Nearly six years ago, Nathan Christian went with the basketball team to state championships. In the 2013-2014 school year, his father Nathanial ‘Dean’ Christian became head coach for the same team.

“It was the first job I wanted,” Christian said. “Because of Plano’s age, there is a real deep tradition and incredible sense of community.”

For the last three years, Coach Christian worked with the McKinney Boyd boys’ basketball team to take them to the state tournament. He noticed some differences between the students at both schools.

“When you have freshmen and sophomores, the atmosphere is different,” Christian said. “The maturity of the students here is why we’re able to have an open campus.”

Before coaching for high school, Christian coached for Dartmouth, Southern Methodist University and the Air Force Academy. However, he said working at the collegiate level held him nack from both reaching his goal of becoming head coach and making an impact on the students.

“In high school, people are still figuring out what to do and where to go,” Christian said. “I want to use my privileged background to be a consultant for people at this age.”

His job experience not only includes his time coaching, but his time serving the Air Force as well. He, his son and his father all served in the military.

“I got to see different parts of the country, different countries and get a great education,” Christian said.

Christian said the life he enjoyed as a ‘military brat’ encouraged him to join the military himself. He served for 22 years in the air force, flying missions for conflicts such as Iraq.

“It was pretty challenging,” Christian said. “But I am honored and humbled to serve my country.”

Now, the job he has serves people in a different way. In addition to his duties as basketball coach, he is in charge of the Partner’s P.E. program, which allows special needs students to pair up with other students in order to fulfill their gym requirement. Junior Harmony Ford, one partner, said she thinks Christian is a good match for the class.

“He’s always walking around laughing with people,” Ford said. “He just seems so happy, everyone gets happy around him.”