Allow me to vent

[The Bad Guy]

I just need some space to rant and let off some steam. As some of you know, I was furloughed from my job 3 weeks ago as a special education teacher. I just had acquired tenure in the district, built up the program from basically scratch, and was let go because of an enormous amount of cuts in the district that initially happened in early July, but because they screwed up the seniority list, I got bumped by one spot. 3 years of sterling evaluations and the best I got was a voicemail from the superintendent saying I didn't have a job anymore.

I had an interview at another district 2 weeks ago and it went well. They had called my principal that was at my old school and they told him it was between me and another teacher I worked with that was furloughed. The district ended up making their decision based on the fact that this teacher also coached field hockey.

This was the absolute worst ****ing time ever for me to get laid off. Just built a new house, just had a ton of concrete work done at the house just a week before the call. They let me go 3 weeks before the year started, which means all the jobs have basically dried up.

I'm just beyond frustrated and angry. The union is doing next to nothing to get jobs back. I've requested a grievance about the fact they had 2 lottery drawings my initial year. The first drawing I was 4th highest on the list. The 2nd drawing, I was 15th. I also was hired for elementary and they moved me to high school a week before the year started. The lady I beat out for the elementary job, who was only hired after I got moved, is higher than me on the seniority list. My union head doesn't seem to really care about that.

I went to clean out my classroom yesterday and it's amazing how cold people can be. Some people I was really nice to just wouldn't even acknowledge me even though I wasn't let go because of any doing of my own. It just pissed me off to be treated like a bastard stepchild.

Even if I do get a teaching job elsewhere, I'm likely looking at 10-15k paycut.

I'm just really angry and needed to vent tonight.


***UPDATE***

I was called back by the superintendent of the district that furloughed me and they have a long-term sped position available until the end of the year. I accepted it. I go back to my full pay with benefits. While I'm hopeful that a full-time position will present itself, this gives me some security and flexibility.

I'm excited.