Thank you and Farewell, At least for now

First of all, I wish to express my deepest thanks. Dr. Teri, as my instructor, you critiqued my work in order for me to improve and make it better. You showed me how to take big pictures and narrow them down to smaller pieces; the pieces of the puzzle do not all fit together at once, it takes time. So, Dr. Teri, thank you for making me a better educator and advocate. To my colleagues, thank you for your continued support, some of you I just met in this course and others I have had throughout my Master's program. I have learned a lot from each of you and will take what I have learned with me beyond this course into my future career.

Secondly, as I look ahead I realize that a passion I always had in the past, but got away from, has been reignited and will be used as I continue on my journey. I am going to write; it was suggested that I write a curriculum based on my capstone project and I am going to do it. Beyond the curriculum for my capstone project, I wish to write a coordinating curriculum on math using the same concept. Additionally, I also want to try and write a children's book or book series.

Finally, as I look back on this course I realize I am not the same person I was when we started eight weeks ago. I now truly believe that I can make a difference and I have an existing community of practice to support me along the way. I think of the expression "Rome wasn't built in a day" and take a deep breath knowing that advocacy efforts are not completed over night and may take time, but the end result will make changes positively impacting the field for years to come. And as I mentioned above, issues are tackled little bit by little bit, so the big issue you wish to impact can be changed piece by piece.

I wish all of you the best as you continue on your path to accomplishing great things.

Jobs/Opportunities in the ECE field: Internationally

While continuing to pursue new knowledge and gain a better understanding of opportunities available outside of the classroom, we looked into international organizations this week.

 The first I looked into was the academy for educational development (AED). My reasoning was simple, I had never heard of it before. What I first found was that AED has been acquired and is now known as FHI 360. So I continued pursuit and found that in relation to education, there are currently two opportunities in the United States. The first is a research associate which requires a Master’s degree in international education and completion of research projects. The second is a director’s position which again asks for international education experience but also wants a minimum of 10 post-doctorate years of experience. So while these jobs are out of reach for me at this time and not necessarily of personal interest, it gave me an insight into the international piece of striving to improve education.

The second site I looked at was the UNICEF website. I looked into this website a little more since I have had minimal experience with this site in the past. What I found was that the job opportunities available are currently overseas and since they would require relocation which is not of interest to me I did not pursue the requirements for the positions. However, what I did find was a wealth of information I had forgotten existed through the UNICEF website. So it is now marked in my favorites list in order to revisit the website for information later.

The final website I looked at was the site for World Vision. I am familiar with the website and what World Vision strives to do since I was once a child sponsor. However, I had never looked at opportunities to work for World Vision before and when I did for this blog entry, I found there is a need for a grants officer for All Children Reading. I thought wow, children, reading (which connects to the literacy capstone project I have created), and World Vision, I have to check this out. Unfortunately, I do not have any experience in completing the tasks required for the position nor do I meet the requirements of the position. But knowing this organization is working on tasks such as this will make me stay more abreast of the global happenings through this organization.

The opportunities are available if we want them, or know of others who may be influential.