Job. Check.

About two weeks ago, my department chair asked to meet with me and out of the blue (to me) offered me a full-time faculty position in my department as a Clinical Instructor. An explanation- (if you really don't want the details skip to the next paragraph).... The position is to teach and be the coordinator for the ESOL certification we have just begun to offer the students in the undergraduate program in my department. This consists of 4 optional classes in addition to their regular bachelors degree. Eventually, the goal is to integrate these courses into all the required literacy courses they take since it's a fact that all teachers will have these students in their classrooms soon. A Clinical Instructor is a position that is not tenure track and may or may not be held by someone with a PhD....basically, it means you are expected to teach a lot more than do research. So...I'll be teaching 3-4 classes a semester and coordinating the program.

Whew! Bored yet? So....this was honestly an amazing offer and I felt so honored that I was asked. She was interviewing a couple of people, but said if I wanted the job it was mine. Wow! I felt like turning around and saying- Are you talking to me, are you sure about that? It's a wonderful opportunity- more money, benefits, incredible new teaching opportunities that will look great when I graduate and apply for a job, and I get to park in the faculty deck (I may be the most excited about that). But, it definitely means that I won't have as much time to work on my prospectus (dissertation proposal) and then conduct my research in schools, so it meant that I needed to think about this for a bit. Plus, I am teaching 3 brand new classes....lots of planning there. Did I mention these classes start mid-August? Ah....

After sitting down with my adviser and planning out how it should be possible to only push my graduation back a semester to a year later (hopefully!), I decided to accept the job! Although the position is considered temporary and is on a year to year contract, there's a good chance it would continue each year based on our projected enrollment.

Friday morning, I found out that the Dean had officially approved me for the position- yay! So...if you don't hear from me much this year, you know why now! Now, I need to go plan 3 syllabi:)

New babies rock!

Our friends Ben & Blythe (and big sister Elena) welcomed baby Colin into the world on Thursday. Isn't he a cutie? We went to see them in the hospital on Saturday and everyone is doing well. Congrats guys! We took some pics but haven't uploaded them yet. This one is from the proud parents.

In other news, it's been a busy week....We saw R.E.M. last night which was great and went to dinner at Restaurant Eugene for Matt's bday on Friday, which was excellent despite being a little stuffy.
Summer school is keeping me busy and I've been working most of the weekend. Hope everyone else had a good one!

Happy Birthday Matt

Happy birthday to my handsome, sweet, and smart husband...how did I get so lucky? Although he's less than thrilled about it as usual, I hope that he'll have a nice day and fun celebrating. He's got a work dinner thing and neither of us can get away for lunch, so we'll really celebrate on Friday night when I take him to dinner. And, now since he just loves me posting pics of him on the blog, here's one of my favorites from the wedding....Love you honey:)

Happy Father's Day!

....To all the fathers out there:) We're going to dinner with my dad soon and we're sending lots of love out to CA to my father-in-law. Happy Fathers Day to two wonderful dads!

It's that time again...

Wait, didn't the last semester just end last week? Oh well. Tomorrow starts the official 'summer semester' ...taking a class and teaching a class, so the 6 week semester will be fast and furious. Wish me luck...

This weekend started off well...After winning 'Camper of the week' at Boot camp (oh yes, get excited), I had a wonderful breakfast with Meg, then finished off my syllabus and plan for the class I'm teaching. Then, we celebrated Sarah's last day as a classroom teacher at a really fun get together in Midtown. Saturday, we went to pick up Matt's new bike. I drove home while he biked home...I was so nervous (I do not trust Atlanta drivers one bit) but he made it home and loves his bike! I am impressed with his bravery and am considering getting one just to tool around our neighborhood or trails with....I think riding a bike to school would interfere with my wardrobe (I like skirts too much) and ability to lug large amounts of books back and forth.

Today, I worked for a bit, then saw the SATC movie for the 2nd time with my mom, sis, and Sonia....It was great the 2nd time too! Now, I need to go to bed early to get ready for boot camp and my first day of teaching.

'Night!

Sarah is the teacher of the year!

This morning I went to the Teacher of the Year celebration for my dear friend Sarah. She and I in our first year of teaching and we taught K next door to each other basically. Sarah has remained at that school and has been through a lot there. She is an amazing teacher and a wonderful friend. I am so proud of her! It was a nice celebration for her, although a little last minute. I always enjoy going back to that school for a visit since there were so many nice people there that I worked with. Sadly, Sarah is leaving the classroom this year to pursue a job with Primrose Schools (I believe they are daycares and have Pre-K and maybe K too, but correct me if I'm wrong Sarah). I think she'll be great at this new adventure, which will be a great way for her to use her knowledge of curriculum, leadership skills, and vibrant personality in traveling a lot...but I am sad because it is a loss for the students.

Congrats Sarah!!!!

Boot camp is going to kick my booty

I had been thinking about doing a boot camp (there are a bunch in Atlanta and several in the park and high school near us) for awhile, but sort of decided at the last minute last night to sign up for one that started this morning. From 7-8am 4 days a week I'll be at the park nearby (walked there today, but the walk back was rough!) getting my butt kicked. The funniest part today was that when I was walking up to the track where we met today at the high school, there was a group of ROTC students all dressed up getting ready to go on a trip and for a minute I thought they were the trainers!

I got home at 8:10am and laid on the floor for about 15 minutes watching the Today Show (didn't want to get the couch sweaty) before I could move again.

Apparently, the consent form I signed gave permission to use photos of my likeness on their website (this will remind me to read the entire form from now on...!) so if you are interested, apparently there will be photos on their blog today of the 'newbie' group- i.e. people who have never done this before. The veterans group is much larger than the newbie group, which I thought seemed promising. For the first 2 days, they keep the newbies separate and I thought what we were doing was pretty hard, so I'm worried about what will come next! They recorded our numbers of sit ups, squats, and push ups to compare to our last day....I figure I can only do better than the pitiful number of push ups I did today!

http://www.fitwitbootcamp.blogspot.com/