How to bomb a teaching job interview

Scene - A high school office in a southeastern Idaho city. The first day of school is about one week away. Some students are milling about, registering with their parents. Two plump secretaries with porcupine haircuts sit and exchange amusing anecdotes about yoga, their dogs, and their attempts at playing with a Nintendo Wii. The Rob Thomas / Santana collaborative effort "Smooth," plays on the radio, followed by Maroon Five. 

I sit, anxiously awaiting my name to be called. I mentally go over what I've read about the school district from their web site. Under a section listed as their "Teacher's Pledge" they had something along the lines of: "We believe that all students are equally capable of success, regardless of history, lack of family or parental involvement, or personal lives." Although I absolutely do NOT believe any such thing, I made a mental note to not mention anything that might give that impression.


The interview was scheduled for nine o'clock sharp. I arrived at eight fifty as to appear punctual. It is now nine fifteen. 


At approximately nine twenty the door to the inner office opens. A young blonde girl walks out; presumably twenty-one or twenty-two years of age. She waves goodbye to her interviewers, who are smiling and waving back. 

Interviewer: Jer-- Jeran...doe?

Me: (pronounces name while standing up, shaking interviewer's hand)

Interviewer: Oh. Jeran-doe?

Me: (repeats proper pronunciation of name)

Interviewer leads me into the inner office. I proceed to shake hands with three other men and one woman who are all seated at a long table. They motion for me to sit at the head of this table. The four men are all wearing front-pleated khakis and black polo shirts that are tucked into the khakis. They could easily be mistaken for Radio Shack employees. They all have thin goatees. The woman is wearing a beige pants suit and glasses.


 I repeat my name for them several times, as none of them can say it. They apologize profusely, but I continue to smile broadly in an effort to let them know that it's not a big deal. After many repetitions they give up trying to pronounce it properly. None of them attempt to say my name for the rest of the interview. 

Interviewer no. 1: So, before we get started with our questions we'd like to give you a chance to tell us a little bit about yourself, a little bit about your background and how you got into teaching.

Me: [I tell life story; about how I was born to an American father and an immigrant mother from Italy, how I was raised in a bi-lingual home speaking Italian and English, how I always wanted to do something artistic with my life but could not decide what until I spent two years as a missionary in New York City after high school, how I lived in the Bronx and Manhattan in some very poor neighborhoods, how I worked in soup kitchens and homeless shelters and drug rehab centers and churches, how I slowly realized my calling of wanting to be a teacher, to help young people make the most of themselves, of how I was in New York City on the terrorist attacks of 9/11, how I wanted to return to Montana someday and make a peaceful life for myself there, how I enrolled in BYU-Idaho and studied English and minored in Art, how I married, student taught in Salt Lake City, got a teaching job in Montana for three years, how I never had my own room, only a pushcart, and how I was laid off after three years because I was un-tenured and they needed to cut the budget...]

All interviewers look as bored as possible during this spiel of mine, like if there were an easily accessible gun in the room they would have committed suicide by now. Most of them don't look up from their clipboards, several let out very big, loud yawns. At the mention of minoring in art, the lady perks up.

Lady interviewer: You minored in art?! That's just like me!

Me: Cool! [I have no idea who this woman is, whether she's an English teacher or an administrator or what. I later suspected she was the principal.]

Interviewer no. 1: I noticed on your resume that you were a... par... a par-uh... par-uh... [trails off]

Me: A para-professional?

Interviewer no. 1: What is that?

Me: [I explain the very mundane duties of a para-professional, which is what I was this past school year. I try to not act very surprised that they've never heard of a para-professional.]

This puts an end to that introduction of mine. Nobody has any questions or asks for any kind of clarification on anything (not even a nod on the part where I mention being in New York City for 9/11) and so the whole thing kind of peters out...

Interviewer no. 2: [as if coming out of a stupor, reads a line with obvious effort] If I were to come into your classroom, what would I see?

Me: Like what would you see in the room itself? How would I set up the room?

Interviewer no. 2: No, I mean if I were to come into your classroom on any given day, say November 2nd of this year, what would be taking place in there?

Me: Well... I... I guess it depends on... What grade is this position for?

Interviewers confer with one another, as none of them seem to know. They come to a consensus. 

Interviewer no. 2: It's either for freshman or sophomore English.

Me: Okay, well you'd see some definite daily routines for one. I like to establish routines early on like journal writing and daily discussion and reading, so that they know what to expect every day when they walk in. But my class is a versatile one. I like to explore all parts of the language arts. We're reading stories, novels, poetry--we're writing research papers, personal essays, maybe even some creative writing. I like to read aloud almost every day, so you'd see that. I like to hold classroom discussions, small group discussions, sometimes formal debates. Stuff like that...

I continue to describe my classroom, but they all look puzzled and confused by my answers and not very interested. 

Interviewer no. 4: What is your favorite part of English to teach?

Me: Hmm... Well one of my favorite things about English is helping my students develop a love of reading, so there's that. I love to share books and stories with them by reading aloud. One of the first short stories we read as a class is "The Cold Equations"...

I wait to see if anyone recognizes it. I thought it was a fairly well-known short story, as my class read it in high school and I also re-read it in college, and it's in many of the English textbooks I've worked with... They just stare at me, dumbly. 

