I Just Might Be Crazy!

I have a confession. I am addicted to learning. No, like seriously addicted. I

finished my doctorate in 2012 and by that summer I was thinking of pursuing my Autism Certification. Due to family issues I ended up taking two years to get the certification, but I did get it. A year later I was thinking of getting my National Board Certification. I wavered about this for quite some time as I had heard that it was difficult to obtain. My best friend got her Master's Degree and attempted her National Boards (as a generalist). After three attempts each time being just a 1 - 3 points from passing she was done. I think that her struggle was one of the major reasons that I hesitated about signing up for board certification.

In March of 2015 my school district surprised me and asked if I would like to go to Washington, D.C. for the Teaching & Learning Conference. Of course I jumped at the chance to go! (See more about that here.) The conference was geared towards those who have, or who are seeking to get, their National Board Certification. I was in!

Then, as always, life got in the way and I kept putting off signing up. My school district is offering an incentive to sign up...they are paying the $475 fee for each component (of course, if you fail to pass, you have to pay the second time yourself). We had until November 12, 2015 to sign-up to have the

district pay, so of course, me being who I am, I waited until November 11th to sign up. So now I am enrolled to complete the first and second component this year. A test on Literacy standards and a 13 page reflection paper focused on student progress in writing in a 3 month or 3 week (my choice) period.

So anyway, now I was all in. I had to get it done and I was excited (and anxious) about it but it was too late to stop now.

I wrote part of this post in November with the expectation of posting it shortly after I wrote it but as with everything else, life got in the way. I am SO bad about this. (I keep promising to blog on a regular basis - I have to get on some schedule regarding this.) My paper is due no later than May 18th. Naturally, that means I didn't start writing it until the end of April. Each section is only allowed to be about 2 pages and being concise is not a strength of mine so that was very difficult, but write it I did. I had two others review and edit my work and then made the revisions they suggested. Finally, last night around 9:30 I finally submitted the paper for review. Now I just have to keep from pulling all of my hair out between now and late fall when I will find out if I passed this component or not.

After celebrating this feat a little bit I logged in to schedule the test for component 1. The testing window is open until June 15th but in my area the best I could do is sometime in the next 3 weeks - during the last 3 weeks of the school year. Sooner or later, I would have to take the test so I did - I test on May 24th. Wish me luck!

Do you have your Board certification? Are you thinking about it?