Take a deep breath
and pour your broken heart onto the keys. I keep joking that about the time I get things right they will fire me. I must have gotten German right, because my program is being given to another. I already made the awful decision to give up my Latin program. The rest of my life is taking up more and more of time, or maybe I value my time home more than formerly. Here is the official story: the athletic director at our school . . . is no longer the athletic director. The only applicant for the position is the Spanish teacher they brought in to coach the football team. As the new AD, he now has a half-time teaching contract; the rest is taken up with his AD duties. The other Spanish teacher is taking a full-time position at a junior high; we can't offer her full time. The only other game in town is me. No one else on staff is qualified to teach Spanish. My student teacher from last year is qualified to teach German. I have been "asked" to change my assignment to Spanish one and two, two classes of each, for the next year at least. They will then review the situation on a year by year basis. Maybe I will get it back, maybe I won't. I am finally going to Germany for the first time. When I took over the program from school's first German teacher, my brother's Teacher of Blessed Memory, there were only enough German students total to fit comfortably in my little classroom. Levels one through five met together. It was a nightmare. For the past couple of years I have had three German classes--two beginning and an intermediate/advanced. The intermediate/advanced was on the verge of getting big enough for a split. We nearly made it this year. I began teaching concurrent enrollment, where the kids got college credit for taking my class and passing an interview at the end of the year. Nine of my twelve candidates passed, a number Frau Daines said was consistent with programs that have been running for several years. One of my kids was only coming back to school at all next year because of German. There will be no more concurrent enrollment German. I am finally going to Germany. I've never been to a Spanish-speaking country (well, technically. Last I heard the United States was the fifth largest Spanish-speaking country).