I am looking forward to an exciting 2019 – 2020 school year at Royal Oaks Elementary School of the Arts and Cox Mill Elementary with my SOAR and LIFT students. I will be teaching SOAR and LIFT AIG classes at Royal Oaks Elementary School of the Arts for 2 days a week and I will teach LIFT AIG classes for 3 days at Cox Mill Elementary.  I am originally from North Carolina, but I have lived in Alabama, Massachusetts, Maryland, Virginia and South Korea during my time in the U.S. Army. This is my eighteenth year teaching in North Carolina. This will be my fourth year as the Royal Oaks AIG teacher. I taught English Language Arts in the Mandarin Chinese Immersion program at Cox Mill Elementary for one year. I taught for thirteen years as a classroom teacher at W.R. Odell Elementary where I taught kindergarten, second and third grade. I have been married to my husband Mark for 33 years. We have two children and an adorable dachshund. I enjoy running, reading, yoga and traveling.