So I took that offer of a substitute teaching job yesterday and went south, to spend most of my day in a Kindergarten classroom. From 8 a.m., till nearly 3 p.m. It was a mostly uneventful experience, other than the chaos of thirty minutes of lunch room duty, where I always have a feeling of being thrown in with the sharks. All the other adults/staff/aides in the cafeteria know what's going on, what to do, who goes where, and when all the whos are allowed to leave. And don't seem to want to share any of that with newcomers. Fortunately the kids are still small enough to be intimidated by an adult - even if the adult has no idea of what's going on.
When I got home I discovered an email from the school system, telling me I had to go to the district office and give them my fingerprints to be checked by the GBI. I don't think that is unreasonable, and know in this day of crazy people, probably necessary to protect both kids and school board liability-wise. And if they are requiring every single employee to have it done, you can't feel singled out. But that fact that it is required and necessary, and you can't keep the position/employment without submitting- and then they require you to pay for it - somehow doesn't seem quite right.
If it is being done by the school system - how come they are not the ones footing the bill? The money order I had to take to pay for the background check was just about what I made spending my day in that Kindergarten classroom. Which means I went down there and spent the day wrangling five-year-olds, basically donated my day, as I then gave the school district back the money they will eventually, weeks from now, pay for my day's work.
Is there something seriously wrong with this picture? oh, yes.
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