Goodness . . . is everyone else busy too???

It's been forever since I've blogged on here. Sorry. School has been VERY busy this year. Between volleyball, NEASC, Harvard Model Congress, and teaching the new AP course, I've been running around my building all day (and sometimes night) long. :-(

Updates:

* AP Euro is going well. A lot more work than what I thought but it's been good. I've been told that the first year is always tough to teach. Sources on the Internet have been a god-send. It's been nice to teach the upper-level student as well.

*Finished up my JV volleyball season 9-11. Last season we only had two wins so to go from 2 wins to 9 wins is a HUGE improvement! I'm so proud of my girls! :=) It probably helped that I coached Junior Olympic volleyball last winter (I will be doing it again starting on Dec 5th - every Sunday between now and the beginning of May).

*NEASC (accreditation for my school) has been very dramatic and A LOT of work! I am a co-chair of the curriculum strand. The visitation committee arrives in April so I will be happy when this process is over.

*Harvard Model Congress has been keeping me busy too. Added a few more fundraisers and a lot of the kids are not using the fundraising to their advantage. It sucks but I don't want to hear it when their parents have to pay the full $450 for the conference when I've offered numerous opportunities for their kids to fund raise to bring that cost down. The students that have taken advantage of the fundraising have made out like bandits. A few of them will only have to pay $100 for a $450 trip (which is a huge savings!).

*I'm also a mentor to a new teacher in our dept. It's been interesting to say the least. :=)

Good news:

*I will going to Poland over April break. The local university and Holocaust Center are doing a trip to Poland for teachers with the focus to be on the Holocaust. I am so excited about this opportunity! I also convinced three of my colleagues at my school to go on the trip. There will be three Saturday classes prior to the trip to learn about the history of what we will be seeing when we are over there. We will be going to Warsaw, Kielce, Aushcwitz, and Krakow (the heart of the Holocaust). In grad school, my research was the Holocaust namely Auschwitz so I'm very excited to be going on this trip. My students are even excited for me and told me to take a million pictures! :=) And, I'm Polish so I get to go visit my homeland! :=)

*I will be getting a student teacher for the spring semester. It's a first so I'm excited about it. It's something that I haven't really felt like I'm ready to do in my career but after 12 years of teaching, maybe it's time? The student teacher did a lot of observation hours with me the past year so he really likes my teaching style and really pushed to do his student teaching with me. Nothing like a little boost to the self-esteem!

*My sister flew out for Thanksgiving this year. Thought we would start a new tradition. We had a lovely visit. Took her to a Bruins game (a first for both of us). Ate lots of yummy seafood.

*Will be going to Phoenix, AZ again for Christmas to be with my family. Hoping it will be warmer than last Christmas.

So, what is new with you? :=)

Have a lot going on - will post after June 22nd.

The end of the school year is always bitter sweet.

The end is near - we get out on June 22nd. But, I have way too much to do before I can even think about summer break.

Currently proofreading research papers, proofread research papers will turn into must correct papers (College Prep page requirement was 2-5 pages; Honors page requirement was 5-7 pages) - I have 90 9th graders doing this assignment, correcting WW I quizzes, final projects in my local history class, and trying to get the rest of the common final entered into Scantron for Final Exam week. Oh, and at some point, I will need to get grades calculated and entered into the school system for report cards.

Throw into this lovely equation that I have 2-3 days to teach World War II to my 9th graders. So, I'm coming up with a cliff note version PowerPoint of how to teach World War II in 2 days.

It's just too much.

And, we are going to have budget cuts. Still no news about who has a job for next school year.

The Life of a High School Teacher in an Urban School . . . . . .

It seems that the drama never ends at my school.

We've been dealing with all sorts of problems the last few weeks. I think partly because the bad economy impacts our kids (we have a high percentage of students that come from low socio-economic backgrounds) and partly because the few weeks before any school vacation our kids go into "crazy mode" - you see, we provide stability and safety for a lot of our students. When their usual schedule is disrupted in any way, they react to it by getting into a lot of fights or causing serious problems within the school community.

