Happy 84th Birthday to my Mom in Heaven

THE ONE WHERE I THOUGHT I WOULD NEVER GO INTO TEACHING

1985-1986 Student Teaching & Substitute Teaching

Fall 1985

BA, University of Oklahoma 1985  

When it came time for me to do my student teaching, I knew that I wanted to be placed with Marianne Stitch at Noble High School. She was well known as being the BEST Speech/Theatre Teacher in the area. I will never forget my first meeting of the staff at Noble High School. I got up and introduced myself and let the staff know that I was going to be student teaching Speech/Theatre under Marianne Stitch. No said anything and there were confused looks around the room. Finally Katheryn Hartney spoke up and said that she was Marianne's replacement and no one told her that she would be having a student teacher. No one had bothered to tell me that Mrs. Stich had moved on to another school district. I didn't know what to do and really did not have a choice at that late date to move to another school. I liked working under Katheryn's guidance. I remember attending her 26th birthday party so she was only 4 years older than I was. She also taught English (which I knew nothing about).

Football Game fun, fall 1985

During our lunch break we would go the the smoke filled faculty lounge and watch ALL MY CHILDREN. Almost every Teacher in there was smoking. Katheryn was a lot of fun to work with. She missed a lot of work that fall which gave me plenty of opportunities to have the classroom to myself.  She herself was a brilliant actress and I would often find myself mesmerized with how great she was with the students. In December I found out about a High School Debate Teaching position in the Oklahoma Public Schools. Although my BA that I earned in December of 1985 did qualify me for the job I did not have a back ground in debate. I did not apply for the job. I sort of knew that I did not want to be a teacher.  Besides my newly earned Bachelors degree would allow me to get on at Boeing in Wichita. I packed up my stuff and moved back home to Belle Plaine, KS. 

I don't know how I got away with this but my Bachelors degree from The University of Oklahoma did not require any math classes. A plus for this math phobic. I obtained my teaching license one semester before the Praxis test was a requirement to go into teaching in the state of Kansas. I know of several teachers from my years in the profession that struggled with the Praxis having taken it multiple times before passing it. If the Praxis would have been required of me I would have most likely failed it and never been a teacher. I am of the belief that there needs to be other ways to measure if a recent college graduate would make a good teacher. I have acute test anxiety and am math phobic. I thought about Law School but knew I would not be able to pass the LSAT. Years later when pondering my Masters degree I ruled out School Leadership/Administration due to my fear of the GSAT. I wonder what my life would have been like if I had become an Attorney or a School Principal?

Spring 1986

Spring 1986

It was pretty common thinking in the 1980's that a college degree could get you a well paying job in the aviation industry in Wichita Kansas. Many of my high school classmates went right into the aviation industry and got well paying jobs.  My Dad had been an employee of Boeing Military since the mid 1960's and my Mother gained employment in the early 1980's. My Dad did not finish college and my Mother had an Associates degree (which allowed her to teach from 1958-1962.) Dad said I would have no problems getting a job at Boeing. I applied to Boeing and never even got an interview. I began substitute teaching for $35.00 a day in the Belle Plaine Schools. Sometimes my brother Todd (who was in middle school) would be in the classes I subbed for.  I subscribed to a bi-monthly newsletter that came from WSU that listed all of the upcoming job openings. I remember using my Dad's computer and his dot matrix printer to create my resume and cover letter so I would be ready to apply for teaching openings. I wasn't having any luck so I accepted a job at JC Penney's.

I entered my final scholarship pageant and one of the contestants told me that the Drama Teacher at her school was leaving. I applied for the Speech/Theatre position at the Argonia public Schools. I was hired under the condition that I would also be their K-12 Librarian. I would need to begin graduate level classes at WSU that summer which the school district paid for. Another stipulation of the job was that I had to live in Argonia. I agreed to the conditions and signed my first contract.

Miss Arkansas Valley Pageant, 1986

In the spring of 1986 I became involved with SEARCH for Christian Maturity. It was a retreat group through the Catholic Diocese of Wichita. SEARCH/SOJOURN was pretty much my social scene.

My next blog entry will publish on 4/25/21 and it is titled

The One Where I was a Hot Commodity 

1986-1987: Argonia Public Schools K-12 Library, 9-12 Speech/Theatre