Meet Your Teachers

I am an Iowa transplant, from south central Kansas. I am the second of six children, only one of which is a girl. We lived outside of town, so I have always been drawn to exploring outdoors and being outdoors.

I was raised and received my primary education in Arkansas City (Ar-Kansas), KS, where I attended Arkansas City High School and Cowley County Community College. I graduated high school in 2000, then received my Associate of Arts in 2002. I, then, received a small grant to attend Wichita State University, enrolled in the School of Art and Design wit ha focus on painting. After two semesters, I changed my major from Drawing and Painting to Art Education. I completed my Bachelor of Fine Arts Education degree in December of 2005.

My first full time teaching opportunity came in 2006, when I accepted the high school art teacher position in Estherville, Iowa. I taught at ELC until the end of the 2016 school year. I, then, took up a position as the Elementary Art Teacher at West Elementary in Emmetsburg in 2016. Following the 2020 school year, I changed my roll within the Emmetsburg School District, an now teach all of the High School Art classes as well as some middle school art here at Emmetsburg Community Schools.

I am the Assistant Wrestling Coach for the storied E-Hawk Wrestling program. I have coached wrestling since 2003, first serving as a Volunteer and Assistant Coach at Wichita North High School (the alma mater of NFL Hall of Famer, Barry Sanders and Olympic Gold Medalist, Lynette Woodard) before moving to Iowa. I served the Estherville Community as the Assistant and then Head Wrestling Coach for the ELC Wrestling program for 10 years.

I married my wife, Ashley in 2008 and we have three beautiful daughters.

I enjoy creating and teaching ceramics, drawing, painting and lots of other "get your hands messy" mediums.... like Batik... I do have a lot of different interests which sometimes translates into a lot of projects waiting for me to come back and finish them. I also enjoy any time that I can spend outdoors, which include hunting, fishing & motorcycling. I am a person of few spoken words, but I love finding time and ways to spend time making connections with family and friend.

“An artist is not a special kind of person. Every person is a special kind of artist.”

I attended the University of Northern Iowa and earned an undergraduate degree in Art Education with an emphasis in Painting. Then I went on to earn my Master's degree in Art Education at the University of Nebraska at Kearney. I began teaching at Emmetsburg in a middle school special education position for a year and then taught K-12 Art in West Bend for two years. Currently I teach some Middle School Art classes in the morning at Emmetsburg, and then travel to West Elementary to teach Elementary Art in the afternoons.

I grew up with a love to create. Outside of school, I enjoy sculpting, drawing, painting, rollerblading, the lake, dessert, and spending time with my family and friends. I married my husband in 2017, and we have one daughter, Delaney.

Rewarding experiences with children and a passion for art has led me to become an art educator. I am also a practicing artist and have been painting and creating sculptures for different commissions over the past six years.