Miss Tara's life story (short)

In case anyone wondered ...

It’s been a long, twisty path, but I finally ended up in the field (more or less) that I intended to be in when I was a little girl. As the sign on my office door says, “I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I have ended up where I needed to be.” (Douglas Adams)

Columbus in the 1960s and 1970s was a much different city from the Columbus of 2007. Many people have heard me tell the story about my 8th-grade Spanish teacher, who told me that it was really nice that I was taking Spanish, “but you have to understand that you’ll never meet any real Spanish speakers in Columbus”.

At the time, that was not too far from the truth. Columbus today is much more interesting – and a lot more fun.

I fell in love with the Spanish language when I was in the fifth grade, and I started taking classes when I was 11. I was at a used-book sale at Barnett Elementary School and saw a Spanish textbook. I opened it and started looking through it and was transfixed by a picture of the Court of the Lions at the Alhambra in Granada, Spain. What went through my 10-year-old brain was, “I must go there and see that and meet those people. To do that, I need to learn this language.” I bought the book, but of course made no progress with it at all.

(And when I did finally get to Spain nearly 20 years later, I went to the Alhambra. It was a beautiful day in May. The smell of roses and oranges hung in the air. The sound of water was everywhere from fountains and channels cut into the handrails of the stone staircases. Kittens followed me around looking for just one more bite of the ham sandwich I’d shared with them. Then, without really knowing where I was, I turned a corner and there it was, with sunlight pouring down on it – the Court of the Lions. Just like in the picture so long ago. I stood there and burst into tears.)

I come from a long line of teachers and should-have-been teachers. Apparently, it’s in the blood. My “School Days” book (you know – the one to be added to each year with the school picture and spaces to fill in information such as “My friends” and “What I want to be when I grow up”) shows that when I was in kindergarten, I intended to be a teacher. That held true pretty much through elementary school and junior high. By high school, I became more specific: English teacher ... maybe. I had some serious doubts about my ability to handle some of the students I saw in normal junior-high and high schools. And elementary students? No way.

Taking journalism in high school and working on the high-school newspaper got me thinking about other directions to take my love for words. Then there was the consideration of what major to have in college. My first plan was to major in English; but was that practical? Strangely, it was the comedian Gallagher who really got me thinking about that, with his line: “If you’ve got a degree in English and you don’t teach, what do you you? Open up a poem repair?”

So I graduated from Columbus Alternative High School in 1981 and got my BA in journalism (with a minor in Spanish) from OSU in 1984. At that point, I was thinking about being an international journalist; however, one of my professors told me I wasn’t “obnoxious enough to be a good journalist”. (There are those who would disagree with that assessment, I’m sure.)

One of my professors in the Romance Languages Department at OSU suggested that I go on for a master’s degree, which I did. In 1986, I received my MA in Romance Languages and Literature. During that period, I taught my first ESL class (for the Diocese of Columbus) and then began working part-time for a place called – yes, really – the House of Tutor.

At that point, I was completely burned out. I’d been in school since the age of four. But money still had to be made, so I started temping. That eventually led to a job in the marketing department of Wendy’s International, where I did marketing research, budget coordinator and advertising materials work. By the time I left, my title was Advertising Materials Administrator.

From there I went to the Marketing Department at Combustion Engineering (which two months later was bought by ABB Process Automation). Four years later I was near the breakdown point. I was not doing what I wanted to do – I wanted to TEACH!

I started taking classes part-time in the Ph.D. program in the Spanish and Portuguese Department at OSU. Then my department at ABB was downsized, and I was out of a job. So I moved to full-time graduate student status, and got a TA position. I was back in the classroom!! And loving every minute of it.

In 1997 I finished my classwork for the doctorate and my funding ran out. I started teaching Spanish and ESL as an adjunct in the Modern Languages Department at Columbus State. In 1999 Garry Fourman and I wrote the grant for what would become the Language Institute. On January 3, 2000, the Language Institute was officially born. (I’ll let the Language Institute have its own bio.)

In August 2000, I graduated from OSU with my Ph.D. in Hispanic Linguistics. Derek and I were married in December of 2001. We have a house in Clintonville and four cats. We enjoy reading, writing and music.