Partner Interview

My classmate Mary Ann interviewed me the first week of class, and this is what she wrote about me:

Beatrice was born in Taiwan. As the daughter of a diplomat, she grew up living in three countries: Brazil (4 to 8 years old), Colombia (8 to 10) and Panama (10 to 18). In 1984 Beatrice came to the USA to pursue her undergraduate and graduate studies at UCLA in Spanish and Portuguese Literature. During her Junior year at UCLA, she participated in the study abroad program and lived in Madrid, Spain, for a year. When she graduated in 1991, she was offered a position to teach Spanish at Irvine Valley College, a community college in the heart of Orange County in Southern California. Beatrice loves her job and sees herself retiring there, in another 20 years plus! :-)

This is one busy lady!! Besides the regular face to face instruction, Beatrice also teaches an online course, Spanish 4, almost every semester. This past summer she took two courses: Web Design for Educators and E-Learning for Educators, and this fall she's taking this course and two more: Creating Collaborative Communities and Instructional Design for Online Learning. She is taking these courses to update and learn current online teaching techniques. The graduate units will also help her advance in salary classification. Upon completion of these courses, Beatrice is considering doing the practicum in order to fulfill the requirements for the Graduate Certificate in E-Learning and Online Teaching. And I think I'm busy taking one course!!

Beatrice tells me that with her last name and Asian complexion, people usually never guess that she teaches Spanish. :-) As a matter of fact, there are always some students that when they see her the first day of class walk away from her classroom, thinking that they entered the wrong classroom! But then, after checking the schedule again and the classroom number, they walk in again, still half puzzled. :-)

P.S. I'm on sabbatical leave this fall semester; therefore, have the time to take the three online courses mentioned above. I couldn't do it if I were also teaching full time! :-)