Example 1: Last week, there were three REALLY bad fights in the cafeteria. One of the fights involved one student using his keys to stab another student in the kidney (yes, the keys punctured the kidney). There was blood everywhere. :-(

Example 2: A freshman boy (one of my kids) is being accused of forcing a girl to perform oral sex on him by knife point (the incident didn't happen on school grounds but the school is involved). The boy is out of school for the rest of the school year pending the investigation.

Example 3: One of our students was beaten up by her 21 year old boyfriend in front of our school while holding their 1 year child while a lot of our students (and teachers) watched it (this happened in the morning while students were being dropped off at school so teachers and students were walking into the building and witnessed everything). The police were immediately called. The police were in the building on Thursday questioning everyone on what they saw.

Example 4: One of my freshman gals had a baby back in November (yes, if you do the math, she got pregnant in middle school). The father of the baby (17 years old) was just arrested for robbery (he tried to steal a safe from the local movie theatre and got caught).

Example 5: In one of my classes, at least half of the parents in that class are laid off from their jobs. I've noticed a significant difference in behavior like acting out, being disrespectful to me or other kids in the class, etc.

It's been a very tough few weeks having to deal with all of this AND try and teach these kids World History. All of these events are impacting the kids in some way. They bring it into the classroom every single day. And, as the adult, I try and provide a fun learning environment for the kids since they are dealing with all of this drama around them. I will admit that I do take a lot of this emotional stuff home with me since it is impacting me too. I worry about my students.

I am VERY grateful for the long weekend (we get Good Friday off from school). I will admit the past few weeks have been double stressful since 3rd quarter ended and I had to do grades. We have next week in school and then we get the following week off for April break. I have never been so excited to have a break in my life. I just hope that I (and the kids) can make it through the end of next week.

To end on a positive note: A colleague of mine asked me if I would go with her to North Carolina for April break (her daughter is looking at colleges down there and she wanted the adult company). I said yes! So, I think this will be a good break for me.

Happy Easter! Happy Passover! :=)

Etc, etc, etc. . . . . .

It's been a productive yet insanely busy few weeks in the life of M-Dawg.

Where do I begin?

*Volleyball season officially ended on Friday with a rematch for varsity against our rival. We won! Life will settle down a bit for a while. No more riding on a school bus with 40 screaming teenage girls trying to sing the Barney song at the top of their lungs. Are you not just so jealous of me as you read this?

*Had a fund raiser for Harvard Model Congress on Saturday. A local business donates their parking lot to our school to charge tourists during the month of October that are visiting our lovely city. We made $880! All money raised will deter the costs of the conference over Feb break. It was a little chilly on Saturday - I sat outside 8-5 all day. I was so numb that I thought my fingers would break off.

*Still enjoying having my weekends off. I'm still doing stuff on the weekends - like proctoring SAT's or doing fund raising stuff for my groups that I advise but it's different. I'm not stressing out about it or getting annoyed which is a good thing.

*My former roommate from a few years ago is living with me until Jan 1st. She's looking for a place to live permanently. She sold her house to her son and daughter-in-law. Today, we went looking at places and I think she found a place that she likes and is reasonably priced.

*I signed up for a local history seminar on Wednesday that I'm excited about and they are paying $125! Bonus!

*The ecomony is soooo depressing . . . how's everyone holding up?

*Wish I had some news on the love front. If anyone has any suggestions on how to meet a nice guy, let me know.

OK, that's about it for updates. I somewhat have limited of computer access since my roommate is using the second bedroom (my computer is located in that room).

I know . . . . it's been a while since I've checked in.

What can I say???? It's been a VERY busy few weeks between school and volleyball.

Life is good. Busy. It has been an exhausting few weeks getting back into the swing of things at school. The good news is that I no longer work on weekends so I can relax a bit. I still have tons of school work but at least I can sleep in on the weekends.

I have a normal teaching schedule again. No more 40 minute Preps (planning periods) on one day instead of the contractual 80 minutes per day like last year. The administration fixed all schedules so that the teachers have 80 minutes per day planning (at my school, we have block scheduling and by contract, we are supposed to have an 80 minute planning block every single day). I have A Block (first block of the day) as my planning block on red days and H Block (last block of the day) on white days. I'm teaching the same classes - World Studies (4 sections) and the local history class (one section per semester). We changed the curriculum a bit in World Studies so we hope to get further in the curriculum by the end of the school year. We cut five units out at the beginning of the year. We are now starting with the Middle Ages and hope to get to the end of the Cold War if not to the present day.

