Somebody thinks I'm acceptable

I got accepted! Somebody thinks I'm acceptable! Granted, they don't know me from a bar of soap, and I'm only acceptable in an academic sense, but it's nice to feel wanted all the same.

Two weeks after applying for a Dip Ed Bachelor of Teaching (in high school science), I got a letter of offer. I can't actually accept the offer, because UTS's website isn't ready yet, but you can't have everything. The strangest thing about this is that people keep asking me if I'm going to be a teacher. It kind of seems like an existential question, will my being be changed by learning about pedagogy? I doubt it.

Even on a practical level, I don't know what I'm going to do with this qualification. It won't be a career, that's certain. I'm done with careers, I only want jobs now. Given that, I don't know whether I want to teach full time or just be a casual teacher. I think both have merits, both from a teaching and financial view point. What this will give me more than anything is a flexibility I've never had before. Every job I've ever had has been firmly anchored to capital cities, mostly no smaller than Sydney. I've resisted moving overseas because I'm a sedentary creature - I put down roots and I don't much like pulling them up. This has limited both our careers, but it's allowed us to start to feel like part of a community, and we have friends that mean so much more than a directorship.

I'm also a little nervous about learning about teaching. I've always taught - tutoring, training staff, teaching my own kids. I'm worried that I'm either going to discover that I'm doing it wrong, or (more likely given my disposition) discover that I don't believe a word of what they're telling me. I hoping that I'm going to discover some perspectives I hadn't previously considered and also some names for things I already knew.

And then of course, there is the minor matter that I still have a business that I'm part owner of that needs running, growing and supporting. I don't want to be doing this forever, but we have every intention of continuing to build this business, so I seem to trying to split myself in two.



One day I might know what I want to be when I grow up.