Finals week is usually a time for teachers to start winding down and getting ready for the respite of summer, but instead, I was gearing up for an entirely new undertaking. In May (at some point but now I can't imagine when) I replied to a random grouping of vague postings on Craig's List for tutors, teachers, and SAT instructors at various locations around the county. (I was staring summer - and it's pending 4 months of no paycheck for substitutes - in the eyes for the 3rd summer in a row and just knew my savings account would be sorely diminished come winter if I didn't at least attempt a search for potential income. I've never taught an SAT class or had any interest in doing it, but since I now know that I am capable of teaching a first grader how to read, 2 of the 3 SAT section tests are officially in my qualification wheel so why not?)
I'll admit that when I first received a phone call and had a preliminary phone interview, I couldn't even remember the names of the companies with which I had applied for jobs. That's how much attention I had paid to the application process. But I talked to the director of a particular institute for about half an hour on my cell phone while roaming the aisles of Target and we hit it off nicely. Within a week or so I had a job teaching 9th and 10th grade "Book Camp", 4 days a week, 4 hours a day. Not bad at all for summer. Maybe two weeks later, my new boss asked me to take on the additional responsibility of teaching SAT Critical Reading in the mornings, 4 days a week, 4.5 hours a day at a separate office for the same company.
So that's where I've been. I spend 8.5 hours a day teaching. 12 hours a day commuting, working, or on one campus or the other. Officially I work 4 days a week, but seeing that I'm up late on Sunday night reading one of the book camp books and I've just finished several hours of prep work including taking an SAT, reading 2 articles aloud to my mom, and writing discussion questions that my students will do for homework this week, in reality I'm working 5 or 6 days a week. In 9 days, I logged 90 payable hours... A calculation that doesn't include the additional 20 or 30 hours spent doing other work-related activities.
But here's the really cool part about all of this: I get to read abundantly and I find over 80% of the material interesting, some of it downright fascinating. I get to spend all day laughing and talking with some really smart, motivated, hard-working teenagers. My colleagues are intelligent, interesting, and generous. In short, I'm LOVING my job. I feel rewarded. I feel like I'm growing as an educator. I feel like the work I put in in genuinely valued and I am compensated accordingly.
Overall, I feel like this:
