Ok, so it was techincally December 2007...but it was twelve years in coming. I received my degree in Music Education with emphasis in strings from ASU. The link http://kellyrphotography.com/colleenporter.html is a photographic journal that my talented photographer sister Kelly created for me. My only complaint is that there are too many pictures of me!! Once you get through those pictures (quickly), there is pictures of the actual commencement and my family.
My final semester was student teaching - a very rewarding experience. I had two amazing mentor teachers: Anita Archer in Mesa for Strings and Karen Sejkora in Chandler for general music. I grew attached to all the students I was working with and I could see myself as a future teacher working with my own group of students and loving it. However, I was turned off by the hoops that public teachers have to jump through depending on the current politics...like taking more courses or adding on new pressures or possible losing an entire program you built up because of new government decisions or lack of funds. This is not to say that I will never work in the public schools, I just would like to feel like I'm in control of my own future and success...so I have been working on starting up my own music business....more on this on another post.
