Students often ask me about how I became an academic, and I think it’s best described as serendipitous. Here’s why…

In my first years of undergrad, I was contemplating dropping out, get corrective eye surgery, and then try out to be a cop… gang violence in Edmonton was at an all time high, and I wanted to be on the front lines to combat this, as many of the gangs overlapped with my social network.

Being mentally checked out of school, I decided to party the night before a biology final… needless to say, I nearly passed out on the street, and failed the final. During meeting with undergrad program registrar, I was prepared to drop out… but somehow, they convinced me to just make up failed course by registering for an extra class... I reluctantly agreed to their proposed remediation plan.

This make-up class turned out to be an urban economics course… as luck would have it, I didn’t fail the course midterm (when pretty much everyone else did)… so the professor teaching the course reached out to me about the possibility of working as a research assistant. It was a compelling offer, as hourly rate was higher than what I was getting as a staff trainer at the gym, so I signed up. I was surprised I enjoyed the research assistant job… eventually, I spent more hours on that, and less time working at the gym.

When I was nearing graduation, the professors I was working for suggested grad school… I was hesitant, but they said a master’s program is at most 1 or 2 years, so it wouldn’t keep me trapped. At the Master’s program in Economics, we all had to take the usual math review course before fall semester… turns out, this first day of review is where I met my eventual wife. I convinced her to work together on a group assignment… though I ended up screwing up the answers and dragged down the grade… despite this, she kept hanging out with me!?! Because she needed to stick around Toronto for her studies, I thought that applying for a PhD after the masters program would provide me a nice excuse to linger around… as best articulated in the Barbie movie: “Ken only has a great day if Barbie looks at him.”

Fast forward to present day…

I’m now blessed with a beautiful family (15+ years of marriage, father of a sassy daughter with emerging tennis skills)… as a bonus, my academic career has truly been enlightening, especially being able to meet so many brilliant students and scholars… serendipitous indeed!!