It's All Happening
So much to tell, so let's get to it.
On Thursday, after only 13 days of official unemployment, I received news from the Hyde Leadership Charter School in the Bronx that they would like me to join them as a special educator in the fall. I got the job! To put this into perspective, only about 1/3 of corps members currently have been placed, making me feel both extremely lucky and proud. I'm proud of my ability to frantically plan a 7th grade math lesson, pack up my life, fly to a new city on 3 hours of sleep, deliver my first lesson to a live audience, interview for 2 hours and somehow manage to convince a Harvard graduate and long term educator that I will be ready to be a teacher in September. This also means that in a single 24 hour day, I both moved to New York and got a job. Not a bad way to come out of the gate.
In addition to this brilliant news, the past few days have been a blast. I'm continuing to enjoy the conversations I've had and relationships I've begun to form with fellow corps members. On Thursday night, after visiting a local public school, we were broken up into groups and sent out into the city to have dinner with local Teach for America alumni. Dee Dee, our 27 year old host with a swanky Brooklyn apartment, graciously provided us with appetizers, salad, ravioli, and desert, coupled with red wine and craft beers. It was a really awesome evening and great chance to hear an unfiltered perspective of the program.
Friday, following the official close of New York's Induction (to be followed with Institute, starting this week), many of us went to Iguana's, a local mexican restaurant and bar in Queens. I'll admit that after joining Teach for America, I was a bit worried about the personalities and weekend habits of my peers - part of me pictured a group of mild mannered boy scouts gathering in the quad for scrabble parties on Friday nights. This is not the case. I've come to find that the majority of corps members have the demeanors of recent college graduates, which most of them are, and in short, it was a good evening. Andrew, my roommate from Queens who I've unofficially nicknamed, "New York," escorted a group of us into Midtown to see the bars in the area. Standing in the city surrounded by the buildings that stretch on as far as your eyes can see, you truly appreciate how large this place really is. Fortunately, I have at least two years to get to know it.
Last night, I reconnected with my friend from junior high school, Adam. He lives in Brooklyn, which he lovingly refers to as "Hipster Mecca", and invited me to his comfortable apartment in the area. We literally haven't seen each other for over 6 years, so being able to catch up was great. As I mentioned to him during a part of our conversation, even though people come in and out of each other's lives at various intervals, we never really change too much. He still reminds me of the 8th grade guitarist who introduced me to musical performance in our extremely awful band, Sequoia 95. We picked up right where we left off.
Today was very chill. I took a cab to Target and picked up some much needed supplies (clothes hangers, soap, garbage can, etc), but was disappointed to find they were fresh out of extra long twin bed sheets. So yeah, I still don't have those. A "silk jersey liner" from REI that I used in hostels throughout Europe is getting me by, but I would really like to get some sheets in the next few days. Perhaps tomorrow.
For now, I think we're caught up. As you can tell, my life is still pretty outrageous, but it's calming down a bit. Tonight was our first meeting for Institute, the 5 week crash course in teaching and classroom management that will prepare us for our assignments in the fall. This week is purely sessions, but next week I will be teaching 7th grade English Language Arts to summer school students. Sometimes, I can hardly believe it's all happening. But it is. It's all happening.
On Thursday, after only 13 days of official unemployment, I received news from the Hyde Leadership Charter School in the Bronx that they would like me to join them as a special educator in the fall. I got the job! To put this into perspective, only about 1/3 of corps members currently have been placed, making me feel both extremely lucky and proud. I'm proud of my ability to frantically plan a 7th grade math lesson, pack up my life, fly to a new city on 3 hours of sleep, deliver my first lesson to a live audience, interview for 2 hours and somehow manage to convince a Harvard graduate and long term educator that I will be ready to be a teacher in September. This also means that in a single 24 hour day, I both moved to New York and got a job. Not a bad way to come out of the gate.
In addition to this brilliant news, the past few days have been a blast. I'm continuing to enjoy the conversations I've had and relationships I've begun to form with fellow corps members. On Thursday night, after visiting a local public school, we were broken up into groups and sent out into the city to have dinner with local Teach for America alumni. Dee Dee, our 27 year old host with a swanky Brooklyn apartment, graciously provided us with appetizers, salad, ravioli, and desert, coupled with red wine and craft beers. It was a really awesome evening and great chance to hear an unfiltered perspective of the program.
Friday, following the official close of New York's Induction (to be followed with Institute, starting this week), many of us went to Iguana's, a local mexican restaurant and bar in Queens. I'll admit that after joining Teach for America, I was a bit worried about the personalities and weekend habits of my peers - part of me pictured a group of mild mannered boy scouts gathering in the quad for scrabble parties on Friday nights. This is not the case. I've come to find that the majority of corps members have the demeanors of recent college graduates, which most of them are, and in short, it was a good evening. Andrew, my roommate from Queens who I've unofficially nicknamed, "New York," escorted a group of us into Midtown to see the bars in the area. Standing in the city surrounded by the buildings that stretch on as far as your eyes can see, you truly appreciate how large this place really is. Fortunately, I have at least two years to get to know it.
Last night, I reconnected with my friend from junior high school, Adam. He lives in Brooklyn, which he lovingly refers to as "Hipster Mecca", and invited me to his comfortable apartment in the area. We literally haven't seen each other for over 6 years, so being able to catch up was great. As I mentioned to him during a part of our conversation, even though people come in and out of each other's lives at various intervals, we never really change too much. He still reminds me of the 8th grade guitarist who introduced me to musical performance in our extremely awful band, Sequoia 95. We picked up right where we left off.
Today was very chill. I took a cab to Target and picked up some much needed supplies (clothes hangers, soap, garbage can, etc), but was disappointed to find they were fresh out of extra long twin bed sheets. So yeah, I still don't have those. A "silk jersey liner" from REI that I used in hostels throughout Europe is getting me by, but I would really like to get some sheets in the next few days. Perhaps tomorrow.
For now, I think we're caught up. As you can tell, my life is still pretty outrageous, but it's calming down a bit. Tonight was our first meeting for Institute, the 5 week crash course in teaching and classroom management that will prepare us for our assignments in the fall. This week is purely sessions, but next week I will be teaching 7th grade English Language Arts to summer school students. Sometimes, I can hardly believe it's all happening. But it is. It's all happening.
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