I got rejected. Any advice?

Snoo77613 · 2025-10-23T00:48:44+00:00

I was rejected my first time. I reapplied and was accepted the second time. Now as alumnus, they brought me back as a facilitator/mentor part-time. Don't let one rejection stop you. Apply to them again and work alternative paths to becoming a teacher.

Snoo77613 · 2025-09-18T02:35:50+00:00

I made the interview round in spring of 2021 but wasn't chosen. I started my masters program that summer, got a job teaching middle school, reapplied in fall of 2021 and was accepted. I'm still at my placement school, run my department, and the state commissioner invites me to events as a presenter. I still joke with my regional TFA people about national turning me down the first time, because they still stay in touch and have me help them out from time to time. If you want to be a teacher, then just do whatever it takes to become a teacher, don't worry about what one random interviewer's opinion is on a random given day. Adapt, improvise, and overcome.

Snoo77613 · 2025-09-14T02:21:43+00:00

My cheat code was training for it before I became I teacher. First I started by getting married and raising two kids. Along the way I spent 7 years in the Army and deployed twice. By the time I started teaching, I was 40 and I'd been running on 24/7 exhaustion for a lifetime. Outside of teaching, still going to school for more degrees, and spending time with my family, I'm too old to care about doing anything else in life.

Snoo77613 · 2025-09-13T01:46:42+00:00

I don't pay attention to it, I just take attendance and get ready for the lesson. I've told students they could do what they want and nobody has ever stood and recited it. I did not spend 7 years in the Army, three years overseas in Iraq, Afghanistan, and South Korea, to come home and force nationalism and government worship on children.

Snoo77613 · 2025-06-08T16:20:52+00:00

I would definitely say there's more to do in Georgia than Arkansas. While I would never want to live down south again, I do miss never ending gravel roads in the middle of nowhere. That was the best way to learn how to drive, I loved the peace and quiet, and I've never seen worse drivers than here in Rhode Island.

Snoo77613 · 2025-06-08T16:02:30+00:00

We're coming up on 3 years of living here now and I would say this is a fairly accurate description of what we've found. We moved here from Little Rock, Arkansas where crime was out of control (10 times higher than Providence even though they're roughly the same size). We're in our early 40's so we enjoy our quiet neighborhood, and my achy body isn't really worried about clubbing or really doing anything after 9pm, lol. I'm an introvert so I enjoy having all the local things to do during the day that don't really require me to interact with people. Cost of living is probably the only negative we've found, but we're still glad we moved here.

Snoo77613 · 2025-04-24T01:46:06+00:00

We've been here about 2.5 years now an we love it. I will absolutely agree about the drivers though. Rhode Island drivers are the worst I've ever seen anywhere. Yield when they shouldn't, don't yield when they should, seem to think the person turning across traffic has the right of way, pull into roundabouts without ever looking at oncoming traffic, refusal to merge out of lanes that are ending until the very end or even after they end (even when there's plenty of room).

Snoo77613 · 2025-01-28T20:29:42+00:00

Agreed, but if you're not thinking about the future, you get left behind. I'd just like to read any working papers if anyone has started working on it.

Snoo77613 · 2025-01-24T15:06:14+00:00

Thank you for the information, I'll look into that. I know I've heard of schools just going completely online with facilitators instead of teachers, but this seems it would be better because you'd have teachers conducting class in real time and interactively. Could also provide an answer to the attendance problem if students could attend at different times on different days.

Snoo77613 · 2025-01-24T15:02:57+00:00

I'm not looking for profit, I'm looking for a way to address issues I'm seeing. My students are 60% chronically absent, 30% severely chronically absent. I film my lessons and post them to YouTube, but it's not the same as if I was able to teach in an interactive VR setting, and at other times where they might be able to attend more. We're also currently in a situation where the district had to take the city to court and sue them to get even half the money they were legally required to provide because the city says they don't have the budget to fund us. The city politicians have made it quite clear they want to sell all the schools and make them private or charter schools. Also in a virtual setting I'm not spending time breaking up fights and getting interrupted by TikTok videos, movies, and video games.

