So, I'll start this off with a quote from my sister, Mariana. Earlier today I mentioned some of this to her while asking her to review my resume and her response was "You are sooooo all over the place". Yes. Yes I am.
But let me start at the beginning, life in Saclepea has been slow the past few weeks. School seems to be winding down (even though there are still several weeks left in the semester), and I find myself not teaching more often than not due to school cancellations. This has given me more time to think about what I'm going to do when I'm done here and, well, as many people can attest I have a hard time making up my mind. The tentative plan as of like 2 weeks or so ago was to work a job teaching English in France, being paid a stipend to live off of, and traveling a bit while bulking up my resume with a little more international experience and a higher proficiency in French, applying to grad school from France, and going immediately into a teaching masters program.
However, I've also been researching more and more grad school options, and I'm currently riding a line between getting my masters in Secondary Education, International Educational Development, or (as a sort of compromise) Curriculum and Teaching. Basically, do I want to commit myself to being qualified primarily as a teacher, as an international development worker, or do I want to just know a bunch about how education should be and let potential careers fall out of that.
One complication that arises out of this is that I can get my teaching masters subsidized by teaching full time while taking classes at night - there are many programs (both Peace Corps and non-Peace Corps) that would pay for much of my tuition in this scenario as well. However, the alternative programs (curriculum, international policy, etc) tend to not be subsidized in the same way which means I would have to pay more (and in the case of the intense one year masters program at Harvard, I may not even have time to work a job to pay for this at the time).
There are other considerations as well (there always are....how "international" is France in the development world?, how will another year of not-too-serious abroad experience look when I do eventually get serious about a career? why work a job that pays 800 Euro/month when I am qualified for jobs that pay 2 or 3 times that in the states? Do I really want to be away from my close friends in Portland or family in Arizona for another year (and holiday season)? etc. etc.
So I got to thinking that it might be a smarter move to teach at an independent school (they don't require state teacher certification like public schools do) for a year or two, save up some money (in addition to my Peace Corps resettlement money) for grad school, and be financially prepared to avoid student loans for my masters rather than live in France for 8-9 months being paid just enough to get by, and blow all my money traveling just in time to not be financially prepared for grad school and have to take out major loans. Plus, if I look for jobs in the US I'd actually get to teach science instead of English.
So this leads me to today, job browsing on some independent school databases. Turns out there are 2 private schools in the Pacific Northwest (one in Portland, another in Seattle) looking for an interim middle school science teacher for 2 years - one of these is a school I would love to teach at in the future (ideally in the high school section). So, I decided there was no harm in applying and leaving that avenue open. If (and I think this might be a big if, given the economy) I get the job, it would mean I'll be living in Portland again starting this August for 2 school years before (I assume) going somewhere to get some sort of masters - be it teaching, or international development. Either way I will be more prepared with US teaching experience, some saved up money, and having had more time to think about what avenue I want to pursue.
So yeah, I'm sooo all over the place. I may continue my job search for similar school positions on the east coast as well. If I'm going to get wet I may as well dive in and see what my options are, right? Meanwhile, I'm still waiting to hear back from the France program, so I will still probably do that if I cannot get a concrete job offer before I need to decide.
Anyway, there's a little glimpse into the tangled web that is my potential career path. I'm pretty content with it, but that's probably because I'm at the center of it looking at the mess as an interesting puzzle that can be solved in a variety of ways and I'm just trying to pick which way will be the most entertaining for me.
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