I had so many great teachers growing up, but there's one who I owe my entire career to.

A caller during Kekeluv's afternoon show on Tuesday pointed out to us that we almost missed "Teacher Appreciation Day."  Lucky for us, the entire week is "Teacher Appreciation Week."

Tom Sullivan was my 7th and 8th grade shop teacher, middle school track coach and my high school television production teacher.  We went to the same church while I was growing up, so he became a close friend of the family, as well.  My mom always joked with him that if this radio thing didn't work out for me, he'd have to support me for the rest of my life.

I wanted to be a veterinarian up until the time Mr. Sullivan picked me as one of the kids to work behind the scenes on the morning television announcements in 8th grade.  I fell in love with television production and he encouraged me to take the class in high school.  From directing live productions of our school's Grammy recognized music programs, to doing video shoots with police dogs and to getting the chance to be color announcer for our the girls basketball team, I got to do it all under Mr. Sullivan's guidance.

Before my senior year, he had the opportunity for his TV 3 & 4 students to intern with a radio cluster in my hometown.  I never thought radio would be something I'd be interested in, but it was one of those things that he told my parents was "a good opportunity for her."  Needless to say, I got kind of pushed into giving it a shot.  Up until then, I was rather quiet and shy until you got to know me so when one of my first assignments as an intern was to crawl in people's backseats to put a static sticker for our talk radio station on their windows, I almost quit.  Mr. Sullivan wouldn't let me and the more time I spent at the radio station, the more I loved it, the more I was pretty sure radio is what I wanted to do for a living.

So during Teacher Appreciation Week, I want to thank Mr. Sullivan for pushing me out of my comfort zone (not just in broadcasting, he pushed me to start running distance in track and field too...and well, running is still one of my favorite things a zillion years later) and for believing that I could succeed in broadcasting.  I'll never forget the day you were at the hospital welcoming your daughter into the world and believed in me enough to direct the live TV broadcast of the trustee and school board candidate debate.  You've no doubt helped shape the woman I grew up to be!

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