by Carole Bailey

e-mail:  letswrite2day@yahoo.com

I suppose one could say my writing and editing comes naturally.  It all began when I got a “love note” from a 5^th grade boy (in my sister’s class) when I was in 3^rd grade.  His sentences were full of grammatical mistakes and misspelled words.  Using a red pen, I circled all the errors and corrected the spelling and sentence structure then sent it back to him the next day by my sister to give it to him.  I never heard from Phillip again.  It was then that I knew deep down that I was destined to be an English teacher and lavish myself with the written word. 

Our high school produced an annual literary magazine with the best writings from many genres.  Somehow I managed to be published each year from the 8^th through 12^th grades.  My journalism skills were honed on creative humorous stories published in our high school newspaper.  For all of my college years, my being a literary magazine staff member just encouraged my need to write.  One short story was submitted to the South Carolina Collegiate Press Association for judging.  I didn’t win the contest but I did win the election to a state office on the SCCPA for 1966-67. 

My first year of teaching was as an English teacher.  It was an emotional year in which I spent quite a bit of time putting my feelings on paper … a habit I still do to this day.  I still have all of those writings, some of which are to be included in a future book. 

Other ventures into writing and publication include editing, proofing, and writing various portions of several data processing textbooks and test banks for college level.  As a Software Engineer, my writing involved development of business proposals, curriculum, training materials, documentation, and How-To manuals.  As an educator, I have developed and published numerous documents including some of the original material that eventually became Florida’s Sunshine State Standards in the area of Business Education. 

Having written for a majority of my life, I started to fulfill my lifelong dream in November, 2009 with the NaNoWriMo National event sponsored by Florida State University to write a novel in one month – 50,000-word goal.  I completed my word count of slightly over 63,300 by the end of the event.  Currently that novel has grown to 73,733 words.  My goal is to delve into my novel full-time and have it ready for publication by December of this year. 

Carole's Educational Background 

B.A., Business Education, Minor in English , Columbia College, Columbia SC, 1967. 

M.Ed., Business Education , University of Central Florida, Orlando FL., 1977 

additional Post-graduate courses:  thirty-seven (37) hours Computer Science 1989 - 2002 

Florida Teacher Certification Areas (DOE #365461:  Valid through June 30, 2012):  

-     Computer Science K-12  

-     Business Education 6-12  

-     English 6-12  

-     Teacher Coordinator of  Cooperative Education Endorsement  

-     Vocational Certification Endorsement  

Associate Master Teacher, June 1985-87 -- based on meritorious ranking of teaching practices and subject matter knowledge