My name is Doug Smith and I live by beautiful Trout Lake in Vancouver BC. My route into the MET program has been a quick one, but it came with some long precursors. I originally received a B.A.Sc from UBC in 1994 and worked as a mechanical engineer for 15 years. The last 10 of those were spent designing and testing medical devices, which was a very interesting and rewarding experience. However, I decided in 2009 to make a career switch and began the PDP at SFU in the fall of last year. On the first day of class at SFU I felt a bit better about my choice: it turned out that one of my classmates was an instructor of mine when I did my engineering degree. I completed my B.Ed a couple of weeks ago and this fall I\u2019m starting to chip away at the MET program.<\/p>\n
The two biggest reasons for wanting to join the teaching profession are my two kids, and the chance to have a direct effect on the growth of our communities through education along with infusing ideas on sustainability and social awareness and justice. At this time I am on the TOC list in the Surrey School District. I\u2019m hoping to get on the with Vancouver School District too, since Vancouver is less geographically challenging for me! I teach math and physics in secondary school.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve always been a bit of a \u201ctech-head\u201d and I\u2019m excited about the MET program and what I can learn from it. Although I\u2019ve used quite a bit of technology during my practicum, I\u2019m also acutely aware that the technology needs a solid pedagogical foundation. I think the MET program is also extremely relevant, as devices such as the iPhone and iPad creep into the classroom, along with the ever-growing number of students turning to distance education.<\/p>\n
On a personal note, I seem to have way too many hobbies and interests. Hiking, cycling, boat building, fly fishing, music, photography, gardening, windsurfing\u2026 If I retired tomorrow, I would be a very busy person. I also love traveling and my wife and I have already involved our 5 and 7 year old kids by taking the family to Vietnam last April.<\/p>\n
I look forward to working with everyone and having a positive experience!<\/p>\n
cheers
\nDoug<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
My name is Doug Smith and I live by beautiful Trout Lake in Vancouver BC. My route into the MET program has been a quick one, but it came with some long precursors. I originally received a B.A.Sc from UBC in 1994 and worked as a mechanical engineer for 15 years. The last 10 of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3283,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":10,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-2","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/smithetec565a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/smithetec565a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/smithetec565a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/smithetec565a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3283"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/smithetec565a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/smithetec565a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":125,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/smithetec565a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2\/revisions\/125"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/smithetec565a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}