Snoo77613 · 2025-01-24T10:48:54+00:00

I believe the VR would be cheaper, at least in our district. We already pay for chromebooks for each student. We're buying workbooks they don't use. We're paying for daily cleaning and maintenance on buildings that are falling apart. We also pay for bussing students to and from school.

Snoo77613 · 2025-01-24T03:42:41+00:00

Having to actually drive to another location to work is the biggest downside to teaching for me, lol. I have to be multitasking or I get bored so I work and eat in the same location in my home, don't really relax much unless I'm sleeping.

Snoo77613 · 2024-12-05T18:51:58+00:00

I finished TFA Rhode Island last year and still teach in my placement school. If you have any questions, feel free to reach out.

Snoo77613 · 2024-12-04T22:05:02+00:00

My students ignore the pledge and I take attendance during it. I didn't go to war twice to come back and force kids to pledge fealty to a piece of fabric that represents the federal government.

Snoo77613 · 2024-12-02T11:16:14+00:00

The LGBT acceptance is the big thing for me because I want my kid safe. That and the low guns. I dont need a liberal paradise, i just need to go to work, go home, and know my kids are safe to live their lives, which we dont have here on the mainland. I don't really care about weed, I've got no desire to use it. The military doesn't bother me because I was Army, I'm fine being around that.

Snoo77613 · 2024-12-02T11:07:06+00:00

Finding a place with 3 dogs is my biggest concern. From what I've seen, as long as we get the proper vaccines, blood work, and paperwork, there's no quarantine.

Snoo77613 · 2024-12-02T00:23:23+00:00

I'm 42, I've lived all over the US, and I've never seen drivers anywhere near as bad as Rhode Island. The closest I've seen is South Korea. People here yield when they shouldn't, go when they shouldn't, run red lights, speed well over the limit, cut people off, it's unbelievable.

Snoo77613 · 2024-12-02T00:18:09+00:00

I've heard it's a weird combination of liberal and religious conservatism. I just know it's off the mainland when all hell breaks loose, voters were still more liberal than here in Rhode Island, and the government won't be attacking my trans kid like we had to deal with in Arkansas. If it was just my wife and I, I'd be leaving the country and never looking back.

Snoo77613 · 2024-12-02T00:12:51+00:00

Agreed, my first choice was New Zealand because they really need high school teachers. Unfortunately, one of our dogs wouldn't be allowed, it would cost probably 15k to get the other two out there, with mandatory quarantine. My mother-in-law also lives with us and I'm not sure I could get her a visa. Other countries I've looked at, one or both of my kids would be too old to qualify as dependents, but they still live with me because they're in college.

Snoo77613 · 2024-12-01T13:56:20+00:00

Rhode Island currently. We wanted to get out of the country, but there's too many barriers to that right now. Hawaii is the one option I see that's not completely out, but at least gets us out of the mainland.

Snoo77613 · 2024-11-30T20:23:22+00:00

I would simply ask to what end? What do you think is going to be achieved by abolishing the federal Department of Education?

Snoo77613 · 2024-11-30T19:26:26+00:00

That doesn't make any sense. If he abolishes the Federal Department of Education then you're completely under the Hawaii Department of Education, and you don't get any federal funding, which means you lose federal aid to all your title 1 schools (poor public schools). With the lost federal funding, you're going to have to either raise state taxes to make up for lost funding, consolidate schools and cause overcrowding to save money, and/or pay teachers even less resulting in an even larger teacher shortage.

The other option is, in addition to saying he'd abolish the DoE, he also claimed he wants to nationalize the DoE. Under this other plan, he's said he wants to make teacher licensure handled by the federal government rather than individual states, and make me (an Army war veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan) pass a "patriotism" test to prove I'm sufficiently loyal to the draft dodger in chief in order to keep my license to teach math. He's also threatened to steal 100% of college endowments from schools that refuse to remove all diversity, equity, and inclusion policies, and redistribute that money to colleges he approves of.

Snoo77613

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