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There are six key questions that one might ask about me. I have
answered them in more or less detail below. Click on the links to
jump down to a lower section. Who am I? What am I? Where am I? When am I? Why am I? How am I? Who am I?My name is Aaron Wissner. I have lived my entire 34 years in Michigan in the USA. I am the son of Wayne Wissner, a retired magician, and Sheila (Richmond) Wissner, a journalist for the Nashville Tennessean. I have one sister, Marissa Wissner, who is to be married to a fellow named Scott Grossenbach from Wisconsin. I have two living grandmothers; Richmond and Wissner. My grandfather Wissner passed away a few years ago. My friends Michael, Kevin and Amy and my mentor Mr. Snyder have also passed away.I grew up in Bear Lake, Michigan and attended school there, in the one and only school building, from grades Kindergarten through 12th grade. I ate approximately 2,300 lunches in the school's cafeteria. I attended and graduated from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. I have also taken graduate level classes through GVSU and MSU. I currently teach middle school students. I just completed my twelve-year of teaching in Michigan public schools. I greatly enjoy teaching and spending time with students I am married to my wife Kimberly Sager, with whom I own a home and property. Kimberly and I have been together for thirteen years. We live with two house cats named Lauren and Slick, both now twelve years old. I enjoy many hobbies including walking, Frisbee, swimming, downhill skiing, camping, tenting, backpacking, sailing, photography, videography, video editing, CD/DVD authoring, creating web sites, writing, reading award winning novels, movie going, social dining, gathering interesting facts, learning, watching drama and science fiction, conversing, relaxing, exploring, and many more. What am I?I am a white human male citizen of the U.S.A. from Michigan. I am a product of public school education and a very supportive family interested in intellectual pursuits. I am 34 years old, dark brown hair, dark hazel eyes, 180 pounds. I am a teacher and have taught students from grades Kindergarten through twelfth grade. I am the husband of my wife, the brother of my sister, the son of my parents, a grandson of my grandmothers, a nephew to my aunts and uncles, a cousin to my cousins, an uncle to my sister-in-law's children, and a friend to my friends. For the past two years, I have been eating a vegetarian diet.I am a Bear Lake Schools graduate. I am a University of Michigan graduate. I was and am a member of the Greek Triangle social fraternity. I am a member of the National, Michigan and Wayland Union education associations. I am also a member and presenter of MACUL. I have been a member of the science and math teaching organizations MSTA, NSTA, MCTM and NCTM. I have served as an assistant coach for Cross-Country running. I coached Science Olympiad three years. I have helped out as much as possible in various capacities at track meets for the past eleven years. I helped develop, coach and run Allegan County's Sun Sprint for four years. I also have run a middle school news class or team for three years. I am or was a participant in Allegan County's Cadre for Authentic Education and follow on Action Learning series, which I helped to continue through a second year. I am a Courage to Teach member from 1998 to present and have regularly attended, and recently facilitated, reflective formation retreats. I am a person who has and continues to serve on school committees. I have presented at a MSTA conference, a MASB conference and for various school board meetings in Wayland as well as Middleville. I am Board of Education groupie and have attended almost every Wayland Union Board of Education meeting for the past five years. I report interesting results from the board meetings to the school district. I have attended local union meetings regularly for five years. I have served my local union as the chair of the salary sub-committee and also for two years as the association Treasurer. I have been a member of the MEA 9F Coordinating Council for about five years. On this I have served as PAC chair for two years and I am now completing a two-year term as the coordinating council's chair. As chair of 9F, I served as a member and on the executive board of MEA Region 9. I recently spent a week in Lansing observing how the legislature works. Where am I?I live in Thornapple Township, not far from Middleville, Michigan. During the summer, I often live at my childhood home in Bear Lake, Michigan. I occasionally will take an out of state trip. My parents live in Nashville, Tennessee where I will spend a few days a year. My grandmother Richmond winters in Sun City Center, Florida where I typically spend a week each year. My sister-in-law, Kristie, lives near Beaufort, North Carolina where I typically spend one week per year. My in-laws, Don and Ardith, live in Jasper, Michigan where I spend about a week of days each year. My sister, Marissa, lives in Chicago where I will visit her a handful of days each year.Other then that, I have traveled to many states throughout the USA including Hawaii, Florida, California, New Mexico, Utah, Colorado, Nevada, Wyoming, South Dakota, Texas, New York, Wisconsin, Ohio, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Louisiana. I have driven through other states as well. In Canada, I have only been to Quebec. I Europe, I have visited England, Wales, Scotland, France, Spain, Germany and Austria over the course of three expeditions.
(I have a trip planned to Australia this summer which means I
will be away for a certain fraction of time.) When am I?I am now. I do not dwell overly on the past. I am optomistic and look toward the future. I enjoy the present and try to relate it to the past and the future. I try to remember whenever possible that I will not be around forever, so I try to get done now as much as I can. The car accident I was in on March 6, 2004 woke me up to the fact that waiting around too long is not a good plan. Sometimes, people simply die due to accidents. I need to try to get as much accomplished as possible, because I can never know for sure how much more time I have. That is in part a reason why I feel compelled to publish this online and now. Even sitting here in my house, seemingly safe at this moment, later tonight an airplane could crash into our bedroom and kill us. Do I think this is going to happen? No, but it is possible, and it illustrates the point that we are mortal and can almost never predict an accident that may take our life. So it is best to do as much as possible with our time.This precise moment now it is 12:26 a.m. on Wednesday, June 23, 2004. Why am I?I am here because of the earth, humanity, western civilization, the United States, Michigan, community over centuries, my ancestors, my grandparents, my parents, my family and friends, and a handful of luck. I am because I believe that I can help to make things better. There are issues that could be improved upon in many arenas.I am here to be a catalyst in the right place at the right time to help things accelerate on the path to improvement. I am also here to be an extension of that which brought me into being in the first place. I am here as a single thread in a great fabric of space and time. I am a living result of earth, life and humanity. I am here to pass on what value I can to these things for the good of the future of all. How am I?I am okay. I sometimes wonder if I am on the best path or if there is another path I should be on. I occasionally feel a bit sad about the world and its problems. I am concerned about poverty, anger, hate, fear, the environment, treatment of animals, freedom, and the welfare of children. I am happy that I seem to be healing from an automobile accident that left me with a damaged right arm and mixed up vestibular organ. I am happy about finding a few local issues that I can bite my teeth into.In the past two or three years, I have and advocated for removing junk food from schools, expanding Kindergarten to All Day Everyday, and guaranteeing that all student are offered at least 180 full days of school every year. The primary roadblock that arises for all three of these is the issue of cost. Fortunately, there are ways to make up for increased financial costs if one takes the time and effort to find them. Within Wayland Union Schools, I have advocated for equality in education. Computer use in elementary classrooms in not equitable. I have supported and encouraged setting up computer labs in all four elementary buildings with every student signed up for lab time every other day. I have fought to have every student moving through the middle school to get computer class. I have also advocated for academic concerns. In particular, I have attempted to increase the high school graduation requirements for math and science at the high school. |
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