Musings from the Job Hunt

Looking for a job is never easy. But it's become incredibly frustrating in the past week or so. Maybe I need to take a step back and not look at the job lists that come through my email for the next week, or at least until I'm done teaching this school year. Either I've already applied, I'm not qualified, or I have the luxury of saying, "No thanks" to the jobs that are coming through my inbox. If I was a registered nurse, a licensed therapist, or willing to be a warehouse picker for Amazon I might already have a job lined up.

I understand that I'm blessed to be able to pick and choose the jobs for which I put in applications. And I have come across some exciting opportunities from the aforementioned automated emails full of job listings, so I am trying hard to expand my search to include new ideas. But the field of education is on the precipice of something huge here. I don't want to turn tail and flee just as the world situation is requiring a massive paradigm shift in my field. I guess that's kind of an overstatement - I have only applied for jobs where my teaching experience will be seen as an asset.

But I don't feel it is an overstatement to say education is on the brink of a massive shift. The current classroom model makes it literally impossible to keep six feet of distance between students. The fact that educators all over the world made a switch to distance learning with very little training and very little time shows that the future of teaching and learning could easily be turned on its head within the next decade. Proponents of flipped classrooms are probably doing a little "I told you so" celebratory dance in their heads. We knew there was a better way to deliver content, but making the change was seen as mind bogglingly challenging. It turns out, for many of us anyway, it actually wasn't as hard as we thought it would be. 

I myself told my husband in early March that there was no way I could do my job from home. Wow, was I wrong. I would venture to say that with very little training, and very little time to transition, I have been doing a fantastic job teaching from home. Imagine what it could be like with real training and enough time to really do it well? Don't misunderstand - seeing my students in the classroom for six months prior to the pandemic and building in-person relationships before going online was key to our successful transition to eLearning this spring. My private school was also able to accommodate those students whose home tech needs fell short of what is required for full at home participation. But I can now finally imagine myself embracing the flipped classroom model I have been reading about since the start of my career.

The baby tree given to me by my room parents last week.

I will get to watch it grow from my kitchen window.