THE TRIALS OF JOB (OR "JOB TRIALS")

Many apologies for not updating this blog since January! The excuse is mainly technical. Since January, Google has forced bloggers to "migrate" to a new blog site and create a Google password etc., which I tried to do numerous times, and had connection issues, or technical issues each time so that nothing came of these attempts to migrate at gunpoint. (My home internet connection sucks, as young people say these days.)

But you're not interested in my technical trials. A quick news update:

January - took a 3-week Arabic refresher up in Monterey (see previous blog) and returned to Torrance to start teaching ESL at Cal State Long Beach mornings and a second job at West Semitic Research afternoons. This immediately filled my schedule up and has kept me running ever since.

February - same old, same old

March - decided to go full out for job hunting at the TESOL conference in Seattle later in the month. TESOL is the professional organization for the ESL/EFL teaching profession. They have a nice online job posting facility, where I posted my resume and applied for a number of different job postings (mainly in the Middle East). Six replied and set up an interview time with me at the conference. My first interview was with Kuwait University, which went so-so, being my first, but since it was way down the list of priorities, the stakes were pretty low for me, and I got my nervousness out of the way early on. The other five interviews went very well, I thought. I felt like I was "God's gift to Middle Eastern university EFL programs." I mean, who else would have such a background in the area and such experience? Plus a PhD, mind you! Anyway, I flew back home feeling very confident.

April - one university contacted me almost immediately: Zayed U. in Abu Dhabi (UAE), a women's college that had a pretty good rep in the region. They set up a video-conference second interview April 17, which I came to pretty sure it would be low-key, talking with the same department head I'd interviewed with at TESOL, and I'd get an offer by the end of it. Just pro forma. Instead, I was confronted with a room with three total strangers, one of whom was the assistant provost, who grilled me in what seemed like nothing short of a Master's oral exam. And for two jobs in addition to the one I had applied for and for which I'd never seen the job description. It was a bit like those nightmares where you are suddenly sitting in on some exam you haven't prepared for in a class you don't know surrounded by students you've never met. Except it was for real. It took a while to get oriented to what positions they were talking about. (Freshman composition?) The second half I decided to grab the bull by the horns and talk about what I felt was important - I even managed a few hand gestures when I got into it instead of sitting painfully still. I give myself a C+. (They declined to follow up on my application afterwards, not too surprisingly.)

Another university, Sultan Qaboos U. in Oman (Muscat, where my mom was a missionary nurse, is the capital) actually made me an offer via email. (But mixed my file up with someone else's, obviously. They talked about the "family issues" I had brought up in the interview and "my wife"!) I emailed back saying I would consider their lower-than-average salary if they could guarantee me in writing that I'd be allowed to participate in their Curriculum Unit as professional development. (They seemed dead set on corralling me into a classroom like any other MA instructor.) The ball is now in their court, and I'm waiting to hear back from them. I won't take it just because it's the first and (so far) only offer. I'm in my second, post-PhD career now, and I don't want to waste time in something that won't be professional advancement. Hey, I did the full-time classroom teacher shtick in Cairo BEFORE my doctorate. I'm moving on ...

I was most disappointed not to hear back from Qatar U, my first choice. I thought the interview went well, so I'm a bit puzzled how many other applicants they could find that could better my qualifications. I mean I even taught Arabic, for Pete's sake!

Meanwhile, an old Illinois professor friend (from the days I helped out the Portuguese Dept.) who is now a dean at UAE University told me about an EFL job there and has even promised to put in a good word for me with that department head. That application is less than a week old, but looks promising. I think I could have recovered from my interview with Zayed U if I had had a good insider there to vouch for me (because the interview didn't really show me for myself at all), so maybe that's the main requirement for getting a "foot in the door."

Anyway, meanwhile I'm teaching part-time at Cal State mornings and West Semitic Research afternoons and keeping busier than I want to be (for a lot less money than I need to live on here in LA). So the promise of a real full-time (tax-free) salary overseas is sounding better and better all the time! Classes here end May 18.

Keep me in your thoughts and prayers!