The freshman this year are VERY slow (academically and behaviorally) - even the Honors are not true Honor students. Reading and writing levels are terrible so we have our work cut out for us this year. My co-taught class is interesting . . . lots of behavior problems and serious learning disabilities. I have three students in that class that need a para (aka aide) with them plus there is a SPED teacher in the room with me. The good news about the co-teaching this year is that the social studies folks were given a new SPED co-teacher!!!!!! She's great!!!!!! VERY hands-on and from the looks of it, I think for the first time since my time at this school, my students will actually get their accommodations and the help they need to do well in the class!!! I'm so pumped that I can't contain my happiness! She's been working with the kids, helping me, and even doing discipline (remember my co-teacher from last year used to fall asleep in the back of the room and fart and did nothing but complain how horrible the kids were - in front of the kids).

I am having a tough time adjusting my time management during the school day. Since I'm coaching after school, I don't have all that time to get ready for the next day so I need to get better at being more productive during my Preps. It doesn't help that I spend my entire planning aka Prep at the one photocopier in the building that actually works trying to copy my stuff! We have five photocopiers for teacher use and only one has been working since the beginning of the school year. I need to point out that there are 160 teachers in my building and we all use the photocopiers. Ugh.

The building looks great! Most of the construction and renovations have been completed. The school looks like a real school! My classroom has a new LCD projector installed from the ceiling, new MAC computer, new teacher desk, new computer desk, new filing cabinet, and new student desks. On Thursday, my LCD decided to die on me so now I'm back to using my own LCD projector for my PowerPoints. I emailed the tech dept. about it so hopefully they can try and fix it. I think the projector might need to be sent back to the dealer to be fixed though. I tried to troubleshoot the problem online and the problem seems to be the cooling fan. It should be under warranty so it won't cost the school anything.

Volleyball has been fun. This is only the second year of the program so it's been a lot of working getting the girls ready to play. Varsity is doing well. My JV's are still learning to play the game and the skills. All of my girls have never played volleyball before (PE doesn't count since it's not real volleyball). So, I have my work cut out this season. They are having fun and working hard and that is all that I ask of them. The league we are playing in requires a lot of traveling for away games so I'm not coming back to school until late and then I have the 45 minute drive home afterwards. My days start at 5:00 am (I wake up at this time), get to school by 6:45 am, and I'm not getting home until after 9:00 pm! Of course since there is always stuff to do at home and getting ready for the next day (make lunch, school work, lay out clothes for school, reorganize my duffel bag for a practice or game, etc) I'm going to bed after 10:30 sometimes 11:00 pm. LONG day! And, since I'm exercising so much, I'm losing weight - which is a good thing. I went clothes shopping and I went down a size! Let's hope the weight loss continues and that I can maintain the loss after volleyball season ends. :-)

Since I'm not working on weekends, I've been trying to relax and enjoy myself a bit. Today, I'm going apple picking with my friend Michelle and her daughter.

To my teacher friends from the blog world: I hope you all had a great start and wishing you all a wonderful productive school year! :-)

Update on life

Just wanted to do an update on what is going on in M-Dawg's world (warning - VERY negative post!):

*I didn't get the teaching position at my first school. I received the phone call last night. The assistant principal (I'm friends with him) wanted to tell me over the phone instead of waiting for the letter. I'm upset and disappointed. For five years, all I've heard from administrators and other teachers was how they wanted me to come back. Nice.

*Survived the Sophomore Social (dance) for my class. My co-advisor and I have decided that we will resign at the end of the school year from being their class advisor. The officers do absolutely nothing and we are not paid enough to deal with the stress and bullshit.

*My classroom is currently in a modular trailer. I've been in the trailer for 1 1/2 year. The entire freshman house is moving out the trailers over April break. I filled out my request form over a month ago for boxes and moving supplies. When do I get my supplies and boxes: a week ago! I have a ton of shit to pack. Luckily, I have student leaders and a colleague of mine helped me pack most of it. It will be nice to be back in the main building again. Strange. They are moving us to a temporary classroom until June. Then they will move us to our permanent home which will be up on the third floor. I won't be unpacking anything except for two boxes of stuff I need to get me through the rest of the school year.

