Rainy Saturday Breakfast

Hey guys!

I went out with a few of the girls from work yesterday when we got done for the day. I had a margarita and split an order

of spinach dip with a friend. I also had a glass of wine when I got home because Hubby suprised me with a bottle and Cadburry eggs. Yum!  He's so sweet. 

Today I am a little hung over and my fingers and toes are a little swollen. I must be getting old!  

Here's my hungover breakfast:

Peanut butter and banana toast with milk. 

I also see a giant cup of coffee in my future!

It's supposed to be rainy all weekend, so I plan to clean the house and go grocery shopping- my favorite chore!- today and then work on my teaching portfolio tomorrow. 

Now for some work mussing to go with the gloomy weather:

My job is confusing. The goods are really good and the bass are really bad. And up until recently the goods have always outweighed the bad. This is my third year at my current school and I haven't been as happy this year, for a lot of different reasons. 

Firstly, the woman who'd been my neighbor for two years moved out of state. We'd started at the school at the same time and were really comrades in arms after all we'd been through together. Then the school promoted from within someone who has no business being a math teacher. Can't teach and no classroom management skills. And it's right next door so I hear the pandamonium going on over there through the wall. The students are unhappy, the parents are unhappy, and a lot of it bleeds over. 

Then, at the end of the first quarter, there was an abrupt announcement that teachers would no longer be provided lunches. The meal program at the school really is fantastic, and it was always a big perk of the job.  It seems that the school had hired an accountant who was really incompetent (she had already been fired at this point) and the school had a lot less money than it thought. So they decided to take it out on the teachers. 

And so many people are leaving at the end of the year: the Head of School is moving to Singapore to teach, the Assistant Head got a job in another state, his wife teaches special ed and is moving too, the head teacher might also go to Singapore, and three teachers are retiring. Yikes!!  It makes me think that it might be a good time to at least consider my options. 

This is all on top of a challenging environment. I work with a very overpriveledged group of kids who can do whatever they want at home, can do whatever they want in several other classes, and then come to me, where there has to be order and structure in order to run a safe, effective science lab. So even though my "big" class only has 17 students, it's very challenging because they don't want to listen, work collaboratively, or even sit down because they're never required to anywhere else. 

Plus when I sit down and think about why I went into teaching: to help make the world a better place and make a difference, I can't help but wonder if I'm doing any of that working with such a high socioeconomic group.   In the past, I've worked with students where I KNOW their lives are going to turn out better because I worked with them. And here?  These kids, as much as I love them, have every resource in the universe at their fingertips. They are all going to be okay regardless of who their teachers are. 

So I actually applied for another job on Thursday.  It's back in the public school district where I used to work. I left at the height of the economic crisis when schools were really being hammered and I just couldn't take any more. But funding is turning around, and the new superintendent brought back class caps (limits on how many students can be in a class), raised teacher pay, and reimplemented the pay steps (guaranteed small raises each year).  I didn't have a single pay raise in the four years I worked there before, not even a cost of living adjustment. It would still mean taking a very small pay cut, but factoring in the better health benefits and retirement plan would more than make up for it. 

The application was for the science teacher pool. I did it years ago. You interview with a pannel of principals and teach a five minute lesson. If they accept you, then you're guaranteed a science teacher job for the next year.  I don't know what I will decide ultimately but it seems smart to a least look at all my options for next year. 

Wow!  That felt pretty serious, but it also felt really good to get all that out. So here's a Fashion Friday update to make up for venting to you guys:

Navy Ann Taylor cotton scoop neck sweater with heather grey stretch slacks from Express, my kitten heeled faux snakeskin pumps, and blue and green beads from Target.