I know I have been neglecting this blog. Being in the teaching profession you have to be very careful what you say in any medium, not least the Internet where it is difficult to remain hidden. I intend to make a patchy return from my blogging exile.
At the moment I am exactly equidistant between the rock and a hard place. I am unable to decide on my next steps and this is not entirely due to my indecision. To those that know me, they will know that I haven’t qualified as a teacher and that I need to undertake a further final placement. I have some options open to me.
I could do exactly that. That is certainly not the easiest option. Without getting into “administration hiccups”, which are frustrating, I need to find accommodation for three months and get the money to pay for it. With regard to the accommodation, services attached to the university have been rather unhelpful — even delaying the return payment of our deposits for last year’s accommodation. Few private landlords are willing to offer such short term lets. In the absence of being able to give assurances on my future location this has added to the delay of finding me a potential school to do my placement in.
There is the option to abandon the idea of teaching completely, which I am not keen to do but seems the more realistic option. I am uncertain of the viability of this option. Judging where I am now compared to the desolate, disheartening place I was at this time last year, I feel I am in a worse position, somehow. Any potential employer worth their salt will ask me about the previous year and the reasons for not completing the course. Therefore, any role I take is likely to be menial. I have to be prepared for that, but I hope that anyone can see why this is less desirable to me than my first option.
I met and became friends with some absolutely unforgettable and brilliant people during my time there and, dare I say it, friends for life! But though I know I shouldn’t, I feel a little regretful that I went there.
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Everything seemed fine until I got to Manchester Piccadilly. There it poured down: an omen of things to come. An announcement rang out, informing that my train was to be moved to another platform. Quite which platform was unknown to passengers because a rather loud, mouthy announcer voiced her announcement all over the top of it. In the event, it was moved to the next platform. Even so… not very good.
Without too much further frustrations I arrived at Stoke, where it was pouring even heavier. I had a look for the bus station and walked in one direction for about a minute before deciding it must have been the other way. It transpired Stoke’s bus station is actually Stoke’s train station with a bus shelter outside. So I was a little wet, and those already seeking shelter under the bus stop were curiously reluctant to allow a further lost soul camp under it. So I got even wetter.
The bus did eventually come, however where it stopped I was pretty clueless. I found that Keele University was a rather bewildering place, and being unclear on where to get off, I just stayed onboard until the driver alerted me it was the last stop.
I got my map out and tried to work out where to go. After twenty minutes of lonely wandering in the torrential rain and two phone calls later, I found out I was at the right place after all. The automatic doors weren’t automatic and I needed to pull instead of push. Anyway, I was a little wet and my map was beyond redemption. I quickly developed a stonking migraine which kept me awake (and violently moving, shaking, punching and kicking) much of the night.
At the moment, I am in the lounge of the Management Centre, using the free wireless. I am doing this because I am to be interviewed last and was invited to leave and come back later. So thus I am, watching the cricket with one wicket to fall. As for the interview, I’m not greatly confident. But oh well…
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…but I have to. Another interview, miles upon miles away. Despite being in a fantastic position, with the experience I have accrued, I can’t help but feel I’m still not a teacher, qualified or otherwise.
But having spent so much time, effort and money in order to get to this point, I mustn’t let my hesitations impede the interview.
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It’s quite funny really. After six months of unemployment, Jobcentre Plus will send you on a “13 week course”. Putting you on such a “training programme” gets you off their books for the time being, and they give you about £15 a week extra. While you are on there, you are no longer regarded as unemployed as such: government figures on unemployment for July will exclude me.
I have an interview next week, which requires hotel stays and long train journeys again. It’s cost me about £150 so far. JC+ are, of course, unwilling to help remunerate that cost, for it is not a job I am applying for… it’s a course. Annoying.
Talking of annoying… and of this 13 week course…
Before I started, I was volunteering at a local secondary school, getting good quality experience. I had enrolled on two short courses to get decent qualifications. I was sending up to six application forms a week and getting a rather good ratio of applications to interviews. Now I’ve started, I’m not able to carry on my volunteer work, and the placement in exactly the same place doing exactly the same thing they have meant to have organised has not materialised. I have been told I cannot attend those two courses and must do one rather pointless one instead, because they can get double-funding. I attend this course for about 30 hours a week, doing six hours of “jobsearch”: which actually prevents me from filling in application forms.
