The One with the Interview

Our school was compassionate enough to let the students and teachers come late at 8.30am on Monday morning and lessons resumed at 9.00am. It was well deserved as I was really tired from the Excel Fest. Baby Vernice was also having difficulty sleeping because of an uncomfortable blocked nose. But then again I digress..

My colleague came to me, telling me that she got an interview for a post in my previous school. it came as a shock ( maybe 2 shocks?). Firstly she seems well settled and adjusted in the school that i though she would be the last one to leave. After going through the previous principal's dynasty, and surviving and being the last (wo)man standing from the same batch, I did not expect her to have this fleeting thought of leaving.

Perhap my work review with her got her thinking about her future, her path from now. In my usual story telling mood, I told her about the story of a flea. I asked her whether she knew that a flea is able to jump about 200 times the length of its own body. Then again I digress again... I shared with her that there used to be a flea caught in a glass cylinder. As it jumped, it hits the top of the container; which proves to be extremely painful for the flea. the flea tried again and again and everytime it suffered from the collision with the glass cylinder. Slowly it started to adjust the height of its jump so that it would almost touch the cover. This went on for weeks. One day the lid was open and yet the flea was not able to get out, for it has been unable to jump out. it has gotten use to the height which have given it no pain..

I guess she understood the story behind the analogy. She told me that this story got her thinking about what she want and she realised she did not want to stay on and realised she cannot jump out anymore. She did not want to be the flea in the story. That was why she decided to try for the open postings and my former school was one of the choices. This happened to be shock #2.

Much as I was unwilling to see her leave, I was happy that she is moving out of her comfort zone and doing something that she had in her words "lost the courage a long time ago". As a friend and a colleague I decided to help her by giving her the insider's view of the interview... what the interviewers might ask ( my former P's and HOD's likes and dislikes, possible questions and standard answers as liken from a TYS)

As I was preparing her for the interview, it got me thinking that it was almost a year ago that I was going through the same process, the emotional roller-coasters and the anxiety and hesitations.

As I plonked myself in my little cubicle, I said a silent prayer and hope that everything will go on smoothly for her.

Updated
She came back telling me that the interview went on smoothly, though they were more interested in the different systems that my present school have to offer. However as a friend and colleague she now can fully emphathise with the cultural shocks I initally have coming to this school after her brief encounter with my ex school's students and the school management.