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the waiting game
January 6, 2009
With no firm notification date, an aspiring Teaching Fellow frets
Bronx 2020, a career-changer who wants nothing more than to become a New York City public school teacher, has applied to the city’s Teaching Fellows program. He has had an interview, and now he’s just waiting. Until when, he’s not sure. He writes:
I really have no firm date by which I’m suppose to hear back from NYC Teaching Fellows. I’ve gotten various answers back from different people. I’ve heard 5 weeks after the interview (which would be tomorrow). I’ve heard mid-January. I’ve heard late-January and even early-February. It’s like they’ve got a drunken monkey spinning a wheel-of-luck doo-hickey in their office deciding our fate.
Later, he notes that the Teaching Fellows Web site says the program will let applicants know within five to seven weeks after their interviews, so he should know by later this month whether he’ll be a teacher in September. And back in October, he worried about how the size reduction in the upcoming Teaching Fellows cohort would affect his chances of admission.
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January 6th, 2009 1:40 pm
The NYCTF program has lots of great attributes. Administration as it relates to the selection process is not one of them.
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January 7th, 2009 2:32 pm
Egads! I’ve been quoted…
I should add that, after an email from me asking a few question, I got a nice email from the folks at the NYC Teaching Fellows. They answered my questions and also informed me that I would be hearing some word by, and I quote, “mid-late January.”
I’m going to unilaterally decide that “mid-late” means somewhere between Jan 15th and Jan 25th.
We’ll see if I actually do hear from them.
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January 25th, 2009 2:55 pm
I interviewed with the Fellows program on December 20, they told me at the end that a decision would probably come in 5-6 weeks but that it could come as late as early February.
I noticed on their site they keep having new application deadlines, with a “final” one on Feb. 9. I am wondering if they’re now holding off all decisions until after that deadline? Maybe they’re awaiting the state budget/federal aid? This is strange giving how this will be a smaller cohort than before.
Which I thought a bit strange because I thought it was all “rolling” admission. This is what the Fellows program told me when I asked what would happen if I was late due to any Metro North delays from the previous day’s snowstorm (I live in southern Westchester) and they said that while they could accomodate if that happened as long as I kept in good communication with them, that my chances of getting in were better if I made an effort to come now rather than postpone my interview into January because it’s rolling an all.
So who knows, I’m as much on pins and needles as you are. Keep in mind that getting in just guarantees the training program in the summer, technically it does not guarantee a teaching job. Most years everyone gets a job, but there was some issue this year because you have until January to get a position and about 10% of the fellows still didn’t have one, I think they now extended that until mid-February.
The site says that about 1 in 8 applicants will get in (now there’s some other section of that site that seems to show that 1 in 6 get offers, and about 2/3 of them accept). I don’t know what percent of applicants get interviews; I got one and my wife (who also applied) didn’t. Good luck.
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March 9th, 2009 9:09 am
Has anyone been accepted at all to NYCTF? I interviewed Jan. 10 and was told I would receive notification in mid February. I received a notification that I was part of a select group that was still being considered but a final answer could not be given due to uncertainty over the budget. Does anyone have a concrete update on what is going on with the budget? Does anyone have an idea about what the outcome might look like?
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March 23rd, 2009 12:26 am
No one has been accepted yet. NYCTF stated that they are only sending rejection letters and decision pending letters. They “expect” to have final decisions sent out by March 27th. It’s been a long time, and I truly hope they have the final decisions out so that folks can finally make plans…Good Luck to you Justin…
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April 2nd, 2009 8:03 pm
They said on the 27th that they still don’t know yet, will be sending out more rejections mid-April.
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April 17th, 2009 8:37 pm
I was just deferred again on April 17. They say now that they have accepted some, but rejected many more and I continue to be part of a select group. I wish that budgeting was more transparent. Does anybody have any clue, or was anybody else told otherwise? Was this the bulk hiring date? Urg! I guess, what will be, will be.
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April 17th, 2009 9:56 pm
I did receive notice today (april 17) that I was not accepted, but I was “select group, please try again next year” blah blah blah. This was after several interim notices saying they were waiting to hear about budget. Good luck to all accepted.
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