*My shoulder is still painful. I have an appt next week with an orthopedic surgeon.

*Good news: I'm on April break starting on Monday. A whole week off from school. I do have a busy week filled with appointments and working at Paws.

*I really need a break from school. I'm in such a bad mind set right now. Very negative and burnt out. Exhausted from working all the time and getting no financial rewards. And very poor! :-(

*And the best part of my life right now: my first mortgage is going up $250 a month. Got the letter last week notifying me of the increase. They won't even talk to me since I'm still paying my mortgage on time. Nice! I have two mortgages and the second one will go up too. I can't refinance since I owe more on my condo than it's worth right now. So, I'm screwed. Gotta love life. When you are down, you are DOWN! I am looking for a roommate to help defer the costs. If you know of anyone, let me know. I'm also posting an ad on Craig's List.

This is my life. Shitty right now. I think I need to go back into counseling again. I'm really having a hard time dealing with stuff. My personal life sucks. My professional life sucks. Trying to focus on what is good in my life and I just can't seem to do it.

End of vent/bitch/losing mind session. :-(

Job Fair, Dr. Appt, and went to Jail! All in one week!

Just an update of the week:

*Went to a Job Fair at the 1st high school I ever taught at on Tuesday night. I'm applying for the social studies position. One of the guys in the dept is retiring this year. Teaching in NH is sorta a mixed bag - it would provide stability for me which would be a welcomed change in my professional life. But the pay and retirement isn't that great. The guy that interviewed me is best friends with my current Principal. Oops! I wasn't planning on telling my current school that I was going to be looking for next year but due to all the drama that happened in Jan with the budget cuts, I decided that I would look for another job. My Principal received a phone call that evening from the guy at my 1st school that interviewed me. Joy! Where is the professionalism? Anyway, I guess the cat is out of the bag. The administration knows that I need to do what is best for ME. They said they don't want me to leave but they understand how unstable the school system is right now. And, my mortgage won't get paid on loyalty, I'll tell ya that much! :-(

*Had a Dr's appt on Wednesday. He finally decided to get the MRI done on the rotator cuff and make an appt with an orthopedic surgeon. It looks like surgery may be the way to go - ugh! The Dr's office called me today to say that my insurance company is being a pain about the MRI. They are questioning whether the MRI is "necessary" - nice! I'll update when I find out more info.

*Wednesday evening, I met my friend Aileen and we saw Juno here. Excellent movie! Check it out if you get a chance!

*Took my students to Middleton Jail today (Thursday) for a Scared Straight program. It was a huge eye-opening experience for me personally. It really got me to think about some of the choices I've made in life. It was a powerful program and I got the impression from most of my kids that the point hit home for them. The prison guards and prisoners stressed the role of family and teachers in their lives. And, that alcohol and drugs can really mess up your life and you could end up in prison. Middleton is a maximum security jail so it was pretty intense. I really hope the kids learned some important lessons as well.

Exciting plans for the weekend:
*Work at Paws on Saturday and Sunday.
*Correct student projects since grades close next Friday for 3rd quarter - where has the time flown by? One more quarter to go peeps! :-)

What are you doing this weekend??????

Whew! It's been forever since I've posted anything on this blog!

Sorry folks! I know it's been a long time since I've written on the blog. The life of M-Dawg continues to be busy and crazy. I am alive. I am kicking. I am exhausted! :-)

Let's see. . . where do I start?

