Why I'm broke now, clear enough?

I don't know if I've made anything clear, enough----I went into special education in 2001, being told I would always have a job, but it really didn't start out that way, for me. I was told I could get a job before I got my certification, with any sort of Bachelors degree. ( I bet they don't say that now ) As I said, it didn't start out that way. Some time later, after interviewing with several districts and telling them I didn't have a certification, I finally got to be a long term substitute teacher, as an LD Tutor, somewhere.

I wasn't happy there, and as I was told "could get a job, anytime, anywhere," I thought I'd be Ok. Well, I couldn't get a job for a year. I should have been working at a restaurant, but this field was supposed to be recession proof. People were supposed take you in off the street, to work in special education. I didn't worry. I thought I'd make that money up, in time to come. I always looked at the pay scale ladder and knew I'd be Ok, if I didn't get a job "that year."

Did my student teaching in 2003 and I was one of 1500 to 2000 that had their Praxis Test (teaching test) mis-scored. I passed it the second time I took it but they kept telling me I failed. I had a possible position in a school district but they wanted people who were licensed/certified, and I couldn't get the right score. I went to work at a school that was poorly run, in my opinion and I resigned after a couple months. I substituted (always told that was a good way to get a job in a school and paid well). Well, it didn't and wasn't gold. I went to work as an aid in another poorly run school, and stayed 90 days. I have to be in a well run place.

In the summer of 2004 (I found out I had passed the test and got my license as an Intervention Specialist in the middle of the summer, 2003---not knowing I had passed once or maybe twice before), I called Career Services at my University, and told them it was imperative that I get a job in a school. I had always said I would never drive north of Dayton, Oh, to work, but, the next day, an opening came in. I interviewed, I was liked and I was hired, for Miami County ESC and Piqua Jr. High. I drove 50 miles one way, 100 miles round trip, a day, for 3 years. I kept doing it because I loved the people and the place. I had interviewed, the summer of 2006, in my area, after working in Piqua for a year, and was turned down. IN FACT, I was told in one interview it would be too frustrating for me to work there, that I wasn't "up enough" on Guided Reading. I also interviewed for the 3rd or 4th time at another place, only to be turned down. I took those rejections as OK---I was happy where I was and would have been conflicted about leaving. I might have turned them down.

~~I have had to keep on going in something and wonder if you will ever make it, ever reach the finish line, EVER get the respect and happiness you want and deserve in an occupation. I wonder what it is worth. Nothing, now, it seems.

One place, or perhaps, two has not yet turned me down but one person forgot who I was after I interveiwed. I had to refresh his memory. (His initials are not C.H. C.H. still remembers me and my name, I believe.) I went into a "tailspin" after I found out the someone else didn't know when he'd know about my future there and that he forgot who I was and had interviewed someone else. Oh, yes, they interviewed someone else. For sure, I didn't get that one.~~

In March or April of 2007, the day after school let out for spring break, I found out I had been non-renewed, because they were eliminating the position I held. They didn't need LD Tutors anymore. I interviewed several times over the summer of 2007, and I got nowhere.
Something happened--I've talked about it before--to prevent me from searching madly for a job and taking a job, any job--but I did take a long term subbing position in a district. I had grave professional concerns about the set up of the class and left it early. I continued to "sub" until the end of the school year.

There is an idiot form of applying for teaching jobs in this area. There's a website and hundreds of people apply for the same teaching job. SHORTAGE, in SPECIAL EDUCATION???? I got an email from this application system site saying that so many people had applied for an Intervention Specialist position that they couldn't call me to interview. SHORTAGE?

See, I thought I was following the rules. I thought I was doing the right thing.

And here I am, practically broke and never been in this position before---working at a restaurant I never had so much respect for, as now, and considering a job at convenience store and people telling me not to pull my Teachers Retirement. I don't know what Teaching has done for me, except break me, almost, maybe, and it truly did, my mother.

Cindy

P.S---I think, too, I'm broke because I didn't work at a restaurant this whole time, since 1998, when I graduated. I tried to work with AFLAC and made practically nothing. I'm probably broke because I didn't realize that a restaurant was the only place that would want me and keep me.