Michelle Guta, nursing instructor

Q: Is this your first semester at EC?

A: “I’ve been here since the fall of 2012, but I’m full-time since January of this year.”

Q: Why did you choose EC to be full-time?

A: “I really love teaching, so I wanted to do this full-time instead of just part-time. When you’re part-time, you usually just go to the clinical sites with the students. When you’re full-time, you get to be in the classroom with them too, and I like that.”

Q: How is working at the Providence Little Company of Mary Medical Center in Torrance?

A: “I’ve been working there for five years, and I worked there full-time before I got this full-time job. Now I only work there one day a week. I started as a new graduate there; now, I am a charge nurse and have been for the last two years. If I take on more teaching, I may leave that job, but right now it’s a good way to keep in touch.”

Q: What do you enjoy about teaching?

A: I see students learning, especially when I teach a class. They go to a clinic, and apply the concepts that they learned. I like it when I see them having a lightbulb moment. They’re the future population of nurses. So when they take care of me, I want them to be good.”

Shiny Johnson, nursing instructor

Q: Why did you choose EC to work full-time?

A: “I know everyone (and) the curriculum. it’s flexible and easy to work here and at the hospital.”

Q: What’s it like having this teaching job and being at the hospital?

A: “It’s busy, but it keeps me current with my skills.”

Q: What message do you try to send out to your students?

A: “That there is no substitution for hard work. You have to study hard, because I teach pre-ethics that’s four weeks (long). It’s a lot to cover, so they have to work hard to get through.”

Q: What do you enjoy the most about teaching?

A: “I have a passion for teaching, and it’s like a learning experience to me. Also, I learn through teaching. When I see the response and the result of teaching, it’s all the more rewarding.”

Nicholas McGrue, law instructor

Q: Why did you choose EC to teach?

A: “I don’t know if I was nervous or excited, but I came to the interview an hour early on accident. So I had time to walk around the campus, and I liked the college feel that it had. I just really liked what I saw with the students.”

Q: What is your focus in teaching?

A: “I want it to be fun, because it’s very interesting. Also, I want to state the importance of at least knowing the basics, because the law is around us all the time. At least knowing a little bit is very powerful.”

Q: What are you enjoying the most about EC so far?

A: “One of the cool things I like the most is the diversity here. Race, interests, education levels and age differences, it keeps everything new and interesting.”