What happens when I'm alone at lunch time

I made a pretty drastic decision last Friday. I did it during lunch. Usually I eat lunch with Christina and Blair (and more recently Mr. Bowman). Last Friday Christina and Bowman were actually doing work so I took my spinach and two peices of fruit and wandered back down to my room to think heavy thoughts.

Before I get to the heavy thoughts, lets rewind a bit.


Wednesday (of the week before): I interviewed at KIPP 3D charter school. I have to admit, it was super sweet. I'd been there before to observe and liked what I saw. I like the English team (something that is vitally important to me since I'm still working on earning that "plays well with others" label on my report card), I like the principal and his honesty a lot. I liked the offer. English and Journalism. Ohmygoshthatwouldbeawesome.

Monday: I went to Wilson Elementary School to meet with the principal and the coordinator. I had contacted Wilson because they are a Montessori magnet program that is starting a middle school next year. Wilson is a beautiful school that is truly a wonderful environment. I'm a big fan of Montessori for the simple fact that I was Montessori baby (I still miss my carpet square). I think the concept is genius for low income kids because it requires so much self-direction and self-paced instruction.

So anyway, I liked them and they seemed to like me. My day was not nearly done after that meeting. I hopped a plane to New Orleans for a marathon interview day on Tuesday. When I got to New Orleans I had a phone interview for a summer institute job with TFA. It was not so fun. I hate phone interviews. I also hate role playing. On my phone interview I got to role play.

Tuesday: TFA doesn't like to do anything sparingly. It's not enough to do a two hour interview with three people. Oh no, we are TFA, you must interview from 7:30 to 4 p.m. including four different interviews with at least half a dozen different people. Needless to say my brain and my smile hurt after all of that. They asked me at the interview if I would be interested in any other TFA jobs other than the recruitment job I was there interviewing for. I told them yes and before the end of the day I had an email about anther position.

Wednesday: I got the job at KIPP! It was pretty great to hear Dan tell me that when he called my references the word natural came up more than once. I told him I had to wait for the TFA offer, but that I would be in touch.

Lets bring it back round to Friday at lunch...

I had been thinking since I got back from New Orleans that I was wanting to stay in the classroom for next year. Talking about TFA and my commitment to education made me realize that I'm just not done. Of course I had this realization and then the competitive side of me decided to squash it down and tell me to wait until I heard from all the other schools and TFA.

Lame.

Someone pretty smart told me that at the end of my life there won't be a score. True dat.

So I'd been praying and contemplating and had been stumbling over some verses and some thoughts and suggestions that were leading me to see that my worth should not be placed in job offers or my competitive nature. KIPP was a great thing and they were offering me what I want and I was waiting because I wanted an ego boost. No good. No good at all. So when Christina and Bowman were all talking about Texas History and I found myself alone with my thoughts I realized that it was time to stop waiting and get on with where God was leading me. So I emailed Dan and took the job. Then I emailed TFA and withdrew from the running. Then I emailed YES (the other schools) and Wilson and withdrew from those jobs too.

So now I'm teaching 5th grade Reading and starting a journalism program at KIPP for next year. It's going to be a great thing. It's amazing what you can do in a single lunch period.