3. Updating My Quantum Mechanics Was The Easy Part

Updating my Quantum Mechanics was the easy part

Happily, since Oregon State University told me not to enter their FACS program they sent me to the science department.  They said, “We have analyzed your transcript and experience.  Your transcript qualifies you to endorse in Chemistry where you are desperately needed.  We are sending your paperwork there.” 

Science education is in crisis, and I could still teach Nutrition principles, so I was thrilled.    

I went to the Science Ed dept.  They were very encouraging as they met with me and read the note from the FACS dept. and my list of classes and grades, and my work experience.

When my interviewer actually saw my hard-copy paper transcript, and that it was from Brigham Young University, she began to balk. “You went to BYU?  Is that still a faith-based school?”  She grilled me on my views of the origin of man and earth.  My interviewer seemed to want to make certain that I did NOT believe in Creationism if I wanted to be a science teacher in Oregon.  She did this in a side-stepping, tip-toe sort of way.  It was clear by her questions that she knew nothing about Latter-day Saints, and that Christianity in general was a problem.   

When I politely stood my ground and explained my views, then all of a sudden my transcript wasn’t good enough.  What had been enough chemistry background a moment before, now wasn’t enough coursework, even though I had over the required threshold for an Oregon license.  

I pinned her down to explain to me how the entire pre-med chemistry series, one class shy of an undergraduate minor, major classes up to 400 level biochemistry applications, and then grad school on up to 600-level nutritional biochemistry courses were somehow inadequate for teaching high school students how to do an acid/base titration (which is as far as they get in a good year).  She backed down, and offered me admission to their Masters in Science Education program.

I declined.

I enrolled instead at our state’s Education university (Western Oregon University), in a full-time four-quarter "Licensure-only Post-bacc Program" that could endorse me in the sciences:  Quicker, closer and without getting another Master’s degree.  I took out loans and paid thousands of dollars in tuition.  I passed the CBEST test.  I had to take Ed pre-requisites and Chemistry and Biology review/update courses online at the same time I was in full-time school, which required many months of 4 AM study sessions and writing for my Ed classes until midnight.  It took a year and a half.  Thought I was gonna die. 

I took the Ed classes with the seniors in Education, all subjects and grade levels.  I enjoyed the amazing fellow-students.  Most were young adults, but some were career-changers like me.  The faculty was immensely talented, and I had a lot to learn.  The courses were – and remain – extremely valuable.  I got a 4.0 GPA.  I passed first-try the required national Praxis exams in Chemistry, Biology and FACS. (Sorry if this sounds like boasting -- not meant to -- it is a detail that figures-in later.)

I student-taught.  I worked with the juniors and seniors in Chemistry and in Anatomy & Physiology, also with some time in sophomore Biology.  I loved it, and felt privileged to work with high school students and the teachers.  I was supervised by a retired Biology teacher who inspired me with wonderful classroom ideas.  My mentor teachers were equally inspiring and became friends and peers, whom I still admire.  I received glowing letters of recommendation from them. WOU could not endorse me in FACS, but they could do just fine for Chemistry, Biology and related courses.  I got a license endorsed in Chem and Bio, with the school’s assurance that I could easily add a FACS endorsement to my license later.

Upon graduation in Dec. 2008 there were no mid-year teaching positions within a range of 50 miles (commute more than that and the paycheck doesn't pencil out).  Then the economy tanked and the local Salem district had to cut-back and froze hiring.  I began to substitute teach for a small rural district.

My very first day of subbing there, they found an arsenal of weapons in a locker, and a hit list of people some students were planning to kill.  The threats were real and the students were found guilty, but thankfully the police and the administration handled it safely and no one was hurt. It was my introduction to the teaching profession, the first day I drew a paycheck.  I was grateful that we all went home safely that evening.

I had been accepting science-writing contracts since 1980.  Fortunately, this continued.  Now that I was a teacher, I was asked to write high school Nutrition and Foods textbooks.  I have now done three textbooks and their three companion teacher’s editions and lesson plans and revisions that are used in Foods programs across the country.  Between this and subbing, I was able to earn money and pay back my school loans.

The textbook writing kept me busy with late-nighters.  It was just as well.  I kept a close eye on the teaching job openings, and there were none in the sciences, but there were a few in FACS.  However, I still needed to have the FACS endorsement added to my license to be eligible to even apply. 

That is another story.