One of the many new additions to the faculty and staff, Ms. Jade Horn brings fresh energy and and undeterred passion for Nikola Tesla to the physics wing.

Q: Is there anything you want students to know about you?
A: They can come up and ask me questions. Especially, students that are mine, I want them to be able to approach me and just have a conversation, even if it’s not related to physics, you can come up and talk to me, and that’s okay. I think a lot of students are kind of afraid to come up and talk to their teachers. We enjoy having conversations with y’all.

Q: What drew you to the field of science?
A: Oh, it’s amazing. I mean, everything is based on science. Just figuring out how anything ticks and being able to take it apart and put it back together to get a better understanding of it, that’s what drives me.

Q: Why did you choose a career in teaching?
A: Lots of reasons. It started out when I was younger, I had a lot of teachers who told me I would be a good teacher. From second grade I had teachers telling me that, but then as I got older I realized that I really like helping people work through problems and helping them to understand something. Whenever you see that light come on it’s awesome and it’s an amazing feeling to know you helped someone realize how something works. Science specifically has always been fascinating to me and to share that passion that I have for it with other people is why I got into teaching science.

Q: What were you doing before you came to Vista?
A: I grew up in Wichita Falls, TX, that’s where I went to college and I taught two years there. I taught biology, IPC, and physics there. I left in 2014 and worked at Lake Travis (Austin) teaching chemistry for a year before I came to Vista.

Q: If you could go back in time and meet any scientist, who would it be and why?
A: Nikola Tesla. I love Tesla, he’s amazing. He was so beyond his time with his ideas that I think to sit down and have a conversation with him, from my perspective of being from 2015, and just seeing what he thinks of how life is now and describing that to him would be an amazing conversation. He also had a lot of quirks, which a lot of people don’t really know, but he raised pigeons and was super OCD. He said he was married to a pigeon for a while and he had a thing about women wearing pearls. He hated it. He said they made his teeth grind on edge, for some reason. So, being able to talk to him and see the duality of his mind and how incredibly intelligent he was, juxtapositioned with all these little quirks and ticks would be so cool.

Q: Do you have any advice for students who want to pursue a degree or career in science?
A: Take all the science classes that you possibly can, even if you don’t think they’ll be interesting, because you’ll be amazed at what you learn from those. Also, just talk to people, especially those interested in science, but also other specific areas you’re interested in as well. So, have conversations with people and try out a bunch of different things before you settle on one, because you may figure out you have a passion that you didn’t even know about.