I Might Be Crazy.

I probably am to some degree.  ;)  But I'm also excited about this, so I'll share anyway.  Yes, I am having a baby in 4 days.  I didn't forget that, I promise!

I got asked a while ago to be a part of a project with EO to redesign our main assessments we give to students. We need to align them with common core standards, and we want them to be in effect before our new teaching platform goes into effect early next year.  I applied for the project, was selected, and was excited to be involved with the innovative part of EO.  The project timeline has been delayed for about 3 weeks now, as they get this new content loaded into the new classroom format, get those on the team access, etc-all expected honestly.  We are tentatively slated though to start next week, and it will require approximately 20 hours a week...thankfully, 20 very, very flexible hours that I can do anytime, in my jammies, in bed, with kids around, etc, but that's still a lot of time nonetheless.  It's a short term project-should be done by the middle/end of December.

I also got asked by my immediate supervisor to be on the K-12 recruiting team.  Basically, it's my supervisor and 2 veteran teachers (myself included), and we will be running group interviews twice a week for potential teaching candidates.  EO is hiring 300 new teachers (!) as we just got an enormous contract that requires 1:1 instruction rather than our normal 3:1 instruction; thus, we need a huge influx just to cover this contract.  It's exciting but will require a lot of work to get our teaching staff fully functioning to handle it-hence the recruiting team.  I have a schedule set up for this through the end of December, only requiring about 5 hours a week, but in January, the group interview/recruiting process will be turned over to the 2 veteran teachers (myself included) to run; and down the line the goal is to form a recruiting team in general, which I would be a part of.  I am super excited to do this-I love being involved working with the other teachers and after 6 years with EO, I am pretty well versed in what would make a good teacher, especially with our more strenuous expectations.

I do have to cap my hours at 24/week, so even though we will have a huge influx of students, I probably won't have the availability to actually teach until the assessment project ends in December.

So the next month will probably be a little crazed with the new baby, recovering, and these few extra projects....on top of nearly 30 hours a week with WGU.  See, I told you I might be crazy.  The idea of helping support our family though is amazing to me, and I feel so blessed to have these positions, and the required skillsets, so that I can work at home with fully legitimate jobs and bless our family with an extra financial boost....all while taking care of the kids and staying connected to a field I just love.

I do have to admit, I do take things with EO in a somewhat pessimistic manner these days.  After what happened a year and a half ago with the company restructure, and the horrible way they handled staffing, I don't have much faith in the way they manage employees; as such I will not accept a huge position with them again, especially when WGU is such a good fit for me.  I felt good about these two projects though, so I decided to follow my gut and go with it.  I am not, however, holding out hope for this to be any more promising than just a couple of cool projects, and I fully anticipate not being seen as anything more than a fairly decent veteran online teacher who may or may not be appreciated, depending on the situation.  See-pessimistic.  I love teaching our online students, and I truly believe in the product we offer and want to be help it be the best it can be-and hire the best we can hire.  I just won't set myself up again to be disappointed and let-down as I have been in the past.

And that's the work update!  We'll see how crazy the next month gets!