A resident of Central Florida’s Tampa Bay area since 1978, Jim is a freelance graphic designer and a partially disabled military veteran of the Army and Coast Guard. He is a seasoned military veteran that is seeking an entry-level career change in the field of Graphic Design and Print Production, Office Management, or Education. Jim has excellent communication, office management, and computer hardware/software skills. He is both Mac and PC literate.

Jim desires to successfully transfer a record of distinguished military achievements into a record of distinguished civilian achievements.

Jim served honorably in 4 military branches - Active Army, Active Coast Guard, Army Reserve, Air National Guard, and Navy Reserve.

Honored as one of the Army's top five recruits for the year 1981, Jim accepted a conditional 4 year West Point scholarship upon successful completion of West Point's Preparatory School. Upon resignation of his scholarship to pursue marriage and family life, Jim was deployed to a U.S./NATO nuclear missile site in the mountains of West Germany. Jim quickly accepted a supervisory role as his unit's Acting Personnel Security Manager involving Top Secret two-man control nuclear access material, custodial care of classified documents, and personnel security clearance requests and revocations for all members of his team.

Upon return stateside, Jim was immediately selected to attend leadership school at the Fort Bliss, Texas, Non-Commissioned Officer’s Academy where he graduated with highest honors as top dog in his class. After then serving as his brigade’s Enlisted Evaluations Records clerk for managing all NCO evaluations for his brigade and four lower-level battalions, Jim jumped ship to get a taste of the open seas with the Coast Guard.

Jim served nine months aboard the Coast Guard Cutter Cherokee in Norfolk, Virginia, where his ship was commended for drug interception operations in the Caribbean and for assisting the Navy in recovering wreckage from the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster. He was then sent to Radioman school in Petaluma, California, where he graduated with honors and with certification as a High Speed Morse Code operator. During the last few months of school, Jim and his wife suffered an emotional setback with the loss of their newborn daughter to lung disease.

Rather than pursuing a hardship discharge out of the military, Jim accepted a two and a half year assignment to Coast Guard Group Ohio River in Owensboro, Kentucky, which soon merged with another office into Group Ohio Valley and relocated to Louisville. Jim operated one-man and two-man radio telecommunication centers with 18 remote radio towers for monitoring marine band radio for emergency distress over the Ohio and Tennessee River valleys (approximately 2500 miles of river coverage). In addition to daily response to life threatening emergencies, as well as search and rescue missions at all levels of government response, Jim was one of several golden voices that broadcasted daily marine information broadcasts, river stages, and boating safety advisories to recreational and commercial boaters.

From Kentucky, Jim was selected to attend the Marine Science Technician school in Yorktown, Virginia, where he was trained in synoptic meteorology and oceanography. After graduating his class with high honors, Jim was assigned to the National Response Center (NRC) in Washington, D.C., where he served as an Assistant Duty Officer for his last two years of military service. While at the NRC, Jim assisted his office in processing over a quarter of a million yearly telephonic reports of hazardous chemical spills and discharges into the environment, train accidents and derailments, school bus accidents, pipeline oil spills on land and in the Gulf of Mexico, and other governmental emergencies for the Environmental Protection Agency and twelve other branches of federal government.

After discharge from the Coast Guard, Jim spent the next five years or so stabilizing his deteriorating physical disabilities and adjusting to life outside the military. Jim then signed up with the Army Reserve, again, to pursue a path leading to a medical commission. While in Combat Medic school at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, Texas, Jim re-injured himself and was forced to end his military career. Out of a graduating class of 347 medic students, Jim finished 6th in a three way tie for 4th place academically, but he was unable to take a physical fitness test to move on to Nursing school.

After spending the next six years as a Tactical Security Officer involving labor strike disputes and corporate security for nationwide clientele, Jim finally received a partial physical disability through the Veterans Administration. With the financial assistance of the VA’s Vocational Rehabilitation program, Jim pursued a Bachelor’s degree in the field of graphic art and digital design from the International Academy of Design and Technology in Tampa, Florida. Jim graduated Summa Cum Laude with a 3.98 GPA in March of 2004, and he is presently available for hire or freelance contract out of his Tampabay area home.

Jim's last security job was as a Site Captain supervisor for St. Moritz Security Services, Inc. at the Seminole Electric Cooperative headquarters in Tampa, Florida where he worked from 2006 to 2009.