Beginning.My.Journey.In.English
How I got my start
A little background info
My name is Kelly Fontana, and I am a junior at George Mason University, expected to graduate in May 2010. I am studying to receive a B.A. in English, with a concentration in Professional Writing and Editing. This website is dedicated to the journey I have thus far taken in getting that degree, which highlights classes and teachers who have helped me along the way. To your left, there is a section entitled "Insipring Classes," which is where I showcase the classes that helped me along the way and ones I remember the most out of the past three years here at GMU. It also will give you a glimpse of what I am currently doing with school and where I hope to be after as well.
way.back.in.high school
Eleventh.grade is where it all began. Little did I know, my IB English teacher was setting me on a path to be where I am today, that she some how knew all the intensive reading, constant essay writing, and hard.core.literary.analysses would drive me to secretly seek to study it in college, to actually major in English and soak up all the literature and writing I could in the four years I was destined to spend at GMU. IB, or the International Baccalaureate Program, was offered at Stonewall Jackson High, and I took every class under the sun. My.favorite.was.English though, and to me, I felt that this class was the only one out of my back breaking 5 total that even came easily to me. Dr. Jacquelyn Fox-Good made Chaucer's Cantebury Tales interesting, Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Ernest riviting, and most important of all, she introduced me to the father of plays, the best playwright there ever was to live, William Shakespeare.
We studied two plays and a hand full of sonnets, but that was enough to spart my interest. The hidden meanings of how he saw life that still affect our lives today, the complexity of his words that takes even the most scholared to work out, and the vivacity and drive that which it was taught to me by Dr. Fox-Good definitely can be given.credit.for.my.love.of.literature.today. The intense writing we did both junior and senioryears of IB English that helped me develop my writing skills early also curved my English major once the revelation finally hit me that this was what I wanted to do.
Links
The International Bacclaureate Program is designed to have a higher set of rigorous classes for upper level high school students that prepares them for college study and may even exempt them from gen-ed level courses. This has a large role in my education and journey.
Stonewall Jackson is my alma mater, and I had a wonderful four years of high school here. Feel free to browse around the site, looking at the IB class schedules and syllabi that are required of the students. It will give you an idea of what I went though.