OK, I’ll spare you the suspense: I have a job. Two jobs,
actually, one full-time and one part-time.
Back in April, back in Japan, I started job-hunting and
found an open position for ESL Instructor at a community college in North Carolina.
I was invited for an interview, but as I was still 6,000 miles away and they
weren’t into Skype, I was put on hold indefinitely.
The same thing happened with two other organizations I
applied for. One was a social worker-esque job working for the State of North
Carolina in Durham and the other was for a non-profit in Raleigh that I was
strongly drawn to. Both were interested in me but neither wanted to hire me
until they saw me in the flesh.
Two days after moving back to NC in August, I had a face-to-face
interview with the community college folk and was hired on the spot. I started
teaching Level 1 ESL two nights a week two weeks later. Then I was asked to sub
during a day class in Garner four mornings a week. I was really enjoying the
classes, but amusing myself between 12:30 and 6:30 p.m. in south Raleigh
without driving back to my house 35 miles away was difficult. Plus it was still
part-time (18 hours a week) and not quite enough to support me.
I was getting headaches thinking about how to fill in the
afternoons . . . contractual medical interpreting? Nope, I couldn’t pass the
phone screenings. Tutoring? With only one student, it hardly was worth it to
drive there. I really needed a full-time job.
Then they both came at once. I saw an open position at the
organization in Durham on Craiglist and landed an interview. When they offered
me the job, the salary was $6,000 less than I’d been quoted, but the benefits
were good and I’d be able to speak Spanish every day. I was scheduled to start training
on Monday.
But on the Friday afternoon before I was going to start, I
got an email from the non-profit in Raleigh, asking me if I was still
interested in working with them! A position had suddenly become open and they
were hiring fast.
How many hours of anguish did I spend that weekend,
agonizing over this decision! I knew I’d rather work in Raleigh than Durham,
but do I really quit one job before it starts, just for the promise of an interview at the other one, not knowing
how much I’d make or what my responsibilities would entail? Do I start working
on Monday and maybe quit by the end of the week, despite the hours of training
they would have invested in me? Did I tell either of my potential employers
what the situation was? What was the moral, ethical, legal thing to do? Damn
the timing!
In the end, I couldn’t lie. I emailed my new supervisor (who
had only met me once, at our interview) and told her I had accepted another
interview, and if that I meant I shouldn’t come in to work on Monday morning, I
understood. She wrote back a brief but professional reply, completely expected,
telling me good luck with the interview and that she was sorry my career choice
didn’t fit in with her organization.
So it was that I walked into Tuesday’s interview with absolutely
nothing to fall back on if it didn’t go well. As things turned out, though, I
was offered the job the very next morning, and was asked to start work the day
after! I’ll be teaching two ESL classes four times a week and be in charge of
creating a curriculum to use with them. I’m really excited about the
responsibility, experience, and freedom this job will give me.
Of course, I wonder if I was stupid for giving up a state
job that offered a better salary and benefits to work at a non-profit, but then
again, money isn’t everything. I think I’ll have more personal satisfaction in
this job than I would have had with the other. Plus, most of my professional
experience has been with non-profits, so I know what to expect with them. What
makes me even happier, too, is that now I don’t have to compartmentalize my
last two years working in Japan. I can continue to use those teaching experiences
to make my classroom in the U.S. better than it would have been otherwise. And
getting paid to do something you love . . . well, that’s what we all want, isn’t
it?
