Thanks for your comments, Andrew and Don. I still feel overall positive about my conversation, but as I think I already said, I'm also taking it with a grain of salt because I realize the person I had the conversation with has it in her best interests to see me get/take a job with this company, so of course she wants to put a positive spin on it. My overall positives are coming from the person who I originally sent my paperwork to and who forwarded me to the recruiter, because that person told my friend who recommended me that she was extremely impressed by my resume and the skills I had that she felt like would be an asset to the company. So, whether I even hear back from the recruiter, I know someone in a position of authority in that company looked at my resume and thought "she's impressive" and shared it with my friend who shared it with me. Maybe it is nothing, but to me, it is a little pat on the back that I need desperately at the moment.
I am officially in furlough mode as of yesterday. After some self debate, discussion with my precious husband, and just plain ole thinking, I decided to do one furlough day per week rather than 2 half days. Because of that, I only had one option on the day I could take and it is Monday. So, I had my first furlough day yesterday and it was a glorious day. I got up with Sparky when he got up to get ready for work and just sat with him and chatted until he left. After he left, I showered, washed my hair, had breakfast, got dressed, and then sat down and watched a couple of episodes of M*A*S*H (one of my all-time favorite tv shows). Once that was over, I got to work on removing ALL the items from all the shelves and tables in the living room to dust them good, put all the stuff back, moved furniture and vacuumed the entire living room to within and inch of its life. Once that was one, I read and watched a murder show on tv. I'm going to spend my Mondays looking for a new job and taking care of things in my house that need my attention. Next Monday the living room coat closet and our bedroom closet are getting a good clean-out, followed by the closet in the utility room, time permitting. I just need to reshift my focus from this whole furlough thing being a bad thing to it being a good thing and it will help my mental attitude immensely.
On the job front, I have a couple of jobs to apply for this week so I plan to get that done this afternoon. I also had a very interesting chat with my boss this morning. As of today, I know of 3 of the 11 of our current people (including myself) who will be gone by mid-May. 1 for another job and 2 to early retirement. In addition, 2 more have a really good shot at another job that they will likely accept. That's 5 of 11. My boss told me that another is trying their best to find another job, so that is 6 of 11. That would leave 5 here and they will not be replacing anyone, at least for the next few years, until they get the budget stuff ironed out. So, my boss comes to me and asks if I'm willing to take on a whole aspect of our program, assuming I stay, because it needs to be someone who has secondary (high school level) classroom teaching experience and I will be the only one left who has that. He said that if I don't agree to do it, we will have to phase the program out or hope that they agree to hire someone to keep it afloat. So, I said, I would be willing to do it, but if I'm expected to take on all these extra responsibilities on top of all I do now, I would HAVE to have more money and while I realize when they are firing tenured faculty to get the budget in order is not the time to ask for a raise, I'm not willing to take on double or triple my current responsibilities for no more money. It just isn't happening. While it could bode well for my position that I'm willing to take on extra responsibility, it might shoot me in the foot to insist on more money to do so, but it is what it is. You want me to work 3 jobs, pay me more money....plain and simple. I know what I bring to the table and I'm totally willing to walk away rather than to be underpaid and continue to be loyal to an organization who is not even loyal enough to me to let me know whether they intend to keep me past mid-May or not because they're hedging their bets on how many will go before they have to actually swing the axe. It is a sad situation for sure, but if I can stay and pick up other responsibilities, it will bring my job even closer to the job I wanted to have anyway. God has a plan, I just am not privy to it yet. It will be revealed in His time, though.
