A Month in the Life

So this year I received a “promotion” of sorts. But not the kind you would necessarily be excited to receive. You know, more responsibilities, more work, but no additional pay. J I now serve as the district’s Lead Dyslexia Specialist, which is more of an administrative position: training & mentoring new hires, facilitating difficult meetings with parents, etc. Most days, I love my job. I travel a lot, so I regularly meet new faces, and I appreciate the fact that my work has the potential to positively impact a larger number of students than ever before. My supervisor is an amazing woman whose husband is a youth pastor, so working with someone who shares similar values is a refreshing change of pace.

With all that said, there are still days that I’m not so fond of my job. With the added responsibilities comes even more difficulty attaining a healthy work-life balance. I know what you’re thinking—wait a minute, it’s summer time! Teachers don’t work during the summer time, right? Well, this teacher does!

Summer work wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing, except for the kind of work I’ve been doing lately—interviewing & hiring. We thought most of our positions filled, but now we’re falling apart. One of our specialists is moving with her husband’s job, two potential new hires we expected to gain have declined the position due to gas prices, another lady who interviewed well had horrible references (don’t burn any bridges!) so we can’t hire her, and the list goes on. The short of it means I may potentially be mentoring up to 5 new dyslexia “specialists” who have no specialty in reading at all, with little or no relevant training prior to coming to us. This is scary and frustrating…and gives me a wonderful opportunity to turn it over to God!

So, for the past week and a half, I’ve been on the phone, on emails, calling, begging, looking for qualified folks….and praying! I can’t describe to you the burden I have for our kids. While the thought of preparing up to 5 inexperienced teachers to be “specialists” is overwhelming, what’s more concerning for me is the impact of their lack of experience on the kids. I don’t want folks to be experimenting with our kids—a quite vulnerable population. So, when fear or anxiety start to get the best of me, I stop and pray for our kids, that God would send us teachers who will love, nurture and respect them, and help them become all they can be in Him.

At the end of the day, I have to trust that He loves those kids more than I do, and it will all work out. And I’m finding each day that my ministry in the public school setting isn’t much different from my ministry at The Sanctuary of Cedar Park: it’s all about depending on God to use your life to make an eternal difference in someone else’s life. Isn’t that why all of life is worship, and any service to another is ministry to God?