*Survived midterm exam week and finished grades. I was extremely disappointed in my freshman co-taught class grades. Over half the class failed for 2nd quarter. Part of the problem is that the SPED teacher in the room with me does not do his job and help the students (please note that I've vented about this guy many times on this blog). I follow the accomodations according to their IEP (Individual Education Plans) as best as I can. By law, I have to follow their IEP's. I have 25 kids in the class and 16 of them are on IEP's. The SPED teacher is supposed to be in the room to help these kids. He doesn't help the kids. He sits in the back of the classroom and falls asleep. In the rare occassion when I do ask him to do something, he gives me an attitude. And yes, I've already went to his head teacher and administration to complain about him and the response was not supportive nor good. He does the same thing in the other four classes that he's supposed to be co-teaching in as well. So I know it's not just me. He's riding out his time until he retires so until then we all have to suffer - including the kids. The thing that makes me so angry . . . he makes the same salary that I make! I bust my ass to do my job and he does nothing. And they (government, media, public, etc.) wonders why public eduation is failing in this country???? This guy doesn't have the same case load of SPED kids that other SPED teachers have because "he can't handle anymore kids on his case load." (per an administrator). So the administration is aware that the guy doesn't do his job. The man falls asleep in his own SPED meetings with parents and kids! I've witnessed it folks! Scary! I feel bad for my kids not doing well but there isn't anything I can do.

*The school system I work in ended up getting a loan from the state government to try and save all the teacher positions. We ended up losing 5 paraprofessionals and two custodians and 1 secretary in the end of the budget crisis. The numbers were going to be higher. Plus, the community rallied and donated over $400,000 to save jobs as well. FYI: The auditors finished their investigation and turned everything over the police to investigate the Business Manager that did all this craziness. Let's hope they fry the guy! Good news out of this experience: the city is looking to consolidate the city and school budgets. Read about it here.

*I starting teaching a new course called Current World Affairs. 10th-12th graders can take the class. I am very excited to be teaching this class because over the summer, I helped write the curriculum for it. The kids seem to be enjoying it too. The first week was interesting because a lot of seniors thought it was going to be a blow off class and I made it quite clear that it was an academic class that required work to be completed. I even assigned a two page typed essay on the first day! Kids started dropping out like flies! :-) I even have some kids contracting for honors credit for the course. The other teacher that helped write the curriculum over the summer is also teaching a section of it so her and I have been meeting once a week to plan together. She taught a section of it last semester but she found that it was tough on her own. She told me that I've been helping her stay focused and more on task. And, I guess I'm the creative one when it comes to activities so she loves that too.

*On the personal homefront, had a funny experience on Match.com. Yes, I went back to trying the online dating thing. I'm having a really hard time meeting guys so I figured, what the hell??? So, I post my profile and a few pictures of me on the site. I get an email from a 72 year old man. Yes, 72 years old. It gets better people. In this email, he asks me, "Would I like to play with his 'two Irish pototoes'"!!!!!!!!!!!! Dear God . . . he's a dirty old man! And, I check out his profile and his age requirement is 18-38 only! My age requirement was 32-48 (I'm going to be 37 next week). So that's my funny story of the week. At least I can laugh about it????

*Have school this week and then I'm off for a week for Feb break. Half of my break will be with Harvard Mock Congress and 13 students in Boston. Really could use a bit of a break.

*Yes, I will be 37 on the 14th of this month. I'm trying to grasp the idea that I'm getting old! :-)

Oh, sorry about the mispellings in this post. Blogger won't let me spellcheck for some reason???

Any news with you folks out there????

Alive and kicking . . . barely!

I'm here. Overworked. Underpaid. Exhausted.

No news yet. Rumor mill states next week will be notification of cut teacher positions due to the budget. Merry freakin' Christmas to you too! :-(

Oh, the $1.8 million deficit is now $3.0 million. Joy.

I do know for a fact that personnel is going through every one's file to make sure they have their P's and Q's tied nicely in a red bow.

Taking Monday off as a personal day. A mental health day is needed for M-Dawg. The only planned activity: taking Ellie the Cat to the vet for her yearly shots.

Working all weekend at Paws. Seeing the doggies and puppies always cheers me up.

Enjoy your weekend peeps! :-)

Overwhelmed and overworked!

Just a quick check in.

Things in my life are really busy right now.

I need to send out an apology. I won't be sending out Christmas cards this year. I have NO time to fill them out. This is the first year eva! Ughy! :-(

Also won't be blogging a lot the next few weeks. Please understand that I'm working a zillion hours between school, my second job, advising the class of 2010, and advising Mock Congress. I have no life as it is right now.

I know I should be taking care of myself but that just ain't happening anytime soon.

I'll be on a plane to Chicago on December 22nd. I'll rest while I'm at my folks house. :-)

I think I need a vacation . . . .

It's been one of those weeks. Even though I was out sick on Monday and Tuesday, it seems like a very long week!

