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It’s been awhile since I updated this, and in the meantime, I attended a Reception for Accepted Fellows last Wednesday at LaGuardia High School. There were about 60 fellows, and we got some information about placement from two representatives from the Board of Education (it will happen in April or May; most of us will get invited to only one or two placement fairs; we may leave with a job offer, we may not.)
They confirmed what I had suspected: they aren’t telling us much because they simply don’t know. Many districts don’t know what their requirements are; they won’t have pupil counts until the first day of school. At least one of the Graduate Programs — Bank Street College — is unsure whether it will take future cohorts. (The Board of Education representatives didn’t say that, but I was told by Dr. Anand at Bank Street.)
Although the reception was intended for the Fellows to get to know one another, it wasn’t structured very well for that, and the physical arrangments positively worked against it. Still, I was able to speak with the one person I recognized from my interview, a science applicant, who taught a nice lesson on nutrition and the food pyramid.
I also had a chance to listen to one of the 2001 Fellows, a man teaching Kindergarten in Brooklyn. I got some insight into the politics of this situation. Apparently, Teaching Fellows come into the system with some seniority over some of the other teachers, and that’s causing some resentments. The Teaching Fellow didn’t seem terribly bothered by it, and he apparently has a very supportive Principal, but all is not caviar and roses.