What a difference a district makes

Day two of new teacher activities at the new district having a fabulous strawberry poppyseed salad and some soup from the Bread Co.

It is really amazing what a different world it is out here. I am feeling really good about my decision to leave the last place. Really good. The people here are great. They actually say that they love working here. They talk about how helpful everyone is here. About how great a place it is to work in.

I don't think I have hear people at the last place say that. Take that back -- they may say that, but there is always an exception, or it is preceded by something horrible, or all the extra stuff you have to do there, or how crazy the admin is.

Here there are no exceptions, no nonsense.

And imagine that I get three hours all 6 days of pre-school activities to ACTUALLY WORK IN MY CLASSROOM. I don't think I ever got more than 30 minutes of actual time allotted for actual work related to my teaching at the other place.

There are so many little things that already make this place great. A few big ones being that I don't have to worry about watering plants or making sure the extra furniture is aligned correctly in the back of the room. I have a department that is big, but that has all the stuff ready for me since there is more than just me teaching a subject. I have resources so that I won't have to spend hours upon hours getting ready for teaching a lesson or unit. The online curriculum service they are using actually makes sense and it is easy to utilize. They are using a lot of technology, they are one-to-one with computers in the school (they don't get to take them home, but I guess that prevents kids from making fabulous YouTube videos of the raps they create on Garage Band). And the teachers learn technology techniques that are immediately applicable and not a waste of several professional development days. And these days before school are organized by teachers, so they are actually really purposeful (imagine that).

The superintendent is great. The principal is a super cool, competent, focused, non-absentminded woman who seems to know what she is doing. And there is an administration that will be respected by the students, yet also looked upon as guidance figures.

Now the only question about all this (and one Leo keeps asking me) is this: Why did I wait so long to leave?