I go back to school on Wednesday - an early release day for the kids in the morning and a professional day for the adults in the afternoon. My school didn't make AYP (Adequate Yearly Progress - a No Child Left Behind thing) so we are going into freak out test the hell out of the kids mode. The 9th graders spent two hours doing MCAS English and Math practice tests (in my state, you need to pass these tests to graduate - don't pass - no high school diploma). Since I'm on the freshman team, I had to proctor the tests. These tests were thrown together at the last minute so there were no instructions and no communication to the teachers. The 10th and 11th graders were given the PSAT's. The 12th graders were shown a video on how to make positive choices (no alcohol or drugs) and then were put into groups to create activities (they got the better end of the deal since they got to bond with their class). The 9th graders had an assembly for the last hour about responsibility. The last two blocks of the day were shortened to 30 minutes. Not a lot of academic learning could take place in that time.

After the kids left for the day, I got to sit in a department meeting for an hour and an half to brainstorm about how does my dept. help with MCAS (our MCAS are still in pilot mode and won't count until 2012). We then met as a faculty to discuss all the ways every single department is supporting MCAS. It sounds like all departments are doing what they are supposed to be doing to help the kids succeed on MCAS. I just don't know what more we can do except maybe take the test for the kids. The skill level of reading and writing is VERY low at my school. I have a lot of kids this year that can barely read above a 2nd grade reading level. How do I work with that? I'm not trained in it. I help the kids as best as I can during the school day when they are in class with me but they need more help. They need to stay after school for extra help and they won't stay. Compared to my last school, students don't value their education or respect their teachers. It's emotionally draining to continue sticking your neck out to help these kids and they just don't get it! The day was very long and draining and I still wasn't feeling well. I probably should've called in sick again but I really didn't want to take another sick day.

Today, I had parent conferences after school. I had a line! Almost all the parents that wanted to talk to me were the Honor's parents and all they just wanted to hear how great their kid was doing in my class. The conferences were supposed to end at 3:00 but I didn't leave school until 5:00 pm! Ughy!

Also, today the union rep stopped by to ask if I would mind wearing a t-shirt and protest outside every morning to support the union negotiations. Yes, we are still without a contract and the 2nd year without a raise. And, I need to point out that this is my second year so I'm not tenured yet. It's a high risk to go out and protest for the union since the union can't protect me my first three years anyway. $500 a year is taken out my paycheck for union dues.

Oh, my Dad went to the emergency room yesterday morning. He was in pain - he's got a kidney stone and it won't pass. They admitted him and monitored him. I got a phone call a few hours ago and they are performing surgery to get the stone out. Please think happy thoughts for my Daddy! :-)

Sorry this post is all over the place. I'm tired. I'm exhausted. And, I still feel like poop!

Busy week - what else is new?

The life of M-Dawg is always busy and overwhelming. This past week was NO exception! Let's re-cap, shall we?

Monday and Tuesday: Not so overwhelming. I stayed late at school on both days since the kids had a project due at the end of the week. Still had my cold and was feeling miserable!

Wednesday: Early release for kids. Professional Day for teachers. We had to sit in these meetings about assessment. Sorta boring. At the end of the day, we went back into the auditorium to finish up our day. The administration put together this PowerPoint about AYP (Adequate Yearly Progress - it's a No Child Left Behind thing in education). We didn't make it this year. The way the PowerPoint was presented to us was very insulting to a lot of teachers and they were upset. We didn't qualify in ANY of our subgroups. We never pass in Special Ed or Black/Hispanic categories (my guess is that most schools are in the same position). So people left for the day upset and angry because we were not provided with any feedback. Also, people are upset that we STILL don't have a contract. The day ended on a very negative note. It looks like the union is finally going to try to do something. I think we are going to do work to rule (which means that I will only work at school my contractual hours) and we are going to start protesting at the School Committee Meetings every other week. It looks like it might get stressful and scary the next few months at my school. My cold is still here and not going away!

Thursday: Back to School Night. A group of us went out to dinner before the events started with the parents. I stayed at school until 9:00 pm. And, then I got to drive home late that night. Bad turnout by the way of parents. It's so upsetting that more parents didn't show up. I lost my voice from talking and my cold is still kicking my butt!

