placed in a CIU in September of 2011), I spent 2012 looking for a new job. I was hired on a shared services contract for IT Repair at Family & Community Services in Ravenna, OH. I worked there from September 2012 to February 2016 but was let go for attendance and performance-related concerns that directly correlated with my health. However, while I was at FCS, they shared me with two other organizations – one where I found my future – the City of Ravenna and Ravenna School District.
While at the City of Ravenna, I was recruited to work with children under age ten in their Parks & Recreation Department, coaching youth soccer after work hours. And through that, plus working at the school district, I made one fundamental connection that changed my life – Ravenna Varsity Boys Soccer Head Coach Matthew Wunderle. It was through Wunderle that led me to have a conversation in the spring of 2014 with then Athletic Director Dave McBee about working events. However, Dave was retiring at the end of that school year, and it took me a year to work up the confidence to work with the new athletic director, Clint Fetty.