I sat impatiently at the window, waiting for my sister-in-law to pull into the driveway. She was picking up the Kiddo for a weekend visit to his grandmother’s house. Once they were gone, I would be able to leave. I had everything ready, because I am a worrywart and a total dork. I had gotten up at 7:30, on a Saturday no less, so that I would have more than adequate time to get my hair done, makeup done, and find all the clothes I needed. I had my very first ever job fair to go to, and I was a nervous wreck – as usual. By 9:30, I was ready and sitting at the window in the office, impatient for the in-laws to get here already.
We have killer road maintenance going on in the neighborhood, making it difficult to get around. Plus, the little league opening day parade had blocked the main street through town, so the ILs were running just a wee bit late. Once they got here and got gone again, the nerves started to get to me. At 10, I finally decided that I’d procrastinated enough, and I got the heck out of the house. It’s a good thing, too, because it took me close to an hour to get to the administrative building of the district holding the job fair. They had everything organized in a sensible way. Elementary schools this way, high schools up stairs, and junior highs over to the right. Once inside the conference room for the junior high schools, I took a moment to acclimate myself to what was going on. The room had tables set up around the perimeter. Each table represented a junior high and was decorated in the school’s colors. Behind each table sat three to four representatives from the school. A woman standing just inside the door asked me what certification areas I was interested in. She told me there were two schools looking for math teachers. The one closest to me, BJS, had a line going out the door, and they were only looking for one math teacher. The other, HJS, was across the room, but only had a handful of people waiting in line, and they were looking for two math teachers. That’s where I decided to start.
It was a long wait. The system at this table worked like this: Approach the table from one end, fill in the sign-in sheet. The representative at this end of the table takes your resume and scans over it to see where you need to go. She will point you to one of the other two representatives sitting beyond her at the table. This next representative takes the form you were given to fill out when you first walked into the building, plus your resume, and begins to ask you a series of questions. Why do you want to work for this district? What kinds of classroom management techniques do you feel work best? Why do you want to teach in your academic field? Etc. This person is the “screener,” and when she is done asking you questions, she will give you a green dot to stick on your name tag, so that everyone else you speak with knows you’ve been screened. When my turn finally came to be screened, the screener asked me the first question, why do I want to teach for this district, and then began flipping through my portfolio packet. She made a couple of comments about my education (“Oh, you went straight through Lee and UHCL. That’s very good.”), and started asking me about my current jobs. She was very interested in the fact that I am currently subbing for my local district. Again, she interrupted herself, looked at me and asked me to excuse her for a moment, then leaned back in her chair to speak to the first woman sitting at the table – the one manning the sign-in sheet. She was using my resume/portfolio packet to block their faces, but I could still hear what they were saying.
“She’s already in the classroom.”
“Right, so she’s not in for any surprises.”
“And she went straight through, and look at this.”
I don’t know what “this” was, but I suspect it was either my certification test scores, or my grades. When my screener lowered my packet so that I could see her face again, she asked me what grades I had subbed for so far this semester. After I gave her my answer (everything from 4th through 9th grade, and every subject), she asked me to take a seat to the side, and said she’d be right back with Ms. Somebody. I couldn’t for the life of me remember the names of people that day. After a few minutes, she came back with a very tall, beautiful woman, who introduced herself as Ms. Somebody (still couldn’t hold on to it). This woman took me back to a smaller office and proceeded to interview me for the next half-hour. Her questions ranged from what resources I think I have at my disposal as a struggling, first year teacher, to how I would handle a student who simply refused to work for me. I kept at the front of my mind that all issues regarding a student should involve the parents before I involve the principal (unless it’s a kid who is being physically threatening, but we didn’t get into those scenarios). My interviewer and I had a very good rapport going by the end of the interview and we were actually laughing with each other a little. It was the most intense interview I’ve ever gone through, but it was immensely satisfying as well. I was very happy with how I handled myself, with my composure, and with my responses to questions. There was not a single answer I gave that day, that I went home berating myself over.
Once she had run out of official questions, she asked me a few of her own (continually making notes about my answers on a very long piece of paper), asked me if I had any questions for her, and then dropped the bombshell. “If I were able to offer you a letter of intent to hire today, would you consider signing it or would you need time to think about it?” I sat back in the chair and thought for a moment. I had fallen asleep the night before with this prayer: “Father, I do not know where you are leading me and I am a very blind child. Please help me to know, beyond the shadow of a doubt, where you want me to work. If I am not supposed to work for the district I’m going to see tomorrow, make it obvious. Don’t let them offer me a position, or let all of the math positions be taken already. Or, make me extremely uncomfortable with the people I speak with. Just make it obvious, or I won’t understand what you’re saying.” I couldn’t conceive of a clearer message than a job offer, so that settled it. I told her that I would certainly consider signing a letter of intent that day, if they chose to offer one to me.
From there, I was escorted into a holding area. This was not where the majority of the job seekers were waiting. The other people in this area had also been offered potential letters of intent. This wait seemed eternal, but my interviewer did eventually come back, and she did so with the woman who guarded the sign-in sheet. Turns out, the sign-in sheet lady is the school secretary. Instead of offering me a letter that day, they asked me to call the school Monday to schedule a time to come in and tour the campus and meet the team I would be working with. The secretary gave me her card and that was that.
Monday morning, a little after nine, I called the school and was given the secretary’s voicemail. I was disappointed, but still left a message. I had nothing else to do until I had to go to LC that night, so I simply sat by the phone and waited for a call back. About ten minutes after I left my message, I got a call from the school. The woman who interviewed me (she gave me her name again, and this time I was smart enough to write it down) was calling, and she asked if I could come in that day at two to sign the letter of intent. I asked about meeting with the team, but she said it wouldn’t be necessary unless I really felt that I should. I would have had to be at the school in less than an hour to meet them, so I declined.
At 1:30, I arrived at the school, sat in the car for as long as I could stand, and eventually went in. I signed the letter, toured the school, met with a handful of my future coworkers and was done by 2:30. I won’t need to go back until the background checks and reference checks come back.
To make it clear: I have a job as a teacher!!! I will be the newest 7th grade math teacher at HJS in one of the highest paying districts in this area. I keep telling myself that I have an actual job as an actual teacher, but it hasn’t really gotten through yet. But I’m excited, and I can’t wait for August to get here!
When I was in my first semester at Lee College, I knew I wanted to be a teacher. I was going to school to be a teacher, and I knew that I wanted to teach junior high math. I had this idea in the back of my head that 7th grade would be a great place to start, never thinking that I would actually get it. I talked to many people while I was in school, and the overall impression was that the district that hired me is a good place for new teachers to start. They have an established mentor program, they actively work with my alternative program, the other 7th grade teachers will be working with me as a team, and the assistant principal (the one who interviewed me, by the way!) is in total support of her new teachers, especially the ones who have never taught before. She told me that they had received an unusually high number of math applicants. She qualified most of them as “good” applicants, meaning that they wanted to teach math and math only, instead of being willing to take whatever the district would offer. She said that she wasn’t interested in someone who was willing to teach anything. She wanted to hire teachers who were committed to teaching their academic specialty. It was the commitment she was looking for, not just a willingness to do whatever the district asked. That I was chosen amongst such competition is an honor.
My only problem now is what to do with the 39 portfolios I suddenly don’t need. What a waste of paper and ink! And effort! Gah!
