Monday, February 6, 2012

Football and other revelations

Just saw the Super Bowl last night (well, most of it) and think we've almost figured out how the rules work. I just like being part of the fun even if we went to bed before the game was over. (And by the way, thank you all on Facebook for letting me know who won when I checked my phone this morning.)

From my discussion of the fiasco that is my job search, I’ve come to a final conclusion  - I'm giving up on the public schools. I graduated in 2003 and it's been nothing but an uphill battle no matter what teaching job I tried to get or hold on to. This is why I chose librarianship to begin with - having to teach to a test without any real inspiring or using literary and research skills is really not rewarding for me. (Especially when the main task of my job was to babysit kids.)

I recently spoke to the TDA who said I could ask for volunteer work on local schools to see if a head master will maybe be willing to employ me in the future so I can get my QTS. Newcastle University said before I apply for their PGCE program I have to have as much experience in the UK classroom as possible so most public schools will let me work for free if I'm going to apply for such a program.

Again, my experience and education mean nothing to potential employers. You either have QTS or you don't. I can see volunteering would be okay for a short while but if the college wants to to have as much experience on the UK as possible, how can I even be sure that after their whole admissions interview process that they would chose my 40 hours when some other applicants may have years of experience as a volunteer or sub? Then how's that going to be worth my effort?

If it were part of the college program, I could understand that too but it's not. Especially when this program is for post graduates who will be trained in schools. If the competition is this high too (only two local colleges - as well as select colleges with specific program subjects nationwide - offer this PGCE teacher training program) how can I even be sure anything I did was enough for them? If it's this hard to get in and they have a limited number of seats (and a second limit to international students) then it's honestly not worth the effort. The outrageous tuition prices have to be considered too after all this potential effort.

So with that final acceptance and understanding that I really do need to stop trying to make this career as an educator happen, I feel much relief. I can apply for jobs just as I normally would until something finally pops up.  Granted, it’s disheartening and frustrating to not have extra money for anything but there’s nothing I can really do about it. I’ll work on my projects at home and wait things out.

As I’m waiting things out, I see that the little bit of snow we had last week has already melted. We had a lovely little snow flurry on Saturday so we headed out after Tesco delivered the groceries (plus point for the UK – food is delivered in bulk). By the time we had left the Metrocentre (one of my favourite places ever) to IKEA, the snow had turned to freezing rain. As we waited on the taxi cab with Torkel (whom I am sitting in right now), it was snowing again. It was quite nice to drink Swedish coffee and watch the snow fall even if it only lasted for a few minutes and started just being ice again.

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