50-Year-Reunion

Jim Browder After graduation from high school, I went to Virginia Tech where I studied chemistry and graduated with a Bachelor of Science. After looking at several different job pathways where I could apply my degree, I decided to try teaching for a while to see if I liked it. I ended up teaching at Honaker High School in Russell County, Virginia for three years, where I taught a combination of chemistry, physics, and earth science at various times. Although I looked at this time as sort of a test to see if a career in education was for me, it turned out to be one of the most valuable experiences of my life. I learned as much as I taught and I made lifelong friends in the community. I also learned that public education is extremely challenging, underpaid, and underappreciated profession and I gained an enormous amount of respect for anyone that works in public education. Suffice it to say that I decided to move on to my first career shift and I went back to graduate school where I delved deeper into chemistry and chemical physics at Virginia Tech. After graduate school, I tried teaching for one more year and ultimately ended up applying my chemistry knowledge to the environmental profession where I worked for the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality in Richmond, Virginia for about seven years. This period was again a great period of growth and learning for me and I value the experience I gained and the friends that I made there. During this time, I also met the woman who would become my wife, Peggy, and I ’ m grateful for every day that I have known her. In 1995 I made another career change. I started working at an electric utility in Richmond where I worked in the environmental department focusing on air pollution issues and eventually including water and waste issues, mostly associated with new power plants. A few years after moving into utility work, my wife and I decided to adopt a baby from China and then a few years later we adopted another. Our two daughters from China, Kate and Rebecca, are now grown and in their twenties. They are the greatest blessings of our lives. After one more career shift in 2007 into energy conservation work, still at the same electric utility in Richmond, Virginia, I retired in 2023. I ’ m now doing a whole lot of amateur astronomy, in which I have had a life - long interest, and I do volunteer outreach education in astronomy and space science. I work with our local astronomy club and serve as a volunteer NASA Solar System Ambassador. Peggy is also retired after serving as a special education teacher for a number of decades.

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