Convalescence

I have been comparing my experiences with this job and my former job in Japan for the past few weeks.  there are some frightening similarities.  I know. I know, "compare and despair: a Stewart Smally 'no-no'". 

But I will, just this one time, indulge myself because i have mixed feelings about this current job, which, overall, I basically like, as a transition job from the most hellish experience I've ever had. 

My former job  is something I do not wish upon anyone else.  Not that the company itself is all that bad, but my particular school, as everyone who experienced multiple schools said repeatedly, was particularly difficult.  My boss was deeply disliked by everyone in the district.  On my very first day, i received sympathy and condolences that i had to work for a man I didn't even know, but i liked at the time because he gave me a job.  For six months i gave him the benefit of the doubt that he was not the utter asshole he appeared to be; I just didn't see the whole picture yet.  but i quickly grew to understand who he really was and learned to intensely despise him. 

 For the first year, i didn't see by baby because I left work before he got up in the morning and didnt come home until he went to bed, and had to work on weekends too.  I worked about 70 hours a week for a year, for a salary that didn't cover the cost of rent, childcare, and utilities.  Groceries had to be put on a credit card.  there was no overtime pay. their system is you can take "comp time" instead, but i was never allowed to do this because there was always too much to do and never a free moment. 

the students, overall, were good beans, but i didn't deal with most of  them.  mostly i had to discipline the bad eggs and keep people in line.  I dealt with students who didn't get along with their host families, other students, or teachers, or teachers who did things to piss off the students, who were never satisfied with anything anyone ever did.  they screamed at me, at least once a day, that they "owned me," that their father or mother or uncle paid my salary so I had to do what they tell me to do, that i was just an office worker (and thus worth less than gum at the bottom of their shoes), a ":fat fucking bitch" and so on and so forth.  this verbal abuse, technically harassment and technically not tolerated under HR policies of the company, is perfectly OK if the abuser is a tuition paying student, and thus I had no recourse to stop the constant onslaught of abuse.  To be fair, I know this is not the official line of the company and that other centers who have abusive students, get rid of them, but my boss sees only dollar signs and doesn't give a hoot about anything else. 

before ELS i worked at MIIS temporarily and enjoyed the work so much I thought perhaps Adult education was the way to go.  the students were bright, articulate, respectful, and enthusiastic, and such incredibly fun people.  best of all, I was a "real" teacher, not a "fake teacher" like in Japan. I made assignments which I graded; I put in a lot of hours, but i loved loved loved my work.  It was the reason why I got my MA in TESOL.

In Japan, I liked my job because i had a lot of free time and money to do as I liked, something I never had at any other job (and i should know, because I have had a job since I was 14, and often worked 3 jobs at once to cover my bills in college).  I liked the children and I liked most of the teachers i worked with.  the one thing I just couldn't stand was the fact that, as an ALT, I was not the real teacher.  i was shuttled around from class to class and school to school and never really got to know any one well and was treated like a piece of candy the children got from time to time, but i was not the real teacher. 

This made sense because Japan JET program has no standards for their recruits, other than being a native English speaker and having some kind of interest in Japan. 

Kids spend more hours a day with their teachers than with their parents.  This is true everywhere, but especially true in Asia.  As a parent, if my kid is going to spend 10 or more hours of their day with a person, i want that person to be fully vetted and fully credentialed.  if not, that person had better be working as an assistant with a real teacher so they can be supervised. 

So I get it. 

Since the JET program accepts pretty much anyone, ALTs had better be carefully watched.  You never know.  And while i knew lots of fantastic ALTS, there were some real doozies out there, too, so I got it. 

And I made the  most out of my situation, and learned to enjoy it for what it was, but I was determined to go back to school to get my MA so I could be a "real" teacher. I was very saddened by my lack of authenticity and inability to really make any real connection with the kids.  I was a clown to amuse and entertain and very little else.  I liked it for what it was but i was determined never to be an ALT ever again.

Which brings me to my current job.  NETS, employees of the HK government but who only work at one school, are fully credentialed, fully vetted, deeply scrutinized, and hand picked by the schools' principals to be the English teach at the school.  My job, as I understood it, would be to teach 1st, 2nd, and 3rd grade, and serve as a resource for 4th 5th 6th grade Local English Teachers. 

Imagine my surprise and disappointment to learn I have been again relegated to clown/candy ALT who isn't even necessary in the classroom, as there is a  "real" teacher who does all the work, who is a LET, for 1st, 2nd, 3rd grades. 


I didn't realize before i took this job that I would be an ALT again.  Mabo thinks I'm crazy; of course no Asian school would accept me as a real teacher; how can a "gaijin" be a real teacher for Asian kids, unless at an international school? 

Silly me for thinking my years of experience, glowing recommendation letters, my MA TESOL degree, and my Vermont and California teacher credentials would be enough to prove my merit? 

So here I am again, with a job where I basically stand around and smile, to prove to local parents how international their school is, and try to be as white and as blue-eyed as possible, so parents will enroll their kids at the school, and go to all the parent demonstration lessons where I basically do very little, and be paraded around and showcased like the elephants at the circus.

And despite the fact I do very little, I actually am in the classroom a lot.  Today for example, I am "teaching" 7 lessons.  I see my first graders every day.  Because they need alot of personal attention, it is fantastic that the teacher gets an assistant to walk around and help the kids get on the right page of the right book and stay on task.  then she can get on with the teaching part. 

this is so much better than in Japan where I saw kids, at most, 6 times a semester, or as little as once in three years, with an average of once or twice a semester.  Even my third graders, whom I see one a week, will have more time with me than any of my Japanese kids ever did.  So I see this experience as being infinitely better than in Japan in that way. 

And as a transition job from the utter hell of my former job, it is heavenly not to have to discipline anyone and all I need to do is show up on time.  i have nothing to grade, zero accountability, zero responsibility, and the kids love me.  I needed a little loving, since I had been battered so badly by the nasty rotten brats at the "adult" school where I was Academic Director.  And i love the fact that my time when i get home is mine, and I don't need to do lesson planning or grading and i don't need to be frantically on the phone at 9:00 at night talking a teacher off the ledge because the students were so mean and nasty to him or her that day, or desperately finding a sub because suddenly one teacher is sick or has an unexpected emergency. 

And, I'm happy to report, according to the doctor i had to see on Saturday (required health check for work), my blood pressure is a full 30-40 points lower than it was just four weeks ago, when I had my blood pressure taken before i left to go to Hong Kong.  Now its back to what it has been since i was 16 years old: 110/70.  it had been hoovering at the 140-150/100 mark for quite some time.  See? ELS was literally killing me. 

So at this point, I adore the utter lack of responsibility and uselessness and clowning and free time.  but, knowing how frustrated I was eventually with that in japan, I am sure this cannot possibly be a long term assignment for me. I  call it R&R or Convalescence, but I don't call it teaching, not yet. 

My one ray of hope is that I recall that my second year of teaching in japan I was afforded more responsibility (a tiny bit) than when i first arrived.  Hopefully I can be a real teacher in some capacity next year.  This year I will enjoy my convalescence and not worry too much about it.  it's nice to have a period of time to recover and reflect and regroup while being paid enough to support my family with benefits and all that.  it is rare in this world that you can get that.  

So, in essence, I deeply appreciate this position and I like what I don't have to do, but I don't exactly like what I do.  I feel very mixed and i don't feel I'm developing professionally.  it was not an upwards career move.  But it is allowing me to heal and recover, and for that, I am ever grateful.