Tuesday, February 24, 2009
My Favorite Commercial
It makes me laugh out loud. I love Sonic -- who wants to drive out to Aurora?
Monday, February 23, 2009
My Favorite Part of Oscar Night...
This speech by Dustin Lance Black made me cry. It was definitely the highlight of the evening.
I actually watched the whole damn broadcast, which I haven't done in a billion years, if ever. But nothing else was on, and Hideo would not go to sleep, so I just kept watching. Thank God my friend ButterNugget was live-blogging - that made it more entertaining.
It also helped that Robert Pattinson was in attendance (thanks, ButterNugget for posting a pic for me!). I know that I am a grown woman and not a 14 year old girl, but he makes me swoon a little. And I'm not alone -- all the women in my sister's office are atwitter by the Twilight series, and his performance in the movie. Sigh.
The sad part (other than the Robert Pattinson thing)is that I think I only saw a couple of movies that were nominated for anything. I saw Wall-E, which I loved, and Kung Fu Panda, which was cute. I think I saw something else, but I can't remember right now.
Monday, February 09, 2009
This is Why I Teach Where I Do
People who are not teachers for Chicago Public Schools often enjoy hearing my horror stories about my job. After one anecdote or another, they inevitably ask why I don't work for a better school. Or they wonder if I have tried to get a job at a better school. As if working in a substandard school, labeled a "drop-out factory" by Johns Hopkins University, was my dream while in graduate school.
This article from the Chicago Tribune sums it up nicely. There are too many damn teachers in Chicago -- and the rest of the state of Illinois.
When I finally decided to get my masters and my teaching certificate, I was a bit concerned about where I might get a job. I went back to school in 2001 -- by then the tech market had collapsed and already schools were slashing their budgets.
I was jealous of my brother-in-law, because he had completed the MAT program in secondary education a couple of years before I did. When he was looking for jobs, he regularly got phone calls from principals across the nation asking him to interview. Schools were offering signing bonuses. It was a good time to be a teacher.
That was not the case for me. I had decided I didn't want to teach in Arkansas, although I definitely could have gotten a job at a really good school in the state. But I wanted to live in a big city -- or at least a bigger city.
I started researching which cities were hiring teachers. As far as I could tell, New York City, Cincinnati, Chicago, and Las Vegas were the cities who seemed to be doing the most hiring.
I had never been to New York City and didn't know anyone there, so that didn't seem a good idea. And I knew I'd never be able to afford it. Plus, being the Southern gal that I am, I wasn't sure I was up to living someplace that seemed so far removed from what I was accustomed to. That's a whole lot of Yankees crammed into one place.
Las Vegas didn't interest me, either. So that left Cincinnati or Chicago. I applied to both school districts online. I got a phone call from Cincinnati the next day, wanting to schedule an interview. Spring break was coming up, so I decided I would spend my spring break in Cincinnati.
A day or so later, I got an email from a dear friend of mine that he was moving to Chicago, and I should move there, too. I did want to know at least one person in whatever city I chose, so this seemed a good omen. Then I got an email from Nancy Slavin, the CPS teacher recruitment manager. She had received my application and asked if I had any questions.
Through talking to her I found out that Illinois has different teaching requirements than Arkansas, and that I would have to take the Illinois teacher tests. They were offering the tests the week of my spring break. There was also a teacher job fair that week. So it seemed like I needed to go to Chicago for spring break instead of Cincinnati. Ms. Slavin helped get me registered for the teacher tests and the job fair. I called Cincinnati and canceled my interview with them.
The teacher tests -- a basic skills test and the English content test -- were pretty easy. The job fair, however, was a revelation. Never had I seen so many teacher candidates crammed into a space. There were thousands of us there. And we were all standing in long lines to talk to principals and assistant principals sitting at tables.
