Wednesday, August 30, 2006

My Whole Life Changed

...and so did this blog. I just started my first day at my new job, teaching English at the School of Social Justice on the Little Village/Lawndale campus.

School/campus web site: www.lvlhs.org

click on the tab for Social Justice.

Yesterday I spent half a day at the Chicago Public Schools New Hire Center trying to get on staff. There was a snafu about my position between the board and the school, but it got fixed somehow.

My first question to my principal, Rito Martinez, this morning was, "So, am I hired yet?"

"You're staffed," he told me.

Some folks at CPS central office know. Best comments were:

Arne Duncan, CEO: "That's a gutsy move."
Peter Cunningham, communications director (excuse me, director of external affairs):
"Wow, my life just got a whole lot easier."

Mine just got a whole lot harder, I suspect. There's a lot of work to do here. I have a relatively light load--four classes of 25 students, two preps. Sounds like the suburbs, right? But I haven't taught in 10 years, I have a more-or-less weekly elective I'm cooking up from relative scratch, and while one of my English classes seems to have curriculum in place, the other is much less fleshed out and I don't feel really supported by my partner.

So I have work to do.

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