Friday: Exhausted from night before. After school, I had to run shopping to get food and drinks for the dance that my class was co-sponsoring that evening. Had one of the kids come with me (had parental and administration persmission) to the stores to help carry the stuff. Back to school to set up everything for the dance. I would not be chaperoning the dance since I'd already made plans for that evening (the other advisor NEVER checked with me to see if I was free that night so I told him I couldn't chaperone the event). Stayed at school to get some correcting done until I had to meet Janet in Burlington. We had a nice night of catching up and chatting. I miss my Nutty! It was a late night - I didn't get home until almost midnight!

Saturday: Delta Kappa Gamma State Conference in Taunton, MA. I had to meet our chapter president at 6:45 AM and off we drove down to Taunton for the day! It was a long day of meetings and workshops! My head was killing me and I was exhausted! I wasn't feeling feel for most of the day but kept smiling! :-) I went to some great workshops. One workshop was about Vertical Simulation Learning and the other was on Africa and service learning. Very cool stuff! But again, I was exhausted and came home and crashed! Went to bed at 7:30 pm!

So, that was my week. My cold is still here. I slept until 9:00 am. Wow! Over 12 hours of sleeping!

How was your week?

It's a rainy day here in New England!

It's raining here. Sorta a good day to stay in bed and read a good book kind of day.

I'm exhausted from my first full week back to school. My white days are rough. I teach the first block. 2nd block I have 45 minutes of hall duty and 45 minutes of common planning with my freshman team. 3rd block I teach. 4th block I teach. Oh, the block is 90 minutes each by the way.

I need to point out that my white day schedule is a violation of our old contract (We are in the second year of working without a contract). We are to have a planning block every single day. There are six teachers in the freshman house that have the schedule that I have right now. Someone went to the union to complain (not that the union will do anything about it anyway - our union is VERY weak at this school).

My issue is that I'm all for supporting the team. However, I don't want to be taken advantage of either. As a freshman house teacher, we all go above and beyond our hours as it is. I just want to be treated fairly.

I'm even more annoyed with the situation since this is the second year I'm making the same salary. For those of you not in the teaching world, we usually get a "small" increase in pay every year. Trust me - it's not even a cost of living raise but it's something. I've tried to vow to not stay late after school like I normally would do but I've been staying late since I can't get my work done in the time given to me during school hours. It's VERY frustrating - I really don't want to be doing a lot of my work at home anymore. So what's a gal to do?

So, what am I doing this weekend? Sleeping in, resting, and relaxing. I have a ton of school work to get done but instead I'm relaxing and beating up myself for not being more productive.

Ughy! :-(

Hump Day!

I'm already exhausted and it's only Wednesday!

Have a faculty meeting today after school. I'm going to try to leave school after that meeting - I've been staying late at school again and I promised myself I would start leaving at a decent time.

Also, been trying to get to bed earlier since I get up at 5:00 AM! Yes, I get up THAT early for school!

My body is on a completely different time zone.

I hope to get back into the swing of things soon -

How many of you have a hard time getting up in the morning?????

The Internal Battle . . . . to be sick or not to be sick . . . that is the question!

My body is having a battle of whether or not it wants to be sick and blah OR healthy right now.

The dark side (the sick, blah part) may be winning the battle folks. . . . .

I have Sunday off so I hope I can make it . . . . .

Tired. Very tired.

I'm drinking a glass of orange juice as I type this post. Think it will help????? :-)

Exhaustion is the word of the day!

What can I say? I'm tired. I'm exhausted. And, I'm buried with school work right now. Overworked and underpaid doesn't flow very well with me right now.

I do it to myself at the end of every school year. Only this time, I have the Russia trip to get ready for on top of everything else.

If I've been out touch with folks - it's because when I do have ONE moment to myself, I choose to sleep. So, please don't be upset with me if I've been unable to comment on blogs or email back right away. I am trying to do the best that I can right now.

I'm also working a ton more hours at the doggie store. The owner of the store has a VERY sick Dalmatian so the owner hasn't be able to work her normal hours so all of the employees have been picking up extra hours to help her out - including me. The money will be nice for my trip but it's making me a tad bit more tired than normal. For example, last week I worked over 22 hours at Paws on top of my crazy hours that I put into school. I kept track of my school hours last week - I worked over 50 hours! Ughy! No wonder I'm not feeling like myself right now.

