Before procreating I had a number of jobs involving public relations and marketing: writing proposals, copy editing, writing sales documents and presentations. It was all related to my degree in communications from a prestigious and very expensive university so I felt like I had some amount of success in my career. I had the bad luck or lack of intuition about the success of companies and ended up working for several sinking ships. I'd come aboard, settle into work and a routine, and something would happen in a short period of time that had me job searching again. The longest I've ever worked anywhere is two years. Still, I liked the writing and the editing but hated the phone work. I hate the phone. I hate cold calls. I hate begging.
I live with a teacher at a Tech School. He teaches all sorts of IT things that I don't understand. His job is cushy-- great hours, no Fridays. There was a shift in the curriculum at the school and they decided to start enhancing the technical stuff with general education classes and were looking for a communications teacher. I thought it would be a great fit for me.
I'd always sort of had in the back of my head that I'd like to teach. I'm naturally bossy, persnickety about grammar and punctuation and I've worked in fields where writing and speaking ability were key elements of the job description.
I applied on a Saturday and immediately had problems with the web application form. It wouldn't save, it kept giving me errors and I was getting frustrated fast. I wondered aloud, couldn't I just send them a resume instead of filling in all the little boxes that kept misfiring? It was all the same information! After two hours of poking around and filling in the same spaces 20 times, I was able to send it off and wait for a phone call.
It came on Monday morning. I screened the call, naturally, hating phone calls as much as I do, and listened to the HR Chick ask about a phone interview. I immediately called back and got her voice mail.
When she called me back my wonderful sons had been screwing with my phone and left it off the hook. Instead of hearing the phone ring and the answering machine pick up, her call went directly to the strange voicemail system that's on my line from the phone company. I have no idea how to use it, what the PIN is or what kind of song and dance I'd need to do to get that message.
After all of my struggle to apply for this job, I wanted it and wanted it badly. I called her back to schedule a phone interview- the most basic of screening processed. Knowing how awesome this job would be, it was my belief that I would be competing with 500 skilled teachers, all descending on the glass doors of the school like the Mongolian hordes but dressed in tweed suits, clutching their lesson plan books and teaching degrees.
The back and forth to have the phone interview took a MONTH. The morning of the call, I read up on phone interview techniques, reviewed my resume and locked my children in the basement so that I could have the call without a background of whining and screaming. (That's a lie, I locked myself in the bathroom. They would never be quiet without a television.) HR Chick called at the appointed time and asked me a handful of very basic questions that were answered succinctly in my cover letter. Why did I want the job? Had I taught before? Seriously, our conversation was, at most, five minutes long. At the end, she said the next step was to take some online personality test.
Amazingly, she sent the link to the test that day. I figured it would be the standard Myers-Briggs nonsense and it would tell her I was an ENFJ or whatever. No. Not this test. This sucker took me over an hour to do. It was not the Myers-Briggs, it was some insane monstrosity with MATH questions. Sure there was the usual "would you rather do x or y?" but they were comparing two completely opposing things like, "Would you rather rebuild a car engine after taking it apart or eat a sandwich?" So, yeah, math. Tough math, like fractions and decimals and percentages and all these things that had nothing to do with teaching communications. I was PISSED OFF and I wanted a phone call for a real interview immediately.
The call to schedule an in-person interview took a week to receive. We scheduled it for the next week. So I made arrangements for babysitting, managed to dress myself in something not covered in baby detritus and went to the interview, which went well. I kept asking really tough questions like, "What classes would I be teaching? What subjects?" She didn't have an answer for that and we never discussed anything like hours, pay scale, status, benefits or much of anything. HR Chick explained that she had to forward her notes to her boss and then schedule a teaching demonstration in front of other instructors and administrators from the school. I asked her how the demos worked, what kind of topic could I do? She said she'd provide me a list of subjects to choose from when we scheduled the demo. I knew that meant more waiting around.
Another week later, she called to see when I was available and to send the "list of topics" from which I could choose. When I opened the email attachment called "Candidate Presentation Info Sheet." I opened it up and read a lot of blah blah blah about the mission of the school. Then there's a checklist of what they look for that includes things like "confidence and passion for the subject matter, good speaking voice and good grammar," and "eye contact."
Yes, really.
Then she lists the presentation format, and I quote:
1. Briefly introduce the lesson
2. Present the lesson
3. Lead the class in a hands-on activity
4. Summarize the lesson
Then at the bottom:
Presentation topics: Select a topic of your choosing.
ARRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!
Have I mentioned that I repeatedly asked her for a guess at what it is the classes I'd be teaching were about and that she refused to answer me?
I took a week to develop a 20 minute presentation about commas and apostrophe's-- two punctuation marks that are frequently misused in a fashion that makes me go ballistic. Again I found a babysitter for my sons (begged a friend) and she was late, forcing me to speed down the highway to the school.
I gave my little presentation, so nervous that my talking speed was off the gauge. Remember when I wrote that this was a peach of a job and I was sure there'd be heavy competition for it? Wrong! It was me and some old guy with a Master's degree and no personality.
I got some laughs. I think I got my points across fairly well. At the end I asked for feedback, if anyone had any further questions and then I wasn't sure what to do. Should I just leave? Would I be dismissed. I went to the back of the room and removed my CD from the computer, said thank you to those in attendance. Before I could walk out the door, I got a little applause and practically bolted to my car.
I just sat in my car and waited for what seemed like an eternity. My boyfriend came out and said they were discussing me with words like "superb," and "excellent." They said that their students would find it easier to relate to me than the other candidate.
So now I get to play the waiting game again.
