I taught as a graduate assistant for six years before I took on a position as instructional faculty at the U of A in the Fall of 2014. I have been working in my current position for five years, and I currently teach first and second semester calculus (Math 122B and Math 129)
In 2007, I graduated summa cum laude with bachelors degrees in both math and physics. As a graduate student, I won an award for Outstanding Teaching Assistant. I graduated with my PhD in mathematics in 2013. I have personally and collaboratively published papers in scientific journals. I won the Teaching Service Award here at the U of A in 2017.
When I was a freshman in college, before I had declared a major, I took a freshman level philosophy course. The instructor gave us a list of topics to choose from when choosing to write our end-of-term paper. The instructor mentioned that out of all the choices, writing about the concept of time itself would be the most difficult, and only the most ambitious students should try it.
So of course I chose that. In my efforts to rock the paper, I checked out as many books on physics and modern science that I could, and read like a maniac. I got so absorbed in the ideas I was reading about. It quickly became apparent that every instinct I had about the way the natural world worked was likely wrong. Just the simple fact that time is, by all evidence, non-linear was something I simply couldn't wrap my mind around.
I wanted to learn more. I needed to learn more. But I knew that I was going to need to understand a heck of a lot more about math and physics before I could study any of the real stuff being talked about in modern physics. So the next day I went and declared both mathematics and physics as majors.
I believe that learning is an active pursuit. I think true learning can only occur when one has the opportunity, the motivation, and the encouragement to take ownership over one's ideas.