Saturday, July 28, 2007

Fin de Siecle Thinking



Alright, fin de siecle is an exaggeration... It might be fairer to say simply "turning a page" but somehow it feels a bit more consequential than that.

I just finished a four year stint as director of a summer school. Capital S summer school. 4200 students, K - 12. SIx weeks, 3 million dollars gross, the most outstanding programs and teachers I have ever seen.

Directing it was exhilarating, but exhausting. The six weeks are the easy part, the really fun part. Staffing it, looking after the logistics, that's the hard, tiring and stressful part. Faced with some health issues that gave me pause to reflect on the meaning of my life I decided to step down, take a year's sabbatical and go back teaching, which is what I love to do.

So I was expecting that yesterday would be my last day at work for a year. But it won't be. I was asked to fill in for a math teacher who was transferred at the last minute. I was delighted to agree to do so. (But keep it secret. Conventional wisdom is that I am making a huge sacrifice and "taking one for the team." That's not the case at all. I was almost dreading the sabbatical and wasn't entirely excited by the projects I had undertaken to complete while on sabbatical.)

So I have 3 weeks off and then back into the classroom.

Here's the kicker. I will be teaching pre-calculus, and I haven't looked at that stuff in 40 years.

Heads up.

2 comments:

Zootenany Hoodlum said...

I am a little anxious about either the cat or the ball. Unclear...

fiona-h said...

as long as you have your excel spreadsheets - with ALL FOUR COLUMNS - you should be OK.