Me: ...By Tom Godwin? Anyway it's this great short story, and it's exciting to see them as we start out. Some of them are already moaning and groaning that this is going to be boring because it's science fiction and there's no pictures. But I guide them through the process, I read it aloud to them, we stop to make predictions, talk about the moral and ethical questions posed by the story, I ask them what they would do in the same situations... And then by the time we're halfway into it, the kids are just really excited for more. Any time we can do something like that that makes reading a pleasurable experience, I'm happy.

Silence from the interviewers, who are looking at each other shiftily. 

Me: [I'm nervous now, as if I said the wrong thing.] But, you know, there's a lot of things I love teaching. I love teaching writing to my students, especially personal writing like journals and personal essays. Many of them have never written any kind of personal writing before, so they get really excited at the prospect of writing about themselves for a change. It's...

More disinterested silence.

Me:... It's really... I enjoy it.

Lady interviewer: Your main job as an English teacher here would be to prepare the kids to take the state test. That's the whole focus of English class at our high school. We prepare the kids to do well on the test, and the test is all grammar. That's it. So while they do get to read one or two books a year--I think they get The Odyssey and Romeo and Juliet as freshman, am I right? Okay, but our jobs as teachers is preparing them for the state test. The test is all grammar, and so the emphasis should be on grammar. Are you comfortable teaching grammar?

Me: Well, I think grammar is very important, because they need to understand grammar--if they don't understand grammar they won't understand how to read a book. So I take grammar very seriously. I think I was the only teacher at my old school that still gave spelling tests in the tenth grade. My semester finals were all grammar and spelling based. So yes, I am comfortable teaching grammar, although I must admit I don't have a curriculum that's based around grammar--yet.

Interviewer no. 3: It's very basic, especially for ninth and tenth graders. A lot of times we'll spend a whole week just analyzing one sentence. That's about all they can handle right now, one sentence at a time.

Me: Oh? And do you do A/B days here, or is it a traditional schedule?

Interviewer no. 1: We do A/B days. A class period is ninety minutes and we meet every other day.

Me: So you spend ninety minutes on grammar?

Interviewer no. 2: Not always. Sometimes it's only fifty or sixty minutes.

Lady interviewer: You would have a workbook to work out of. That's what they all have, is that right?

The men nod in assent. 

Interviewer no. 2: Yeah, we usually give them some work to do out of the workbook. It tells you everything you need to cover and it has the worksheets right in it.

Me: So do you get together to look over the state test results and then figure out what they're doing well in and what they extra need help in?


They look at one another, doubtfully. 

Interviewer no. 1: They're very secretive about state tests. None of us are allowed to see them, pretty much ever. We're only allowed to use a practice test, but none of us actually know what's on the state test.

Me: So you have to prepare the kids for the test but you're not allowed to know what's on it?

Interviewer no. 1: Well we all know the state benchmarks and goals. We work from those.

Me: In my old district we used to look over the results of the tests the year after they were scored and we could see what kinds of things students needed extra work on... That way we could adjust our curriculum, like if they needed more help with this or that, we would know.

Interviewer no. 2: We don't do it that way here.

Me: I will say that I know my grammar. I don't know if any of you have read my resume...

None of them had. Interviewer no. 1 has a the only copy which he pulls out again. 

Me: On the bottom I list that I've had several articles published in some different publications.

Interviewer no. 1: [struggling] I see the first one was for the... Ex... Ex-plick... Ex-plick...ah-tor-ee? Ex-plick-ah-tor-ee?

Me: The Explicator... It's a peer-reviewed literary journal...


They all look confused. I leave it at that.


Lady interviewer: Some say that there are only two types of teachers in the world. The kind that like to work by themselves and be left alone, a "lone wolf" so to speak, and the kind that like to collaborate with others and always work as a team. Which kind are you?

Me: [half-jokingly] Well... You should not make absolute statements like that to an English teacher! Are there really only TWO types of teachers in the whole world?

The men chuckle at this, but the lady cuts us off.

Lady interviewer: Don't analyze the question, just ANSWER it!

Me: Okay, okay. To be honest, I got into education because the idea of having my own personal space to work appeals to me. I'm an individual, and I'm a unique person. I think most teachers can relate to this. I like the idea of having my own classroom and my own office, I like the idea of being in charge of what goes on in my room, my curriculum and my disciplinary plan. So in that sense, I guess I like being a "lone wolf" like you said. But of course I don't just do everything alone. Everything I've learned in these past few years of teaching I've learned from other teachers. I'm always talking to other teachers and learning from their example. I always like to meet with other English teachers to discuss possible problems and new ideas and to get help. I think all good teachers know how to collaborate with others. We talk about our students and how to best help them, we talk about our curriculum so we know what to cover. We're always working together. So in that sense, I also like being a collaborator.

At this point I know I've given the wrong answer. Of course they wanted me to say "I HATE working alone! YUCK!" but it would have been a total lie. I was honest instead, and I could tell that my honesty was making a bad situation even worse. 

The remaining questions are all run-of-the-mill teacher interview stuff (How do you handle classroom discipline? How do you feel about contacting parents? etc.) They end with a "We'll let you know by Monday." 

On Monday I got the phone call. 

Interviewer no. 1: Jer... Jer-and-doe?

Me: Yes? It's me. Jerandoe.

Interviewer no. 1: I just wanted to call to let you know that we've made a decision about the English teacher opening.

Me: Okay.

Interviewer no. 1: So thank you for coming in for the interview, and good luck.

Me: Thank you. [end of call.]

I assume he meant that they gave the job to someone else, although technically he never explained that.


Oh well.