NEW JOB, NEW CONTINENT, NEW BLOG

Welcome to my new - in fact, first-ever - blog, which I'm calling "Teaching in Indonesia." The reason for this blog: to keep family and friends up-to-date with what I'm doing with my new job and my experiences living overseas. In less than two months, I'll literally (yes, literally, not figuratively) be flying halfway across the world to to my new job, teaching elementary school in Jakarta, Indonesia. 

So, a bit of the background story for anyone who doesn't know how I ended up here, with this job, and consequently, with this blog. To go way back to the beginning, I've wanted to teach overseas for a long time, at least since high school, which is to say, seven, eight years. Basically it's been my dream for the last decade to become a teacher and then teach overseas at American and international schools. The becoming a teacher part I accomplished last year when I graduated from UMM with a B.A. in El. Ed. and a couple teaching licenses. The next part of fulfilling my dream was getting hired at an overseas school. To do this, I went to an overseas teaching recruitment fair in Waterloo, Iowa this past February, sponsored by the University of Northern Iowa. The UNI fair is a huge ordeal, with over one hundred schools from 70+ countries in attendance. During that weekend in Iowa I interviewed with eight schools and got four offers: two from schools in Kuwait, one from Kosova, and of course, from Indonesia. It was a difficult decision to make (especially because the whole whirlwind of talking to schools, interviewing, deciding between job offers, and signing contracts happened in about 48 hours time...) but in the end I signed with Indonesia. I've got to say I'm happy I did. My parents also taught overseas (in fact, they went to the same UNI recruitment fair!) and they taught in Kuwait for two years, from '85-'87. Not that I wouldn't have enjoyed Kuwait, but going to Indonesia is completely different and it will be something of my own. I also really liked the school in Kosova, but they offered me a lower elementary job, and I preferred the upper elementary job in Jakarta.


So... what exactly is my new job? I will be teaching upper elementary (3rd and 5th grade I believe) Language Arts and Science. The school I will be teaching at is called Bina Bangsa School and it's located in Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia. Most of the students I will be teaching are Indonesian, probably from Jakarta. It's a Christian-affiliated school where the language of instruction is English (so no, I don't have to learn Bahasa Indonesia in two months' time!) and the students learn Chinese as a third language. The curriculum is based on the Singapore national curriculum, which is itself based on the British national curriculum. The school will provide housing for me, and I will share an apartment with a couple other female staff members. Here's a link to the school's website, in case you're interested: Bina Bangsa School


And that's how I ended up with my new job, and what I'm looking forward to for the next couple years! I think that's enough of an introduction for my first post. I'll be sure to post some more before I leave in mid-June.


(Just in case anyone is wondering, "Where the heck is Indonesia? I've heard of it, but I can't place it on a map..." Well, here it is on a map, so you'll have some idea just where in the world I will be. Indonesia is in red... as if you couldn't figure that out... ^_^)