First day!

Today is our first day in front of students. A big career decision, few years of planning, a big move, saving up and taking the required classes, and it's finally here.

I'm a little overwhelmed, but in a good way.

Deep breath and...

Union guy

Today, we were going through teacher orientation at OPRF, and as a part of that we had an opportunity to join the teachers union. It's not compulsory, but if we elect not to join we pay a "Fair Share" fee since the contract we signed had already been negotiated by the union. At least this is how I understand it.

The fair share fee is close enough to the annual union dues that it doesn't make much sense not to join, so here I am.

I never saw myself joining a union. I'm in a really alien world, and I guess it will take me a while to come to grips with it. It continues to be an interesting journey for sure.

Here we go!

I've signed a contract and I'm happy to announce that starting next week, I'll be teaching physics at Oak Park and River Forest High School in Oak Park, IL.

I have a great mentor and I can't wait to get started!

Jobs to go around?

Just a quick update on the jobs situation for my class.

There are 13 people in my class, one of which had a job already when she started. Of the 12 that remain, 6 have jobs now.

Considering that I was told by an Alt Cert alum that the offers wouldn't start coming in in earnest until I had a certificate (which none of us yet has), I guess 50% employment is pretty good. We'll see.

Dogs are barkin'...

This week, we spent Mon-Thurs teaching something called the Summer Sleuths, in partnership with the Illinois Math and Science Academy. Sleuths is a kind of science summer camp for students entering the 5th - 9th grade, and they spend 4 days investigating a problem developed specifically to teach kids about problem definition, research, critical thinking, data gathering and analysis, and presentation of results. You know - science. They are four very, very full days. And we were all really, really tired.

Comparing notes afterwards, we found that many of us had a similar thought: that if four days of this were so demanding, how on earth would we handle a full school year of it?

To our amusement, we found that we all rationalized our way to a list of reasons that this experience was actually more demanding than teaching a regular class, and that it wouldn't be so hectic once we got into our own classrooms. And we may have been right about some of that, but the conclusion is inescapable for the 13 of us in the class who are to become teachers: we're going to be working our asses off in our new careers.

That said, this week was simply awesome. I can't wait to start in the fall.

The fat is in the fire.

I've been offered a job at a large, suburban, public high school teaching five sections of physics, starting in the fall.

And I accepted.

My god, what have I done?

I commented to some people close to me that it's odd how years of planning, preparation and even anticipation of this moment still didn't fully prepare me for the shock of actually saying "yes" when offered a great position. I'm still reeling a bit, but this all just became a lot more real for me.

I don't "officially" have the job yet, since they can't legally hire someone without a certificate. But we do have an agreement that upon successful completion of the Alt Cert course at Benedictine, the job is mine. (So the school and I are not married yet, but we're engaged.) It seems quite solid - and by that I mean that they're very sincere and I have little doubt that this deal is all but done - but there's a little discomfort associated with not having a contract signed. Guess I better get used to a little discomfort regarding job security.

There are 13 people in my class at Benedictine, all following a similar path. So far (1.5 weeks into the 8-week class) only one other person and I have gotten jobs. I'm told that it's normal for so few to have jobs at this point in the summer. I trust the wisdom of the folks here since they've been doing this for more than a decade. But i'm VERY relieved to be in the position I'm in.

It's a far, far better thing that I did...

As a followup to my post on the physics content test, I'm very pleased to say that I've passed. As I suspected, I aced the physics portion and lost points on the earth science and biology parts. Not nearly enough to fail though, so onward and upward!

(At the very least, it's one less detail I have to worry about.)