I was born in rural Indiana in September of 1960. Very early on I knew that I felt like a boy. Early experiences led me to reject that truth. After decades of denial, I eventually grew to identify as a transgendered person.
As part of my process of acceptance, I entered graduate school at the age of 41 with the goal of exploring the two-and-only-two-sex/two-gender paradigm currently assumed by Western thought from an academic perspective.
I earned a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology—Inquiry Methodology in 2008 from Indiana University. For my dissertation, I explored societal attitudes toward those who do not fit society’s dichotomous expectations by developing a psychometrically sound instrument that was designed to gage such attitudes, appropriately called the Attitudes Toward the Atypically Gendered Inventory (ATAG-I). After graduating, I joined the faculty at Indiana State University in Terre Haute as a teacher of statistics. I have published work addressing transgendered issues in public education. Additionally, I am currently working on a professional development book on diversity for k – 12 professionals that deals exclusively with the gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender (GLBT) issues.
While still in graduate school, I was asked to present on the topic of gender identity and quickly became a highly sought-after speaker. Since then, I have conducted numerous presentations and workshops on a variety of gender-identity issues, all of which have been very well received. I strive to weave a delicate balance of academic presentation coupled with personal story, which has proven to be quite moving and effective.
My goal is to educate the uninformed about the existence of those who fall outside the dichotomous categories of male and female, and in the process, facilitate societal understanding and acceptance.