el peregringo

I am a teacher. If I look back at my life, I’ve always been a teacher even when I wasn’t actually working as a teacher. For the past four years I’ve been dealing (off and on) with becoming a licensed teacher in the State of Vermont. This is not hard, but it sure is tedious. I opted for the peer review route to licensing since it’s a reasonable way to avoid going back to undergraduate school to get an education degree. For the most part, this has been a valuable experience.

Creating my portfolio was frustrating at times. One is expected to document things in a brief summary that have been the subjects of dissertations and much argumentation over the years. I think I did a decent job of it, but boy were there moments when I wondered if it was worth it. In retrospect, it forced me to think about and to “verbalize” in writing my thoughts on education. I don’t know yet whether I’ll be granted a license, but I think I learned something in preparing the portfolio (my portfolio is entirely electronic and online, but I’m hesitant to link to it because many of the people who wrote letters or provided other documentation of my teaching did so with the understanding that it wasn’t a public document–if you really want to see it, write to me privately and I’ll see about giving you access). My good friend Debbie Hadeka thinks I won’t have any difficulties with getting my portfolio approved. I hope she’s right…

Anyway, as for the rant portion of this post… OK, so I applied to peer review in 2004 and was to have submitted my portfolio in 2005. Ana was diagnosed with cancer in the spring of 2005 and all life went to hell. It essentially took me 2 years to get myself sufficiently organized again to finish and submit the darn portfolio–complete with a check for $1200. So I just got a letter that from the State letting me know I screwed up and didn’t ask for an extension. The woman with whom I’ve been dealing, Linda, is truly helpful, and, like most Vermont State employees I have dealt with over the years, defies the otherwise universal norm of state employee who exists only to screw with you. Linda has been terrific.

Still, the “law” requires that I submit yet another check for $35.00 to apply for peer review–the same peer review that I am already scheduled to have on June 13th. So, my licensing expenses to date are:

If I didn’t love teaching, I’m not sure I could have justified the expense.