I am a sociologist who uses quantitative research methods to study the relationships between education and inequality. How did I get here? Here are a few important points along the way.
- Spent childhood summers in West Texas hoeing/spraying cotton, learning the value of an education and developing preferences for non-manual labor.
- Liked science, but realized senior year of college I did not want to spend my life in a chemistry lab studying a protein strand.
- Joined the Mississippi Teacher Corps, taught high school chemistry and coached basketball in Mississippi for three years.
- Got troubled by and interested in educational inequality and school segregation, decided to study sociology, and went to grad school at Wisconsin.
- Trying to make a career of it in the desert.
When I’m not being a sociologist, I reenact classic movie scenes
with my cats (Max thinks I’ve been pushing too many pencils) or have them fill me in on the latest celebrity gossip.
Sometimes I hike in the desert and my wife documents my suffering.
As of the pandemic, I’ve also taken up woodworking with hand tools. Here is one of my early projects: a dovetail box.