New Teacher Training, Day 1

Whew!  36 C outside - so hot and sticky!  What's a girl to do but go to new employee orientation?  Happily the room was air conditioned, but not the ideal environment for professional casual clothing.

The school year starts on January 30.  I am working at a Jesuit high school (which is called a college) in Melbourne.  It's a huge place - there are three campuses.  Two are prep - grade 8, one on the beach in Brighton, and one in Kew.  The Senior School, where I'll be working, is grades 9 - 12 and also in Kew.  I'll be teaching grades 9, 10, and 11.  My contract is only for one term full-time, but I'm replacing a regular teacher who is recuperating from something, so it may have to be longer, or it may be extended as a part-time position.  The future is unclear.

Below are some photos of some of the campus.  I didn't take many, nor did I take the time to frame them nicely because 36 C.  But you get the idea.  It's very beautiful and spacious (45 acres, I believe they said), and it sits high on a hill so you get a gorgeous view of the city.  There are many athletic fields - three cricket ovals that I believe double as footy and/or soccer fields, six tennis courts, a pool, and basketball courts.  I didn't take photos of those because they were a bit of a walk away, and . . . you guessed it . . . 36 C. Plus my awesome sister-in-law was watching the kids and I wanted to get home fast to relieve her.

The chapel and the front of the administration building.

The view of Melbourne's CBD from the chapel

The Great Hall

The roundabout at the centre of campus

Inside the administration building

So many things to like about the school.  First off, my colleagues seem very smart and experienced.  Many of them had taught in other countries - the US, Singapore, Ireland - and quite a few like me are on short-term contracts or had been on short term contracts at other schools for a while.  It was fascinating to hear them compare the merits of different schools' timetabling (scheduling of classes), extra duties, etc.  One woman I talked to said I was very lucky to get any kind of contract at all, that there was a glut of teachers and dozens of applications for each opening.  She assured me that many, many teachers start their careers with CRT (casual relief teaching, or for the Americans, substitute teaching) or with short-term contracts, and that either is an excellent way to get to know the schools and to get your face and name known around town.


Other nice things:
1.  Free admission to the on-campus fitness centre.  It's not fancy, but the price is right. 
2.  Lunch is provided every day.
3.  Keys and teacher IDs already handed out.
4.  A school laptop to use at work, with a portal that actually, honest to goodness works from home, along with a 20 Gb H drive of my very own.



5.  Did I mention the laptop hooks up wirelessly to the projector and speakers?  I questioned the IT guy carefully about if the system was reliable or not (my Charlottesville colleagues will understand why I did this!) and he assured me it was pretty rock-solid.  Woo hoo!
6.  The most amazing record-keeping system I've ever seen.  It takes attendance, and lets the nurse or coaches or other teachers or counselors put notes in attendance in cases of excused absences.  Teachers put notes about students in their record that is then shared with all other teachers, pulls up kids' photos, contact details, records grades, emails a group of students and/or parents, and on your student/parent portal you can record daily summaries of lessons, attach documents, websites, images, whatever so students can access a summary of lesson plans, any worksheets, etc., then work on whatever the attachment is and upload it back to me.

The system (called Seqta) seems to operate a lot like Google Docs, but I'm not sure if it has all the cool bells and whistles like multiple choice tests that you can make with Google Docs.  I'll have to play with it for a while.  But I'd want to stay at this school just to work with this system.  It is an easy and powerful communication tool. 




So overall, a nice introduction.  Only a few sour notes:

1.  The free lunch is served in a room with no air conditioning.  Who wants to eat Vegemite when it's so humid?
2.  I broke my laptop on the first day by trying to update Adobe.  Now the laptop needs to go to tech help overnight so the IT guy can remove and re-install Adobe to undo my stupid mistake.
3.  Sports at the school are compulsory, so they need lots of teachers to help supervise after-school sports.  I was told about this at my interview and had no problem with it.  However, with only one week left before school starts, no one is able to tell me exactly which days after school I'll be staying until 5 to supervise.  It's a problem because I need to arrange after-care for my kids, and the options aren't great at their school.  Those options they have are filling fast.   Worried.
4.  The timetable (schedule) rotates fortnightly, so I have ten separate daily schedules that rotate every two weeks.  The bad part . . . day two (Tuesdays) I teach exactly one class, day five (Fridays) I teach four classes in a row at the end of the day.  I still see the boys 10 times weekly, but one of my four preps I see them twice in one day, and no times another day.   So confusing.  I won't have it straight before my contract's up, I'm sure.  The rest of the schedule doesn't seem bad, though.  I teach three or four classes every other day, (out of six periods per day total) and no other days have four in a row. 

So, hanging with the Jesuits for a while.  Tomorrow, day two of our  new teacher orientation, I'm going to learn about the Jesuit education system and Ignatian service to others.  Plus a walking tour where I hope to locate my classroom.  It's also meant to be only 26 C - perfect temperature for a walking tour of a 45-acre campus.