Bio
Megan is high jumping into life!
After graduating from OLL in 2007, Megan went onto Manhattan College. A Division 1 track and field athlete, she specialized in the high jump and competed in triple jump and various other events at conference championship meets. Her personal best at that time was 1.75 meters. Megan graduated in 2011 with a Bachelor’s of Science and a NYS teaching certification in Dual General and Special Education grades 1 - 6.
The day after her graduation from Manhattan, Megan flew to Loveland, Colorado to work as a wrangler on a ranch. After a long day of ranch work, she often kept up training with hill runs and drills on the dirt ranch roads.
At the end of the summer of 2011, Megan returned to New York. She began working at an elementary school in the South Bronx and enrolled in a Master’s program for Special Education. As a full time teacher and a part time grad student, Megan trained by herself every night, trying to improve her high jump personal best.
In the spring of 2013, Megan joined the Central Park Track Club and was fortunate enough to have some great coaching. She was jumping well and looked as if she was going to jump 1.83m. Right before her first meet, Megan was injured in a warm up practice. Despite the injury, she attempted the meet and was able to jump 1.80m from jogging 5 steps away. She ended the season, earned her Master’s and set her sights west to California.
Megan picked a spot by the beach on google maps, left her job, packed her life, including her dog, into her Corolla. She picked up her co-pilot Sarah Johnson (also an OLL graduate) and they hit the road.
Once in California, Megan began teaching and training again. She trained before and after teaching, on her own, whenever she could access a track or a high jump pit. Megan was able to jump 1.85m which qualified her to compete for Ireland (where she holds dual citizenship), in the European Championships held in Greece during the summer of 2015. In her first international meet, Megan was able to jump 1.80m and placed 4th out of 12 countries.
Megan realized that with more training, there was a good possibility that she could qualify for the summer Olympics in Rio 2016. Taking a chance, she again hit the road and headed for a training facility in Florida. Megan is working hard at attaining her goal of being an Olympic Competitor!
