Shannon Jones

Student

“The teachers here are the best. They’re funny and they teach in an exciting way that helps you capture stuff in your head and remember it.”

Shannon Jones came to the study of Japanese in a rather interesting way. “I’m a great collector of Japanese animation,” he explains. “During the mid 80s, there was this robot craze and I just fell in love with the art. I started collecting books, posters, comics; a ton of stuff.” Shannon has taken several classes in Japanese and plans to continue them. “I’ve got a Japanese pen pal I write to once a month,” he says. “And I’d like to be able to write whole letters to her in Japanese.” But just now, Shannon is bearing down hard in the SMC library to prepare for a career in x-ray technology.

“I really didn’t have much of an idea about what I wanted to do when I got here. But that changed last summer,” says Shannon. “I’ve got a cousin who’s an x-ray technician at UCLA and she really influenced me. She took me with her to work and showed me the process of x-raying people. And I thought, ‘Wow! This is doing medicine! This is really cool!’” So Shannon is pushing on with his required classes with an eye on transferring to UCLA.

Shannon also works part time as a theater usher to help put himself through school. “The shows at night are when the big business is. And then, when the theater empties,” he says with a laugh, “they have us cleaning up like dogs.” Shannon expects working as a technician in a hospital to be a vast improvement. “Working as an x-ray technician is a secure career,” he says. “You don’t get laid off like you do in other jobs. You meet a lot of people that you can help and—who knows?—maybe even make some pretty good money.”

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