I am smarter than I thought I was...

So, on the road to becoming a better person and finding a career that I can love and do for the rest of my working days... I turned to teaching. I have always wanted to be a teacher. You know the old adage "those that cannot do, teach"? WELL, I CAN DO, but I also want to TEACH! I love breaking things down for people and "showing them the way." Plus, I could put a lot of my organizational skills to good use. *wink, wink*

So, I applied for Project Pipeline back in May. This is a program where you can earn your teaching credential WHILE you are putting in real time in a real classroom. I was missing a couple of prerequisites to get into the program, and realized that I had all of 13 days to study for a HUGE test... the CSET (California Subject Examinations for Teachers), in order to be a Life Science/Biology teacher (which happen to be in HIGH demand these days). I broke it all down into how many hours a day I needed to study. I took a week off of work. I lost a lot of sleep and subsequently time with my baby girl. In the long run, I knew that it would be to her benefit (having me home during the summer), so I tried not to feel too bad about it. Anyway, the CSET subtests I had to take were two general science subtests, and a biology concentration subtest. This was about 150 multiple choice, and 7 essay/short answer questions.

On paper, it did not seem so bad... but in reality it covered a lot of ground, all of which I had been taught in college, but at this point in my life could not remember. Physics and Geology and Astronomy, OH MY! I read somewhere that only like 15% of the people that take all three tests at once pass. So, odds where definitely not in my favor!! Notes, flashcards, endless hours on the computer... I was more prepared that I could have ever imagined. The day of the test, I could not even bring myself to look at the material. If I did not know it by now, I was not going to know it! The first and second tests were okay, not easy, not difficult. By the time I reached the third test (Biology, which should have been easy for me), I was totally brain dead. I was yawning every two seconds, having to reread questions multiple times... then I got to one of the essay questions asking about the Greenhouse Effect, and all I could think of was "COW FARTS." It just so happens that methane does cause it, and I was not just mentally "losing it" at that point. That was the last question I answered.

I felt like I had been run over by a truck, then thrown into a wood chipper. I was exhausted. I could not keep my eyes open the rest of the day (except for the drive home) and the next day. I still had to wait A MONTH to get my results. That day was yesterday, and you know what?

I PASSED ALL THREE.