"You think you know ... but you have no idea." This is my journey

* This morning, as I was typing in my personal journal, I had the intentions of debating my recent decisions...whether I made the right choice? Whether I am ready for this? Can I stick with it? After all that has happened to me since March of this year, I was ready to throw my hands in and say "the hell with it all". However, as evident as it is in my blog, my passion lies in education. I was hoping to do something else within the realm of education; yet, it is teaching I missed the most. I missed the interactions I had with my kids. I missed working with some of my colleagues, particularly those who were like-minded. I missed just being inside of a school house. While I don't missed everything about the job, I missed the essence of what teachers do: share knowledge, meet new people, instill the value of an educated mind, and make a difference one child at a time. I feel like the biblical prophet Jonas. Well, this is my way of acknowledging the fact I need to stop running and face the music. Below is most of my journal entry for today; of course, I amended it to remove any incriminating or "TMI" pieces...LOL. Anyhoo, enjoy...*

11-7-10

Fall back! Meaning set your clock one hour back; Daylight Saving Time begins today. I know working folks appreciated an extra hour of sleep. I guess it is also time for me to fall back myself and be honest with myself.

For the past month and a half, well, since I’ve returned from my last trip in early October, I have been in a slump. While some of the trips I have taken were to seek new opportunities elsewhere and others were for leisure purposes, I realized now that I have been running away from my calling, which was teaching. I guess it really began to hit home when I noticed many of the education bloggers I followed are still in the classroom. Plus, the more I wrote about education, the more I missed being a teacher in the classroom.

Despite the public ridicule we now face in our profession, what we teachers do is not expendable and highly noble. In my heart, I believe we teachers will be ready to fight when the time is right. Many are taking out their frustration via blogging and other forms of writings. While that is great, it is not enough to force our nay-sayers to take us seriously. Nevertheless, once every teacher begins to see the big risk of privatizing public education, they will act. I just hope it won’t be too late.

Then I have my own personal fears and inept. Have I been a competent teacher? Was I always dealt a bad hand with my classroom assignments? When I reminiscence on how I was my first two years of teaching to what I was last year, I can say “not always” to both questions. I know I have experienced growth during my ten years of teaching; otherwise, I wouldn’t have stuck it out as long as I did. Yet, last school year was not a good year; I made some mistakes and wore my frustrations on my sleeves.

I am a type of person who internalizes so much and when I have had enough, I begin to act out. That’s what’s happened to me last school year; I was unproductive because I have had enough. I couldn’t do my job knowing I was being screwed in the ass by my superiors in district office and by our teacher union association leadership; in addition, the teachers at my school site, and statewide in general, were complacent as hell. How much abuse can one take? Plus, I remember our state teachers association sponsored a march earlier this year to protest upcoming budget cuts at the state capitol. It should have been packed full of outraged teachers. It was on a cold, windy Saturday afternoon in February. Plus, during and later that day, I became sick as a dog. Yet I still came out. Considering what was at stake, the turnout was horrible. A few weeks prior, a large group of college students convened at the state capitol to protest against budget cuts in higher education; they had a larger turnout than we did. To me, that says a lot!
         Consequently, I indirectly took my frustrations out on my kids... My heart wasn’t in it anymore. Anyway, after that fiasco [which I refused to talk about publicly], I was on medical leave the following week and have yet since returned to the classroom. While I don’t regret leaving the district and the school, I do regret downplaying my calling by running away from it. Now, I am about to turn 37, Lord willing; I have to do better than this.

Perhaps, I did need the break... Yet I don’t regret leaving my job. Maybe a new setting would be good, even if it is in a familiar place. Right now, I am planning to seek employment in Georgia or in Louisiana. About a week ago, I spoke to my good friend and former colleague who is now a recruiter for one of the school districts in my hometown of New Orleans. She shared with me that the school district is seeking to hire displaced teachers from Katrina. She also stated that we may be awarded a stipend for moving expenses. That’s what up! It would be cool if I can get the money and start over... We will see what happened. Despite this, I feel like I am moving backward than forward. I hate being in Atlanta and home in New Orleans. While Atlanta is more progressive than New Orleans, it and the whole state of Georgia have some ass-backward politics and policies. However, as of right now, these are my two options since I am already certified in both states...

...Then there is graduate school. I so hate it now. My heart is not into it due to the real reason why I went back. During that time, I was bored out of my mind. I didn’t have any social life. After I broke up with my last boyfriend, I doused myself in graduate school. I was hungry for a Master’s degree. I worked hard for it and it paid off, graduating on time with a 4.0 GPA overall, even after having an emergency surgery done. Afterward, I was left with nothing else meaningful to do. So I applied to another graduate program at a different school to make up for the free time at the beginning of last school year. I didn’t see the problems that were forthcoming. From the recurring problems with the new student database system to the corruption unfolding at central office to our local association incumbent leadership won their positions back in a shady election process (I should know because I was on the election committee), I became overwhelmed with all of this, plus meeting my professional duties and becoming accumulated with a new graduate program for a doctorate degree. Now I don’t want it anymore. So I will settle for a specialist degree and say “deuces” to it all. My heart was never really into the program since the beginning.

A few days ago, I realized that I will be finished with my specialist degree before next school year begins. This is great news; when I return back to work, I can be more focus on re-learning and improving on my craft. Actually, I need to work on that like now. I will plan on doing some tutorials for the time being. They always need tutors, especially veteran teachers like me.

Whew! I finally have a plan! I will get back on my feet. You wait and see…

*In closing, I want to thank all of the educators who blog/write about the ups and downs of our beloved profession. All of you have inspired me in one form or another. Keep doing what you're doing. But if you can, do more to make it known to the masses that we teachers deserved to be respected as professionals. Only we can fight for the integrity of our profession. Fight on!*