Preparing for a Whirlwind of Changes

In the next three weeks I will be co-leading an Advanced Adviser Training for the UUA in Shreveport, Louisiana, coordinating workshops for the Continental UU Young Adult Network (C*UUYAN) annual spirituality conference OPUS in Toronto, Ontario, and moving to Albany, NY to begin my year-long internship at the Albany Free School.

I have been nervous about the Advanced Adviser Training. The Training of Trainers was about 2 years ago, so my experience with the curriculum is pretty dusty. All in all I know I will do fine no matter what, but even if I blew it there aren't significant consequences. Either way it is a learning experience for me. My co-leader and I had a rocky start getting communication rolling. She was under the misperception that I was a seasoned Adviser Trainer, and I was under the impression that she hadn't led any trainings since the training of trainers either. Instead, the our perceived roles were reversed: she was the experienced trainer, and I have little previous experience. The affect of that miscommunication was that I was freaking out more than I needed to and she was more relaxed about the process than she now is.

Now we are in a much better position to get everything planned by next week when the training starts. It is a Friday night to Sunday morning training, with Saturday jam packed. All I have to do is take Saturday one step at a time and it will be over before I know it. She invited me to go over the schedule and activities to step up for as much as I was willing to do. Her idea is that she has a lot of experience, and can back me up. However, the experience will be great for me to have so I should step up for as much as I am comfortable with. We are having a conference call tonight to hammer out more details.

In some ways I do feel like I have a lot of talents and skills which will serve me well going into this experience. I have experience facilitating discussion, listening, monitoring energy and engagement levels, following a curriculum... The different activities are intriguing to me. I will be leading Team youth ministry, models of pastoral care, learning styles, listening exercise, creating new games, 'identity, privilege, and oppression', what do power dynamics look like?, and one size does not fit all. I think many of the skills that the activities pertain to are ones that I can utilize in my teaching career. I am happy to be doing this advanced adviser training, because someday I hope to be an adviser myself.

Another upcoming event is OPUS. I have been preparing for it as the workshop coordinator for the past 6 months. Everything has come together in the last 2 weeks. I have adequate workshops for both week long and one shot workshops. They are on a variety of topics, catering to a variety of learning styles, and they are centered around the theme of cycles. Yay! Most of my work will be done by the time I get there. But I did sign up to lead one day of a week long, and a one shot workshop on fertility cycles.

And finally, I have been preparing to move to Albany, NY. Many people have asked me questions about Albany and the school itself which I don't know the answer to. In some ways maybe I was under informed in making this huge life-changing decision. In other ways, I feel like I did know enough, I will learn a lot, and I didn't sign my life away. If the situation isn't what I had hoped for then there is flexibility. I have just been telling people who ask questions I don't know the answer to, that I will find out when I get there! Two things I heard from other people that weren't terribly positive were one, that the Albany Free School just had two veteran teachers resign and that it is in a huge flux state, and two, that Albany is kind of a trashy city. I am sure there will be pluses and minuses about both the school and the city. I will concentrate on the things I love about them. The intern adviser that I have been in contact with has been extremely helpful and positive and I look forward to meeting them.

In some ways I am going into this experience similar to the way I approached Century School. I knew that there were elements of Century School that I liked and I was aware that there might be some I didn't. I didn't expect Century School to be the ideal school that I would want to teach at for the rest of my life. Instead I viewed it as a step in the learning process of becoming the educator I want to be. You not only have to know what you want, you have to know what you don't want. Also, the Free School is a lot closer in theory to what I believe than Century School is. We will see how it plays out in action!