I knew it was bad, when I realized I was standing in a line that was at least fifty people long, and we were waiting to talk to the principal of Nancy Jefferson High School. Nancy Jefferson High School is the school for Cook County Juvenile Detention Center. I didn't know this until I got to the end of the line and met the principal. He explained to me that the job was in the juvenile detention center, and that it was challenging because the student population changed all the time. He assured me that the guards are right there, so it was a safe environment. He said that if I was interested, we could schedule an interview.
He was a really nice man, and by that time I had been at this job fair for a couple of hours. This was the first interview I had been offered. But I told him that while I appreciated his willingness to interview me, my father in Arkansas would have a heart attack if I told him I was moving to Chicago to work in the Cook County prison. He said he understood.
By the end of that day, I had been offered no other interviews. At all. I was one of thousands of prospective English teachers. We are a dime a dozen.
But I moved to Chicago anyway, certain I would find a position. This idea was cemented when I got a letter from CPS welcoming me to CPS as a new teacher. The letter indicated that once I got to Chicago, to get in touch with a recruitment officer who would put me in touch with principals.
I thought that meant I had a job. And it would have, years ago. It used to be that CPS placed teachers in schools. But the principals hated that, so now principals do the hiring for their schools. I didn't find this out until I had actually moved to Chicago. I had an interview (one interview!) and the principal informed me of this fact then.
I had one other interview that summer. I was getting anxious. It was the end of July. I had a super cute Lincoln Park apartment, a new boyfriend, and no job. Then I got a phone call from Nancy Slavin about a new program CPS was starting that needed teachers ASAP. The principals for the program were interviewing the next day, and was I interested? I was interested.
I went to the interviews, and was invited to interview at a high school on the South Side the next day. I went to that interview, and was offered the job on the spot. Which is usually not a good sign, but it was the end of July and I was getting panicky. This was on a Friday. The principal said I could think about it over the weekend, but needed to let him know by Monday if I was interested.
This job is detailed in this post, so I won't go into details again here. It was a tough year. But it was a job, and I needed a job.
During graduate school, I imagined what my teaching career would be like. I thought that I would get lots of interviews with great schools, and after careful research, would take the job offer that seemed like the best fit. I would have my dream job and it would be amazing.
Instead, I discovered that you take the job offered to you. Period. If you are lucky, it will be a great fit. But more than likely, it will involve stuffing your square peg into a round hole and hoping for the best.
This situation is why our schools aren't better. There's no impetus to make the schools better. Principals know that for every disgruntled teacher at her school, there are a billion other teachers dying for a job. So we are all dispensable. Principals can do whatever they want. Teachers, especially new teachers who don't have tenure, spend most of their time worrying about getting fired.
There is no teacher shortage in Chicago, except for special education and bilingual education. If you are certified in those areas, by all means come to Chicago. But otherwise, don't bother.
I don't know many teachers in Chicago who are happy at their jobs. Which is extremely sad. And it's not the students -- the students are not the problem. It's the administration and the ways the schools are run that make the job so challenging. But if you want to be a teacher, this is what you get. I just have to try to make the best of it.
This article from the Chicago Tribune sums it up nicely. There are too many damn teachers in Chicago -- and the rest of the state of Illinois.
When I finally decided to get my masters and my teaching certificate, I was a bit concerned about where I might get a job. I went back to school in 2001 -- by then the tech market had collapsed and already schools were slashing their budgets.
I was jealous of my brother-in-law, because he had completed the MAT program in secondary education a couple of years before I did. When he was looking for jobs, he regularly got phone calls from principals across the nation asking him to interview. Schools were offering signing bonuses. It was a good time to be a teacher.
That was not the case for me. I had decided I didn't want to teach in Arkansas, although I definitely could have gotten a job at a really good school in the state. But I wanted to live in a big city -- or at least a bigger city.
I started researching which cities were hiring teachers. As far as I could tell, New York City, Cincinnati, Chicago, and Las Vegas were the cities who seemed to be doing the most hiring.
I had never been to New York City and didn't know anyone there, so that didn't seem a good idea. And I knew I'd never be able to afford it. Plus, being the Southern gal that I am, I wasn't sure I was up to living someplace that seemed so far removed from what I was accustomed to. That's a whole lot of Yankees crammed into one place.
