Tuesday, I went to an "informational meeting" about tutoring for a local company in the fall that's bidding to do tutoring for schools that get money under No Child Left Behind. If a school misses their Annual Yearly Progress goals three years running, they get money from the feds to offer tutoring to children that get free and reduced lunch. (I, personally, think this is like sticking on a bandaid after a leg has gone gangrous, but those opinons fall second to making some damn money in the fall, and the pay is good, and I would be getting to help kids.) However, most of the meeting was spent telling us every which way but straight up that they need kids to tutor and that if we recruit kids, we'd get hired. They went on and on about how the more kids they had, the more tutors they'd need, and to go out there and tell people in our churches and fraternities and sororities and communities and churches all about this company (apparently, there's a vendor fair at the beginning of school and parents get to pick which company they want doing the tutoring). They kept pushing the church angle, until one person finally said "You keep mentioning churches. What if we don't go to church?" to which the guy said "That's a very good question." Pause. Silence. "Um. You have lots of options. Your fraternities, your sororities..." It was pretty awful; I thought I was looking at a tutoring job, not a marketing one. There was a guy from my grad program there1 and at one point, I leaned over to him and said "I think we've fallen onto another planet." We'll see if the company calls come October when they know how many people they need, but I'm not holding my breath, and I really want to secure other gainful employment before then.
Yesterday I had ESL class in the morning. Jeff has this week off, so we just hung out and hung out with his mom and set up Gallery on my domain and stuff. We got him lunch at Taco Bell and ran a couple of errands. My friend Marshica came over for dinner in the evening. Jeff looked at her laptop, I proofread part of her thesis, and I made teriyaki tofu and rice and vegetables for everyone.
Today, I met with the chick I'm tutoring in stats, and there was more hanging out. There was a Borders run, and then we went back out to the grocery store, again. There was cube steak and squash and salad for dinner. It's been a good day. :)
1. So tired of competing with my friends for jobs.