Our union STILL hasn't negotiated our contract yet which means that we are entering into the second year that the City of Salem has saved a ton of money by NOT paying us what we deserve. I really can't afford to be making the same salary for the second year in a row.

People keep asking me if I'm excited about my trip to Russia. Of course I am excited but I have so much stuff to do before I leave that I can't even think about it right now.

Oh, the local paper did publish the story on me going to Russia. However, when you try and check it out online, it's part of the Plus edition. Here is a snippet. There was a picture of me too. If you want a photocopy of the article, let me know and I can mail it out to you.

Oh, and to add more fun to this scenario - there have been a lot of teachers out since everyone is trying to use up their personal days so that means substitute teachers. Our subs are horrible! They never do their job. Last week, I ended up having to pull apart a wrestling match (yes, you read it correctly) in a classroom as the sub was watching and laughing in the middle of a classroom. I happened to be walking by the room and heard laughing and yelling. This also happened on a day of which I teach three 90 minute classes in a row and have the last block for my prep block (I'm supposed to be making phone calls to parents, photocopying materials, correcting papers, attend meetings, etc. during this block). So needless to say, I wasn't very happy about having to do someone else's job at the end of the day. Every day last week, either myself or my other colleagues had to intervene and monitor the subs. We've all complained to administration about how incompetent the subs are but since it's the end of the school year, no one else wants the job so a bad sub is better than no sub. Nice mentality. Ughy!

So, that sums up stuff here.

I'm exhausted and in desperate need of a day off!

The week has been long, don't ya think?

We had MCAS this week (3 hour delay for the students not taking the test and then an abbreviated schedule for the rest of the day which means not being productive in my curriculum) - Math and US History (FYI: Kids already took English Language Arts). I had to proctor the US History - the state must think that the material after the Civil War is more important since the three hour test focused on everything from the Civil War to the present. MCAS is almost over - we still have the Biology and Chemistry tests on June 5th and 6th. Ughy!

I worked on Thursday from 3:15 until 10:00 last night (Don't forget that I'm up at 5:00 am and that I teach from 7:24-2:02). There is lots going on at Paws. The owner has four Dalmatians. Yes, they are VERY adorable! :-) One of them - Jasmine - is really sick and is dying of cancer in her liver and spleen. So, the owner can't work at this store this weekend since she needs to take care of Jasmine. The rest of us are pulling in a ton of hours to help her out. And the fun part of this: Newburyport is having a festival this weekend which will make the store VERY busy! I feel so bad for the owner - she's really having a tough time right now. Plus, she got a phone call last night that her father was rushed to the hospital (he lives down in North Carolina). I'm working a ton of hours tomorrow and Monday. And, I'm on call for tonight.

The Seniors had their last day of school today. Their senior prank was camping out in front of the school entrance in tents and they parked their cars funny in the parking lots so the faculty couldn't park their cars this morning. At 11:00 am, they all got into their cars and drove around the school for 30 minutes honking their horns. Joy! Next week, they have senior week activities (Six Flags, Harbor Cruise in Boston, Barbecue, and graduation on Friday night). I didn't know any of the kids so I won't be attending the ceremony. The seniors at my last school are graduating so I'm going to try and attend that graduation - they were freshman when I had them as students.

Have a good weekend all and if you are bored on Saturday or Monday, come visit me at the doggie store! :-)

Going on weekend #2 of working at second job and no day off!

Yes! You read correctly! I haven't had a day off since I took my personal day on May 7th. The next day off I have will be May 27th.

And, to add more fun - the owner had extended the hours of the store to summer hours so I'm working more hours on top of teaching. Yes - I know I said I needed money for my trip. I have to admit that I'm feeling this "not having a day off" thing. I'm so exhausted right now. I've been working between 15-20 hours at my part-time job per week. Add to that - my 45-60 hours that I put into my teaching job. Ughy! No wonder I'm feeling not having a day off.

The money has been good for my trip but my body is feeling.

Oh, countdown of going to Russia: ONE MONTH!!!! :-)