Well, the second day of institute has come to an end. To recap – on Sunday we traveled from Meriden, CT to New York City and we’re now staying in dorms at St. John’s University in Queens. The first day of institute, I have to admit, was hell – I got something like two hours of sleep and had contracted some sort of general feel-bad-and-cough-a-lot illness that’s currently bouncing around campus. I also didn’t eat breakfast, forgot my iPod and didn’t have any coffee to drink. I felt like reheated death. Fortunately today was worlds better – got much more sleep and in doing so slept off most of whatever bug I’d had, got breakfast, got coffee, and had motivational music ready for the morning bus trip (“Let’s Work” by Prince. I seem to have developed a minor fixation – apologies to Phil Collins).
Today was also far better because I had some idea about what to expect – beyond being in crap condition yesterday, the whirlwind of sessions and activities was deeply disorienting. I felt way more on top of things today, and we got started on our lesson plans. I’m really eager to have students next Monday – I think I’ll do pretty well. Of course, that could very possibly be new-teacher naivete, but even so I’m excited to face my first crashing failure if that’s the case.
Another big reason I’m feeling so positive about institute is the group of people I’m working with – my corps member advisor Mahaliel is incredibly helpful and a really cool guy. As much as I believe in the TFA mission I tend to be wary of the occasionally-excessive jargon, and he speaks to us with remarkable honesty and candor. My collaborative partner, Emily, is also fantastic – the two of us are a teaching team and will trade off lessons in the classroom throughout the summer. She’s got some teaching experience and is generally way, way better than me, but fortunately she puts up with my amateur cluelessness and I’m certainly very thankful for that.
While I am feeling pretty optimistic, I don’t mean to imply that institute isn’t hard, because it is. It’s really hard. We put in 14-hour days, we’re up early in the morning and awake late at night, we have little to no free time and the food sucks. It’ll only get harder once we have real live unpredictable students to add to the equation. The difficulty is what makes it so exhilarating, though – it’s a great feeling to look yourself in the mirror and realize you’re easily capable of far more than you’d ever guessed. I know that sounds like a motivational poster, but hey.
Perhaps the most significant development, though, it that it looks like I’ve got a job – I’m going through the hiring process to become an English teacher at Hartford Public Schools’ 9th Grade Academy starting this fall. I can’t say how excited I am about that. Kids will be standing on desks in no time.
Definitely looking forward to the weekend – it’ll mean a welcome opportunity to sleep in and do some laundry, July 4th, and hopefully seeing some friends from around the city.
