WWKD? “What would Kim do?” It’s a query formulated in reference to one of many first workplace staff and REL BA alumna Kim Davis. It’s a query a number of generations of our college students might have requested themselves. Past her instance aiding the division in the principle workplace, college students can profit from contemplating what Kim has performed since she left the Capstone.
Kim describes that she “all the time had an curiosity in mythology”, having taken a couple of courses on it and one on the New Testomony with Dr. Trost within the division throughout her undergrad. Earlier than she added REL as a serious, Kim had been learning French with a minor in Liberal Arts by the Blount Students Program on the College of Alabama. After finishing her BA in Non secular Research, Kim went on to get a Masters in French Utilized Linguistics and in Second Language Acquisition Pedagogy from the Faculty of Schooling.
Though she doesn’t bear in mind precisely what drew her in the direction of the tutorial examine of faith, Kim stated that it was Dr. Russell McCutcheon who maintained her curiosity. As a scholar right here she frolicked learning and understanding how methods and classifications work in addition to studying about how people vie for and preserve energy. “It actually type of helped me deconstruct a worldview and reconstruct a worldview that was much more fascinating.” She says, discussing the affect Dr. McCutcheon had on her education and life, “I’ll without end be indebted to him as how he helped me develop as an instructional and an individual.”
At the moment, Kim Davis is a French trainer who additionally co-runs a theater program in a 7-Twelfth public constitution faculty in Santa Fe, New Mexico. How she ended up there? Nicely, she says that she simply type of “fell into it.” She had been educating and serving to run an Irish dance faculty in each Tuscaloosa and Birmingham and realized that not solely may she converse French, however she additionally beloved to show! She started educating French and mythology on the Tuscaloosa County Excessive Faculty, and he or she grew the French division there right into a budding and engaged group earlier than she headed out to New Mexico.
Although a typical day in her life revolves round educating, Kim acknowledged that she enjoys working trails and mountaineering, adventuring and touring, and gardening exterior of labor. She is part of the Santa Fe Grasp Gardeners, her specialty being integrative pest administration. Kim has one spoiled canine and three cats—”two who’re pure chaos” she says.
However what does this must do with Non secular Research?
By way of her profession as a French trainer, crucial pondering expertise that she developed whereas deconstructing worldviews play an enormous function in her day-to-day life. Evaluating curriculum, in search of a strategy to complicate normal language assumptions, attempting to show her college students the complicated nature of tradition, and honoring college students’ dwelling languages are all issues that Kim says require her to make use of the abilities she realized throughout her time right here within the REL BA program. Exterior of lecturers, she makes use of her expertise to judge the media she consumes, understanding how one can speak to folks, “even down to only dwelling in New Mexico, the cultural requirements [between New Mexico and the South] are completely different…so simply understanding how one can analyze these discourse types is admittedly useful on a private degree.” For her, the abilities realized throughout her time right here within the REL division switch over into her day by day life and interactions, not simply her profession.
And a few recommendation?
“Main in Non secular Research and don’t let anyone let you know that you simply gained’t be capable of get a job, as a result of you’ll.” Kim went on to say: “And the abilities you be taught in that diploma will completely enable you to in life… Do it. Ignore the haters.”
So, now we all know what Kim did…What’s going to you do?
