life choice alert

The ceremony tonight was great, or at least it would have been had it come three days ago. As it is, we’re all exhausted and thinking about lesson plans and mentally drafting application essays. So, I was a bit distracted - and of course I'm no better off than I was this evening.

After the ceremonies, I was chatting with some friends about our collabs and managed to miss getting on the first set of buses back to the ranch, and as we were waiting for a last bus to pick up the stragglers, I got word that the woman in charge of LA placements was looking for me. Just as the bus pulled up, we found each other, and she told me that a placement just opened up at a school downtown, that the principal is absolutely amazing, and that she’s scheduled an interview for me tomorrow morning.

It is a middle school.

The placement woman says that she pulled me for this interview because no one unplaced has a clear middle school preference, so she moved on to people who have no preference. Fine, but I marked a clear high school preference. So whatever, the paperwork is screwy. Point is, I have an interview tomorrow and it’s 50/50 that within the week I’ll have a placement in 7th/8th English/Social Studies. First of all...Social Studies? How does my English CSET qualify me to teach about manifest destiny? And second of all...7th and 8th grade? With the possible exception of 6th grade, those were the worst years of my life. Even doing my 8th grade observations exhausted me, and all I had to do was sit on a barstool for 4 hours and take notes.

Here it is, though. I have a high school preference because I love working with high schoolers. But before I got my last job, I had no idea that I would love working with high schoolers. So, I’m cognizant of the fact that I may fall in love all over again. I'm even finding that I'm open to the possibility. And while I thought the 9th grade classes I observed would be loads of fun to teach, I was really inspired by the 8th graders. Despite requiring an amazing amount of maintenance, I could see that they were incredibly bright and hungry for knowledge. They wanted to know everything, and they wanted to know it all now. Their teacher, who is here working at institute, had set the ambitious goal of having all of her students write well enough to pass the writing portion of the California State High School Exit Exam, affectionately abbreviated as the CAHSEE. Her kids were clearly so proud of that goal. They knew that high school was going to be no problem for them, and that if high school was no problem, then certainly life wouldn’t get any harder than that. Anyone who’s been around me this last month can tell you that I talk about that classroom all the time. In fact, I was just talking about it today in Literacy. I don’t think I’ve ever specifically mentioned the 9th graders.

There are two of us interviewing tomorrow, and I really do have the option of throwing this one. I’d still get placed, and the worst case scenario is me ending up at a different middle school. But I don’t think I want to do that. I think I want to walk in there, best foot forward, and see if this thing is meant to be.