When you add communist protesters camping outside, weekly bomb scares and fire alerts, crying staff and violent outbursts, it’s not a great place to be. Having said that, I’ve been allocated to a group that’s actually quite nice. But I still feel I would have been much better placed carrying on what I was doing off my own back.
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Well same old. Experience is my downfall. I’m not sure what more I could have done, or whether it’s even possible. It’s difficult to remain positive, and all the well-meaning folks that say “it just wasn’t meant to be. Don’t worry your time will come,” I apologise for seeming rude or ignoring your kind words — I appreciate your thoughts.
It looks rather unlikely I’m going to get this business off the ground, too. I think a £200,000 initial outlay is rather too outlandish. Maybe in the future…? Ha…
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I haven’t really updated this recently. Not an awful lot has happened, yet a lot has. In short, I’m no nearer to achieving my goals. What’s worse is that I’m being stifled from trying to.
But some good things have happened: I’ve been in contact with my sister and one of my stepbrothers; my business is creeping slowly forward (very slowly…); and um… well they say things come in threes, so I’ll report back later with the other one!
Got two interviews this week. They tell me that’s really good, and they say I’m pessimistic when I don’t agree. I don’t count my chickens before they hatch; I approach each role with trepidation and respect. It seems interviewers appreciate that… but nothing more. Let’s see anyway.
Plenty of fish in the sea, the slippery buggers!
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I went back to Kent briefly this week for an interview. It went “ok”: I regret not adding things I should have done, but it’s all in hindsight. I had a small amount of time left over while in Sittingbourne to myself so I had a bit of a look around.
One question I asked with alarm in my mind is: “what the hell have they done to the place?”, to which the answer is “just about nothing”, which is about the worst thing they could have done. Few shops have changed hands and those that have been replaced were pretty much exactly the same but with a different name.
I wondered back into Milton Regis, saw my old house and had a brief look around the south of the village. The iron works is still there, though the garage has been replaced by a new housing area. The plants and trees in my old gardens were much taller now, but other than that, it’s all the same.
It’s funny really. You’d expect to be sad if things changed and you weren’t able to recognise the place, but Sittingbourne is completely different. When it seems like nothing has happened since you left, it’s as if they haven’t learned anything at all. It’s still crap, but there is still that strange attraction…
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It’s been a productive few days, but it feels like I haven’t actually got anywhere.
I’ve pretty much finished my desk: a few finishing touches and it’ll be done. I have started to move things about in my room but I haven’t finished. I’ve done quite a few other jobs too as I went and left others that should have been a priority.
I think that’s a good analogy of life for me at the moment: I’m doing jobs I shouldn’t be doing and distracting myself from more important things. Things I once found fun seem such a drag now. And the only thing people want to know from me is whether I have found a job. It’s frustrating me a little. I know people mean well but having to report little in the way of news on that front discourages me. When I get a job, I will tell people.
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You might, if you read my blog regularly, have been wondering what I have been doing recently. I haven’t posted for a while, so as you might guess, that answer to your question is "not much".
I haven’t been doing nothing, however. My desk is slowly taking shape, after many trials with the electric jigsaw (the supposed "guide" is surely a misnomer) and the hand saws (one goes straight but takes ages; the other is nice and quick but goes all over the place). I’m now sorting out the keyboard shelf so I shall soon be shouting at the hammer for making such an impression of my thumb, and quite possibly lobbing a few dowels across the room. Then it remains to build the final shelf for the monitor, which could prove the greatest challenge: another job for the electric jigsaw.
I have also applied for a few jobs. I want to start my working life proper somewhere stimulating and exciting: I’ll be damned if I’m forced to make friends with electronic colleagues and a calculator named "Alfred". I still want to be creative and I want to have the opportunity to present myself as an entity rather than as an employee, but chances are getting fewer and I’m looking abroad.
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