Professional--and other--Anxieties

One of the things I keep repeating is that I can't wait to get out of
this school. And on one level, that's true. I'm sick of some of my
colleagues to the point that I hate even being in the same staff room when
they're present, I have little patience for some of the Waldorf weirdness,
and I'm a little tired of being part of a tiny school nobody has ever heard
of.
On the other hand, IF we can make this school work, it would be a good
school. Much of the really weird Waldorf stuff isn't being done here,
partly because you can't do that in a public school, but also because the
staff don't really want to be a clone of a Waldorf school, but a Waldorf
methods-inspired school. And we've got some pretty big issues:

* We're losing Russian kids because they can't stand the airy-fairy aspects
of this kind of school; they want traditional Russian school methods where
the teachers are harsh and unrelenting. Many of those who leave us are
going to Independent Study.

* We're losing Waldorf kids because, frankly, their parents thought they
were being sent to a Free Private School, not a Public School that uses some
Waldorf methods, and they want the traditional stuff, even though the
Principal and the only Waldorf-trained teacher keep telling them it's not
possible.

* We're losing the ghetto kids because we expect them (in some cases, for
the first time) to actually do their damned work, and they don't like the
hassle they get for not doing it. The former admin here really blew chunks
on that score and didn't back the teachers up--this new Principal, for all
her faults, backs us up pretty well.

I sat and talked (well, croaked would be a better word; I have little
voice left) with my two English department colleagues, and as I said above,
IF we can get past some of these issues and build the school we want, I'd be
proud to teach here. But I'm just not sure it's possible.

One of the projects I'm on is to create ACE classes. ACE is a CSU program;
it means "Accelerated College Entrance." Basically, if I do this right,
I'll be teaching two versions of English 12 next year: One version will be
regular high school English 12; the other will be a university level
English 12--basically, I'd be teaching "Introduction to British Literature"
1 and 2. The kids would get both CSUS credits and high school credits.

Sounds great, right? It's hard as fuck. I know enough to
teach it; frankly, these aren't highly-demanding classes; they're the sort
of thing often taught at Junior Colleges--or, as my wife calls them, "high
school with ashtrays"--by guys with Masters' degrees, and while I don't yet
have that MA, I'm pretty good in terms of Content Knowledge. I can teach
it. But creating the course map to submit to the CSUS board? That's not so
easy. I basically have to comb through English Literature in two chunks:
Beowulf to the end of the Augustan Age, and then from the Victorians to the
20th century. That's over a thousand years' worth of Literature.
What do I include? What do I dismiss?

It's not fun, and it's damned difficult to do when I'm here at school, where
I'm needed for all sorts of things, and I have work to grade, and papers to
copy, and blah blah blah. I really ought to beg my wife for some off time
to go with my books and my PC to the coffeehouse or something and plow
through it there, with little distraction from baby. But that seems so
pathetic, at the same time. Bleah.

Know what I really need to do? Get my freaking Masters' and go find a full
time job at a JC. Yeah, right. It can be done, but it's damned hard.

I really blew my chance at being a full-time Academic. I should never have
left college at 22. Only now do I realize how much I wanted that PhD. And
while I have the brains to do it now--hell, I know professors who didn't
even get their BA until they were over 40--there are just too many obstacles
to overcome, and the job market for a PhD actually sucks. I missed my
chance, in the final analysis. I could have been part of the most recent
boom if I'd stuck with it back then. And that really pisses me off.
Because what did I really throw it all away for? So I wouldn't have to
move back in with my parents? I was an idiot. I should have stayed
in school, moved back with them, and finished. I had a free ride, and I
blew it.

Now I have to learn to forgive myself for that.