The Beginning

This school year I'm working at my high school, Union Springs Academy, as a task force worker. My duties here with include, but probably are not limited to: working in the office(s) in the ad building, working in the cafe, Student Association (SA) Sponsor, Yearbook Sponsor, and until something else is figured out or the assistant girls dean arrives I'm helping in the dorm.

Our pre-preweek, most of the faculty and staff went to Camp Cherokee up in the Adirondacks for a couple days. They were having a pastors and teachers retreat there. We had worship all together in the mornings and then divided up... pastors stayed in the chapel, elementary teachers headed off to the cafeteria, and the academy staff went over to another building and if the little kids were in the room we met in we would sit out on the porch until they were done then move inside for our meetings. We went over different school policies and how to address some sorts of issues while we were up there. We met in the mornings and after lunch we had one more meeting before having the afternoon off for some relaxing. However, the whole time we were up there it was cold and pretty rainy. Luckily the only afternoon we were there (Monday) it cleared up enough to sit on the dock. I journaled for a while and read a bit before heading back up for supper. Tuesday we had worship and meetings in the morning and after lunch finished packing up and headed back home.
The rest of the week was filled with a few more meetings, some students came to preregister, getting the ad building cleaned and presentable, and getting whatever else done we could.

Preweek brought the RAs and SA officers to school. We had more meetings, more cleaning, and more work. The faculty figured out registration would run, which evenings we would be on supervision for supper and rec, which weekends we would be on supervision, and did some other stuff too. The SA officers, with a little help from the sponsors, figured out what to do for handshake, decided on a theme for the year, did some necessary shopping, proposed an idea to the faculty and got it passed (more on this later), and helped out in some other areas as well. Everybody did cleaning.

I moved into my faculty house the Wednesday of preweek and had my sister over almost every night and Silvia, one of the faculty members kids and also a senior, over a couple times. They seemed to enjoy it and have both asked to come over again since.

Sunday was registration. I was supposed to be to the Ad Building at 8:30 to get setup for registration at 9:00. Sometime between 8 and 8:15 I got a phone call from Andrew (he's the vice principal and alumni and development director) asking me to get there as soon as I could because he had a bunch of extra stuff he needed help with since Mr. Baker (the principal) wasn't going to be around. Mr. Baker had been taken to the hospital the night before and was waiting to have gallbladder surgery! I got there as soon as I could and helped out until registration opened and I took my place selling books.

Sunday evening was handshake. Everyone went through line by class and met everybody else. After meeting everyone we had them break into their classes once more and do the human knot. When they were done, they could come over to our SA booth and grab a float then go socialize for a bit.

The beginning of the week was a bit of a blur with orientation, working in the cafe, having an allergic reaction and being a bit out of it because of medicine, and everything else. There were a few times I was thinking "What in the world am I doing here?!" or "What have I gotten myself in to?!" But I can see God working already. Partly because I've been here all summer and have seen some of the struggles the school has been trying to deal with and fix. The enrollment is up this year from last and there are still a few that might be coming. Even though Mr. Baker wasn't there for registration things went well and we made it through ok. And He seems to have blessed us with what seems to be a pretty amazing team of faculty this year and a good student body.