Las Vegas didn't interest me, either. So that left Cincinnati or Chicago. I applied to both school districts online. I got a phone call from Cincinnati the next day, wanting to schedule an interview. Spring break was coming up, so I decided I would spend my spring break in Cincinnati.
A day or so later, I got an email from a dear friend of mine that he was moving to Chicago, and I should move there, too. I did want to know at least one person in whatever city I chose, so this seemed a good omen. Then I got an email from Nancy Slavin, the CPS teacher recruitment manager. She had received my application and asked if I had any questions.
Through talking to her I found out that Illinois has different teaching requirements than Arkansas, and that I would have to take the Illinois teacher tests. They were offering the tests the week of my spring break. There was also a teacher job fair that week. So it seemed like I needed to go to Chicago for spring break instead of Cincinnati. Ms. Slavin helped get me registered for the teacher tests and the job fair. I called Cincinnati and canceled my interview with them.
The teacher tests -- a basic skills test and the English content test -- were pretty easy. The job fair, however, was a revelation. Never had I seen so many teacher candidates crammed into a space. There were thousands of us there. And we were all standing in long lines to talk to principals and assistant principals sitting at tables.
I knew it was bad, when I realized I was standing in a line that was at least fifty people long, and we were waiting to talk to the principal of Nancy Jefferson High School. Nancy Jefferson High School is the school for Cook County Juvenile Detention Center. I didn't know this until I got to the end of the line and met the principal. He explained to me that the job was in the juvenile detention center, and that it was challenging because the student population changed all the time. He assured me that the guards are right there, so it was a safe environment. He said that if I was interested, we could schedule an interview.
He was a really nice man, and by that time I had been at this job fair for a couple of hours. This was the first interview I had been offered. But I told him that while I appreciated his willingness to interview me, my father in Arkansas would have a heart attack if I told him I was moving to Chicago to work in the Cook County prison. He said he understood.
By the end of that day, I had been offered no other interviews. At all. I was one of thousands of prospective English teachers. We are a dime a dozen.
But I moved to Chicago anyway, certain I would find a position. This idea was cemented when I got a letter from CPS welcoming me to CPS as a new teacher. The letter indicated that once I got to Chicago, to get in touch with a recruitment officer who would put me in touch with principals.
I thought that meant I had a job. And it would have, years ago. It used to be that CPS placed teachers in schools. But the principals hated that, so now principals do the hiring for their schools. I didn't find this out until I had actually moved to Chicago. I had an interview (one interview!) and the principal informed me of this fact then.
I had one other interview that summer. I was getting anxious. It was the end of July. I had a super cute Lincoln Park apartment, a new boyfriend, and no job. Then I got a phone call from Nancy Slavin about a new program CPS was starting that needed teachers ASAP. The principals for the program were interviewing the next day, and was I interested? I was interested.
I went to the interviews, and was invited to interview at a high school on the South Side the next day. I went to that interview, and was offered the job on the spot. Which is usually not a good sign, but it was the end of July and I was getting panicky. This was on a Friday. The principal said I could think about it over the weekend, but needed to let him know by Monday if I was interested.
This job is detailed in this post, so I won't go into details again here. It was a tough year. But it was a job, and I needed a job.
During graduate school, I imagined what my teaching career would be like. I thought that I would get lots of interviews with great schools, and after careful research, would take the job offer that seemed like the best fit. I would have my dream job and it would be amazing.
Instead, I discovered that you take the job offered to you. Period. If you are lucky, it will be a great fit. But more than likely, it will involve stuffing your square peg into a round hole and hoping for the best.
This situation is why our schools aren't better. There's no impetus to make the schools better. Principals know that for every disgruntled teacher at her school, there are a billion other teachers dying for a job. So we are all dispensable. Principals can do whatever they want. Teachers, especially new teachers who don't have tenure, spend most of their time worrying about getting fired.
