What a year! I know it’s just now June, but I’m referring to my school year! I have taught at the same school for the past 6 years. There have been highs and lows during all 6 of those years, but this year was a particularly bad year for me. I can’t really pinpoint the exact cause, but even the things I can say I choose not to say to protect the integrity of the situations. I will say that I wasn’t alone in my crazy this year! One of my chief complaints was that I really wanted to teach kindergarten and not be moved to a different grade every other year. My principal hired me 6 years ago to teach kindergarten and I got to do that for the rest of the year she hired me and the next year. After that I was moved to 5th grade reading and social studies where I spent 2 years. I was moved back to kinder for a year and started the next year in kinder as well. Two weeks into that school year I was asked to move from kinder to 4th grade due to the numbers of kids in those grades. I’m flexible. I am a go-with-the-flow person. I did this because I knew my principal trusted me to do a good job with those kids. This past year I was a 3rd grade teacher. So in the 6 years I’ve taught at my school I’ve taught 4 different grade levels. Thankfully, I was always in a reading/social studies position when I was teaching 3rd, 4th, and 5th grades. I love reading, but my first love is kindergarten. I had only been able to teach it for 2 1/2 years and they weren’t even consecutive years. I was an education major with an early childhood specialization in college. My teaching certificate specifies my early childhood degree, but I felt like I never got a good chance to use it! I would talk to people who mentioned teaching kindergarten for 10 years or 15 years, and I wondered what that was like. To be put in a grade and really be able to dig in and grow year after year. I had no idea.
I found out in mid-April that my principal planned to either keep me in 3rd grade or move me back to 4th grade for next year. She wanted to keep the current kindergarten teachers in their positions so, with her blessing, I decided to see about transferring to another school in the district. I went to the job fair and met with the principals of the other elementary schools and none of them had any kinder openings. One thought they might have a first grade position for next year but wasn’t sure yet. I got home and decided I should just see what other districts in the area had available for next year. I went to a job fair for one district and was overwhelmed at it’s size. I submitted my application and resume online and had 4 interviews lined up within a matter of days. I went to the first interview on a Monday and loved the principal and others I interviewed with. Apparently they felt the same about me, because within an hour, they called my current school to ask about me. Thankfully, I had informed my principal that I was doing some looking outside of our district and she was very understanding about my need to plant myself somewhere. She told me she gave me a glowing recommendation and was excited for me. She told me that according to that principal I was their first choice. I went to the second interview the next day, and it also went really well. Between the two schools, I was still more drawn to the first one though. Both job postings expired on Friday which was the magic day when they could submit my name for hire. On Monday, I got a call offering me the job at the first school. I immediately said yes and called and cancelled the interview I had for that afternoon at a third school. I also emailed and cancelled the 4th interview scheduled for later that week. Yay! The next day school two called because they couldn’t find my application online anymore and they wanted to call and talk to my principal because they wanted to hire me for a kinder position as well! I had to tell them that I had already taken a job!
I spent 6 years at a school I truly loved. I will miss it and the people I worked with so much, but I know I’m doing the right thing. It was time.
Midlife Natalie 