To conserve money, my plan was to attend Ferris State College (now Ferris State University in Big Rapids, Michigan) for two years, then transfer to the University of Michigan for a degree in chemistry.  By a stroke of providence, my advisor at Ferris would have been my organic chemistry professor the following year.  He asked me if I was really serious about this chemistry career goal.  When I told him yes, he did several things (the details I still don't quite understand) that culminated in my late acceptance at Hope College in Holland, Michigan.  I had never been so challenged academically before in my life!  It turned out to be a great experience for me at Hope where I reconsidered my goal of becoming a medicinal chemist.  I realized that much of that type of work is organic synthesis and toxicology screening, which did not excite me in the way that I had hoped.  However, I did get excited about biochemistry because I thought that if we understood the biochemistry better, we could design drugs more rationally... (It turns out that I was just ahead of my time since that is now commonly done.)  So, I ended up working in Rod Boyer's laboratory characterizing novel enzyme activities for polyphenol oxidase, and earned a B.S. in chemistry.  I also got to play lead trombone in the Hope Jazz Ensemble for a few years and had the luxury of enjoying the beaches near Holland.

After visiting several graduate programs, I chose Texas A&M University in College Station, Texas, for work in the department of Biochemistry and Biophysics.  There, I worked in Tim Lohman's laboratory studying thermodynamic aspects of proteins and peptides binding to nucleic acids like DNA and RNA  About 4 years into my dissertation work, Tim took a position in the department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biophysics at the Medical School of Washington University in St. Louis.  I was invited to come along, which I did gladly.  While at Washington University, I met Bob Thach and we've collaborated ever since doing work on mechanisms of translational control of iron metabolism genes.  Also, while in St. Louis, I co-founded Code Blue which was/is an acoustic jazz group of approximately 5-8 people at any given time.  I also got to play (I can't thank them enough for being cool enough to let a hack like me sit in) with the group called ACO (who used to have a weekly gig at House of Swing and The Grog Shop), but I haven't played much in public since then.

In case yiou are interested in reading this kind of stuff, here's my full CV that describes my research and teaching background.

I also taught for two years in southern New Jersey as an assistant professor of chemistry at Stockton College where I taught general chemistry, biochemistry and jazz. I have now moved to Cleveland to take a position at John Carroll University. Here, I continue to teach biochemistry and chemistry, while also researching gene expression and protein-nucleic acid interactions.  Also, I served as the Chemistry Department Chair from 2005-2009. Currently, I expanded my repertoire into entrepreneurship by both teaching Intro to Entrepreneurship as well as serving in an advisory and collaborative capacity with various startup companies.