My Introduction

Hello, world.

My name is Jacob Emerick, and I am a web application developer and graphic designer. I also enjoy the outdoors, a good challenge, and learning opportunities.

Though I was born in Camp Pendleton, CA, most of my childhood was spent in a small farming community in Michigan called Port Hope. My parents are former Marines, so I was brought up in a fairly strict family environment where hard work was expected. I flip-flopped between a private Lutheran school and the local public school and was involved in sports and other extracurricular groups. Not only did I excel in the school environment, ending up as the Valedictorian of my class, but I worked between 20 and 60 hours a week as a grounds manager for a small housing development.

When I came to Michigan Tech, I had high expectations of my academic career as a physicist. However, I found a new passion within a year: student leadership. For the next four years I was heavily involved in committees and organizations within the university and managed to make quite a few changes before graduation. My largest success was within the Inter-Residence Hall Council, though I was also involved in Student Events Advertising and the Undergraduate Student Government. When I did graduate, I took the first job offered to me as a web developer for Auxiliary Technology.

During my years as an undergraduate, I spent a good deal of time working with websites both voluntarily and as a paid position. My web development jobs at Michigan Tech allowed me to refine my skills and learn a few more programming languages in my free time, especially as I worked on my new summer-long project of finding and documenting local waterfalls. When my job started offering more restrictions than opportunities, though, I started looking for new career opportunities, which has led me to my current situation.

There's an introduction of me in a few paragraphs. I plan on a few more personal posts in the future, but I hope to use this blog primarily for web development discussion and an occasional hiking story.