Update Great News!!

Good news to share!
First, I was reappointed and given a professional services contract (kind of like tenure) and I will have a job next year. I don't know what grade I will teach but I will be teaching Reading at St Lucie West K-8.

Secondly Becca and McKenzie rocked their FCATs!! Becca got perfect scores on her Math and Reading tests. As far as I know, she is the first kid in the history of our school to do that!! McKenzie got Level 5s in Reading, Math AND Science!!! Great job girls! We are so proud of you!

At their award ceremonies yesterday, Becca had the "highest GPA" for her class and Kenzie was named "Best Artist" by her classmates. Will post pictures when I get time!

Happy Mother's Day!!

Happy Mother's Day to my wonderful mother!

I got breakfast in bed this morning and then stayed there most of the day sleeping. I was definitely not feeling well. The kids and Mike took over laundry duty, etc. so I could rest. I am a lucky mom.

Back to the grindstone

Well, I went back to work today after 10 glorious days of spring vacation. I will try to post a few pics of our trip to Daytona when I get a chance. . . it may be a while. Things are already crazy around here!

Young Authors (Rebecca)

Great news! The young author's book that Rebecca has been diligently working on for the past three weeks was chosen as a Finalist at her school! Her story won for 3-5th grade! We are immensely proud of her for her hard work and for her creativity. She spent many many hours outlining her story and then writing and revising. She spent many more hours on all of her drawings. Here it is!

Looking Up!

After a very trying week at school, it was nice to enjoy the weekend!

On Friday I took 5 girls home with me. Well we didn't go home, we headed off to McKenzie's art lesson. So I dropped Kenzie off at her class at the community center and the four girls and I went to the grocery store to get stuff for a picnic!! Then we went back and got Kenzie and headed to Claudia's house. The girls ate and played on the trampoline and swam and had a grand old time! The adults? We watched a movie, Burn After Reading. Different, but pretty funny. I took Becca, Kacey and Rachel home with me and left Carlie and Kenzie with Claudia. Mike and I went to bed around 11:30 and apparently the girls didn't go to sleep until 3! Ugh.

I got Rachel up early because she had a Girl Scout thing to go to. She came back around 11 and the girls, plus the neighbor girl Kiera played all afternoon. McKenzie came home around 3 and Kiera and Kacey went home. Then Michelle came to get Rachel, Rebecca and Kenzie and took them to her house! Yes, it was a crazy day with lots of little girls running everywhere.

At 5 Mike and I went to the Martin-Vegues and we all headed down south to Marissa's wedding. It was a beautiful semi-Jewish wedding and we had a wonderful time. Good food, lovely people and dancing. Plus open bar. ;) We didn't get home until after one, so we slept in. I woke up dehydrated and with a major headache and I DIDN'T DRINK ANYTHING!! I even took a nap. Outside of a load of laundry and some dishes, I didn't get much accomplished. I went and got the girls around 4 and helped Mike pour some concrete. He built a little concrete pad on the side of the houses to keep the garbage cans on. We got ticketed for a code violation from the city a few days ago because our garbafe cans are visible from the street. Oh Puleeze! There are at least 4 or 5 abandoned houses on our street that haven't been mowed since Christmas and we get the citation? We have one of the best looking yards on our entire street. Ugh. Anyway, we still need to put up a screen or plant a bush or something, but the hard part is over.

Tonight Mike and I took the kids out to dinner. Nice to just relax. But now I have a stack of papers to grade before the big game starts. Later!!

The end of March, finally

Well, I've almost made it through March. It's been a rough month. We started with McKenzie getting sick, moved through to FCATs (also known as Hell Week) and since then have been dealing with major budget cuts and union business. I'm so ready for Spring Break.

There has been lots of drama at work. The district has decided that they want all teachers to have their ESOL certification, pronto! Like yesterday! Nevermind that they state Department of Education gives you six years from your hire date to get all of your classes done. Our district says four years, or else! Only they didn't tell any of the teachers. Oops. Major headache.

So I've been scrambling to get all my ducks in a row. Because I'm in my fourth year of teaching. Yeah, major panic. In the end, I think I'm okay and have everything done that I am supposed to have done. It gets so confusing because everyone you talk to says something different. There are five classes to take for some teachers, others need one or two. As a reading teacher I have to take five. I have taken two but then some of my reading classes count toward this requirement. How many and which ones vary depending on who you talk to and when and which orbit the moon is in. Crazy. Or you can take the ESOL test and only take two of the classes. Some websites say two specific classes, some say any two classes. Ugh.

So on Friday morning it really looked like my job would be in jeopardy. But then someone from the state apparently said that if you pass the ESOL exam and you have a reading endorsement, you're good. And this morning I got an email that said my paperwork was on it's way to the state and should be approved by the end of next week. I'll believe it when I see it.

Thursday night the girls and I went grocery shopping for the first time in weeks and filled up two grocery carts and spent $400. Whoa. Had a quiet weekend. Laundry. Cleaning. Shopping. Friday I went out to dinner with Michelle for some much needed girl talk and venting (about school stuff) time. Later that night Gonzaga lost to a very good UNC team. Saturday Becca went to a spring training game with a friend down in Jupiter. In the evening the girls and I went shopping for a dress for me to wear to a wedding next weekend. I found two and I couldn't decide so i got both. I think I have decided to wear one of them to the eighth grade dance in May and one of them to Marissa's wedding. I got a new haircut and highlights on Sunday afternoon and had many compliments today. I guess I look good as a blonde. Also on Sunday I made two dozen cupcakes for Marissa's surprise bridal shower at lunch today. I used marshmallows to make flowers for the tops. Very cute. And of course I didn't even take any pictures!! I've been bad about that lately.

So there you have it. Tons of stress at work as the budget nightmare goes on. And lots of chores at home. Fun. Fun. Fun.

Bad News All Around

I have spent the past couple of weeks up to my elbows in union issues. For those of you that don't know, I am a union rep at my school site. It's my first year, so I'm learning as I go. Because of the fiscal disaster, otherwise known as Florida, our district is looking at needing to cut at least $30 million out of a $238 million budget (this is on top of the $23 million cut last year). It's not pretty. We are a district of declining enrollment in a county where home prices have fallen 40% in the past year. Unemployment is over 10%. It's ugly anyway you look at it. And some very unpleasant decisions have to be made. Three hundred jobs are on the chopping block already.

As it stands, the budget committee and superintendant have made recommendations which the School Board will review. The final decisions will be made April 7 although things will need to be tweaked depending on whether the FL legislature can cough up some more money or decides to make even deeper cuts. Whatever happened to the FL constitution that says the "Paramount responsibility" on the state is to educate it's young people?

I am still on annual contract, so my job is by no means safe. Principals will not know how many positions that have until mid-May and I may not know until the end of May if I have position or not. If I have a position I have no guarantee as to grade or subject area. Needless to say I have had a lot on my mind lately.