I was born and raised in Canada’s chocolate town, St. Stephen New Brunswick. For those who don’t know St. Stephen is a small border town in the south of New Brunswick famous for high tides and inventing the first heart-shaped chocolate box. I loved growing up in the close-knit community of St. Stephen.
From as early as I can remember, I was always an active member of the community. I grew up playing a lot of sports like soccer, rugby, basketball, and ball hockey. Whether it was an organized league or just meeting up with some friends at the field for a game of pick up, I loved being active and being part of a team. My favourite sports are soccer and rugby.
I also got involved with different extracurricular activities through school. Participating in peer mentor programs, school council, and even being voted the Vice-President of my graduating class. I was also very involved with theatre productions growing up. Drama productions taught me many valuable skills that I still use to this day. Being on stage helps build your confidence, once you’ve sung YMCA in front of 500 people, giving a training session on how to create quotes in a CRM to ten people doesn’t seem so bad.
In 2011 I was accepted in the Shad Valley (now called SHAD) program. If you’re unfamiliar with the program you can check out more info on their website. It’s a month-long enrichment program for high-achieving high school students with a focus on the STEAM Disciplines. Over the month of July, I joined 59 other students from across the country to spend roughly 12 hours a day listening to speakers from different educational backgrounds. We also completed a business plan for a new product that reduced childhood obesity. I’m pleased to say that my team won first place among 12 teams at our campus.
After graduating from High School as the valedictorian of my class, I decided that I wanted to stay close to home and attend UNB to attain a Bachelors of Computer Science. I had taken a few CS courses in high school and studied Java a bit on my own time, but school and especially co-op made me realize just how exciting my degree choice was. You can read more about my co-op experiences on my work history page.
As I continued through my degree I found myself gravitating towards more and more business courses. I completed many of the core courses associated with Business Administration such as Organizational Behaviour and Organization Design. I also enjoyed taking Technology Management and Entrepreneurship (TME) classes. TME classes usually had more mature and/or interested students who engaged in class discussions and the topics fell into an intersection of technology and business that intrigues me.
To this day, I continue to build my skills as a developer, but I also take the time to grow my abilities as a business person. I don’t like when people label me as one or the other. I love when people can view me as a unique professional who excels at solving problems. Feel free to get a hold of me through my contact page if you’ve got a challenge that you think I can help solve or if you just want to chat about something you’ve read on my page.