Take Courage to Look Fear in the Face

Oh, what a week I've had! And today held it's challenges as well. My sweet guardian angel, where are you?!  

Thank God that I was able to meet my numbers.

I have 102 kids in my program when I only needed 100. It has been so hard to get them, because about 99% of the kids are kids that I have gotten on my own, without recommendations from any teachers or staff.  My coworkers do not have the challenges that I have because they have the same kids over and over again, only having to add six graders as the eighth graders leave or ninth graders as the seniors leave. Here I am at a new school where most of the kids do not know about this program, and yet, I have made the numbers! I am very proud of myself for that. I just hope that I can come up with some new ideas to keep them interested until the end of the year. Too bad the tango lessons didn't work out... That would have been the icing on the cake to finalize this school year... Maybe next year?

I was able to get most of the parents surveyed except for one, even though I had to make home visits to almost all of them to find them and get the paperwork completed. I lost about two days this week trying to do that. One parent I couldn't find, but hey, I wasn't even supposed to have done them... the parental involvement person was supposed to have done them. My boss said he was going to notify the man who wanted these surveys that his staff put me to do it instead of doing it themselves.

I have had to reset all the passwords for my kids, because they were not able to get into the school Internet and/or were not even in the system! The school staff was supposed to have been done that at the beginning of the school year. It is too bad that here it is almost the end of the school year and there were at least 98% errors. Having to reset all the passwords set me back several days from completing the student evaluations.

<FONTSIZE=4>Also, because the kids have been testing in the labs for the past three days, I have not been able to do the surveys in multitude. I suppose God had his hand in on that one, because I had to bring in the kids one by one and have them do the survey on my computer. Well, at least I know that only one student gave me a bad evaluation. That was the kid who locked my filing cabinet earlier this year that kept me from getting to my paperwork; remember?! Well, he is the main student who really liked the woman who was here before me. I think she probably let him get away with a lot. From what I hear, she didn't have any order and the kids would go to her only to hang out and skip classes.

My bad kids are suspended. My boss told me not to worry about getting their surveys done, which may be a blessing! Perhaps it will give me some time to get them to straighten out, maybe not. I wish I had asked the boy in the beginning if he really wanted to be in this program, because it seems that every time I go look for him, he is always in trouble... and the girl, well, she was court-ordered to be in my program. She is into drugs and a gang and she is being raised by her 18 year old sister because her mom is in jail for drugs. If it had been up to me, I would not have had her in the program, because she really does not want to straighten up. She is an 8th grader who misses a lot of school. She was recently suspended because she beat up a 6th grader. Being suspended is not any kind of real punishment. It's a way for her to be out and do drugs and all the bad things she wants to do. I wish administration would see that suspension does not work. They should put her to do community service instead.

I was very surprised in the change of one of my most depressed students. His father died on his birthday. He had a light in his eyes today that I had never seen before. Our relationship seems to be much better. He trusts me and he looks for me. That is a good sign that he is finally getting over his depression. I love to see my kids smiling and happy.

Today, I had to try to get the staff to evaluate me in a survey. Oh, that is so scary, to put your head right under the guillotine. Cut off my head, why don't you?!#

  The evaluations were only supposed to have been done by administration staff and the staff who recommended kids into my program. Unfortunately, the principal emailed the whole school to do it. Ouch!!!! That's like cutting off my head and mutilating my entire body in small bite sized pieces!!!!!!  

One of the teachers told me that she overheard someone from administration saying negative things about me and that I am not very professional. I don't think it was very professional for them to say that or to try to convince the others to say bad things about me in the evaluation.

A lot rests on this evaluation. It could cost me my job. It hurts to know that so many people will be evaluating me, even if they do not know me and/or have not helped me in my job. How would they feel if the whole school had to evaluate them?! 

Looking for work is such a pain. I hope the staff won't judge me harshly. I would hate to have to be forced to look for another job again... I have done a lot of good at this job. I hope enough people will be able to recognize that so as to balance out the people with black hearts.

God, help me get through this. Guardian Angel, stay close. Help me to continue to do my best at my job.

God, please help me to feel that I am not alone... But if I am alone, help me to remain standing with my head held high.

Winivere