There is no teacher shortage in Chicago, except for special education and bilingual education. If you are certified in those areas, by all means come to Chicago. But otherwise, don't bother.
I don't know many teachers in Chicago who are happy at their jobs. Which is extremely sad. And it's not the students -- the students are not the problem. It's the administration and the ways the schools are run that make the job so challenging. But if you want to be a teacher, this is what you get. I just have to try to make the best of it.
Sunday, February 08, 2009
Boy I'm Tired!
I know I have been neglecting this blog -- and I have many things I want to discuss. But I'm tired and spend most of my time dealing with my chitlins. The transition from one kid to two kids is tough! My sister tried to warn me, and I believed her, but until I experienced it firsthand, I just didn't understand.
But Hideo is awesome and is a very sweet baby. He sleeps ok. He was sleeping in his bassinet in our room, but he is the squeakiest, gruntiest baby I've ever seen. It's very cute, unless you are trying to get some sleep. So now he's in his crib in the nursery. He sleeps two to three hours at a stretch if I'm lucky. I'm looking forward to his sleeping longer.
We were breastfeeding, but that is over as of last week. I had a terrible time nursing Emiko, and was hoping Hideo would provide some redemption, but no luck. At least Emiko nursed for four months (although we had to supplement with formula). Hideo gave up at six weeks. He is a little piggy who always thinks he's starving, so I guess he thinks nursing takes too long. And the fact that I couldn't nurse him in the hospital didn't help, either.
At first he'd nurse, then demand a bottle. Then I had to start with a bottle, then he'd nurse, and he'd finish with a bottle. He decided that that was too much trouble, and started pretending to fall asleep when I'd try to nurse him. A baby playing possum! (Emiko did the same thing -- it's amazing how alike they are!) He wouldn't wake up until I gave him the bottle again. I was pumping, but that wasn't working too well. So now I'm done. I'm trying hard to not feel guilty about it.
Hideo was circumcised on January 21 -- and this was quite traumatizing for both of us. I'm still recovering from his circumcision, and I hope he won't be scarred for life. I was going to blog about it in more detail (it was a pretty ridiculous experience), but changed my mind. So if you want the gory details, let me know. You'll probably have to come over, and I'll need to drink a cocktail.
I can drink cocktails! Now that I'm not nursing and all that. Of course, one half glass of wine and I'm drunk. So I can drink half a cocktail!
Emiko is adjusting well to her baby "brudder." She is really cute with him. The other day Hideo was napping in his swing, and she brought her lovey to him and gave him her bunny to sleep with. Occasionally she'd come by and snatch the lovey from him, but then she'd bring it back. And he kept sleeping through it, thank goodness.
Todd got me a teeny little video camera for my birthday -- a Flip Mino. It's awesome and super easy to use. So now I can take videos and post them on YouTube. There are some really adorable ones (if I do say so myself!) at www.youtube.com/fujisan42. If you are bored at work, here's a way to kill some time!
My friend Tera was in town in January, and it was fantastic seeing her. My friend Martha is pregnant, so I've been sending her all my maternity clothes. I'm so excited for her, and glad to have someone to send all that stuff to. I'm sick of maternity clothes! Most of my non-maternity clothes are kind of snug, but I'm wearing them anyway. They'll eventually fit. I hope.
My friend Alannah managed to continue blogging through Arkansas' worst ice storm in a billion years, so I feel guilty that I've been slacking so badly. I do have some more things to blog about regarding my job, but that has to wait til tomorrow or later this week. In the meantime, forgive me, and enjoy some pics and a video!
And let me hear from you -- I miss my friends. I do feel like I'm missing out on adult conversation. Hideo is awesome, but his squeaks don't count as talking. Emiko is talking a storm, but I only understand about half of what she says. So that doesn't count, either!
Saturday, February 07, 2009
This Will Make You Cry. .
"Fidelity": Don't Divorce... from Courage Campaign on Vimeo.
I truly hope the California Supreme Court invalidates Prop 8. There is no way it is constitutional. Let people love who they want to love, and leave them the hell alone.
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