Calame -Bio

My name is Daphney Calame. As a Jamaican living in the United States of America, I have made a point to make education a major part of my life. Through my determination and family support I graduated from Miami Dade Community College with Associate degrees in Biology and Medical Laboratory Technology in 1996 and 1997. This task was not an easy one as an international student with tuition being a little over two thousand dollars ($2000.00). This status provided no loans, no grants and no scholarship. My mother, the sole bread winner took home $300 a week for our family of six. I later went to Florida Memorial University and received Bachelors degrees in Biology and minor in Chemistry; my hope at that time was to become a Medical Doctor or a Pharmacologist. I was working in the pharmaceutical industry for 6 years as an Analytical Research and Development chemist until my lay off in 2006. Since I had a child in 2006 I took a year In an attempt to find a job I went to classes and did examinations to acquired a real estate license and worked in that field for a year. There I learned numerous things about home ownership and other business avenues.
When my daughter was five months old, I decided follow up on a career path that I had given up on after my graduation from FMU, that of becoming a teacher. I interview with Middle and high schools in Broward and Dade counties. At Miami Carol City Senior High School in my first year I worked as Chemistry and as an Anatomy and Physiology teacher. The strength that I brought to this position though not a formally taught teacher was to bring relevance to the class room. Coming an the industry where science was the focal point the principal then was trying to get the students interested in science so that their performance would be better on examinations and most of all in life. The Coming from the Caribbean, I have an interest in the sporting pass time of Netball (a game with similarities to basketball that is mostly played by females). I also enjoy watching track and field, myself being a former sprinter. At home on those rainy days I draw portraits of no-one in particular or of family; this passion I share with my husband.