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of Pennsylvania with a degree incommunications, he went on towork for two years at WTAE asassociate director for morning news. Itwasn’t long, however, before he knew he wantedsomething different. “City High posted a job for a digitaleducator, and I thought it was right up my alley, having thereal-world experience and strong teaching background fromRobert Morris University.”While he was getting his certificate from RMU, Duty did hisstudent teaching at Mt. Lebanon High School, where hetaught a class in TV production. “RMU’s education classeswere really helpful to me during that time,” he says. “Theyput us into different situations and showed us how to do alesson plan and how to deal with different types of students.It made easy transitioning from the corporate world toteaching.”Tiana DeLaRosa M’05, received both her BCIT certificationand a master’s in business administration from RMU in2005. Today she works as business and technology teacherat City High, teaching the Microsoft Office certification class.Previously, she worked in banking before deciding to go backto school at RMU.One of the reasons DeLaRosa chose RMU was its flexibility.“I liked the 8-week class schedule,” she says. “It allowedme to work full time while pursuing my degree andcertificate from RMU.”Like many people whochoose a secondcareer inteaching, DeLaRosa was worried what the students wouldbe like. But she soon found out that City High was special.“Teachers and students have better understanding here,”she says. “The interaction among the faculty is helpful,and, because of the positive environment here, the kidsare more tolerant of each other.“I also think the technology these kids are exposed to is areal advantage,” she adds. “and my RMU education reallyprepared me to work with today’s high-tech educationaltools.” Currently, City High has over 200 students with morethan 500 Core and Expert MOS certifications in MicrosoftWord, Excel, PowerPoint, Access, and Outlook.Perry Harrop M’08, is a technology teacher at City High.He received his certification from RMU in the fall of 2007and starting working at City High in the spring of 2008.Previously, he worked in accounting and finance as a CPAfor big corporations; however, after 21 years, he decidedto change careers. “I wanted to do something with kidsso that I could pass along my business knowledge,”says Harrop. “I didn’t have a lot of time, but I had somefriends who had completed RMU’s MBA program andreally liked the flexibility and accelerated programs. Plus,I knew I wanted a solid business education, so RMUturned out to be a great move for me.”Harrop fits right in at City High,which places an emphasison both personal andbusiness finance. “Thecourses they offer here,” he says,“you just can’t get anywhere else.When these kids graduate, they’re ready for the world.”Robert Mays is the 11th-grade business andtechnology teacher at City High. He received hisBCIT certification from RMU in the springof 2007, and is currently working on hismaster’s in business education.Before starting at City High inSept. 2008, Robert worked for twoyears with Mellon Financial’sspecial investments group inPittsburgh. He first became1 4 • W W W. R M U . E D U