It's been a while since I've updated this blog, but I'm still just as determined as ever to achieve my goal.
I spent the month of July in Guatemala, taking four hours of Spanish classes a day and living with a host family. I studied hard every day, but in the end I was a bit disappointed by my progress. I think my level is too high to continue seeing noticeable gains over such a short period of time, so I'm not entirely sure the trip was worth it. I did increase my vocabulary by at least 650 words (according to my Memrise.com account), and I think I cleared up some confusion about the past subjunctive, so that's good news. I feel like my level was comparable to other people who had been living in Guatemala for more than a year, and I still feel very satisfied by my reading level. I finished another Harry Potter book while I was away, plus a short novel by Carlos Fuentes ('Instinto de Inez'), which was the first literary novel I've ever read in Spanish. This Tuesday I'm starting Skype lessons so I can continue working on my oral language skills and stop any regression from happening.
I also had fun this summer: I went to a wedding, went tubing on the Guadalupe River, and caught up with some old friends. But that's not what this blog is about!
While In Guatemala, I read a book about the foreign service, and I was influenced to change my choice of career path from consular to public diplomacy. I've always thought public diplomacy sounded interesting, but I felt like it was best suited to journalists and people who had studied public relations. Consular seemed like a better fit for someone making a career change, and consular work was also really interesting to me. After learning about cultural affairs (a subset of public diplomacy), though, I feel like there exists a job that was tailor-made for me. I have a Master's degree in humanities, with a concentration in art. I work as an ESL teacher. I've participated in and helped to facilitate exchange programs. All of these things relate to some degree to the work of a cultural affairs officer, and they're all things that I'm tremendously interested in and would love the chance to continue exploring. I've heard that entering the foreign service under public diplomacy is more competitive than the consular cone, but I also feel like I'm a better candidate for public diplomacy, so maybe it will even out.
The other area I'm working on improving right now is my job experience. Last year was my first as a public school teacher, so I spent a lot of time just trying to wrap my head around all of my responsibilities. This year, however, I have a clearer picture of what my role is and what it can be, so I'm working on expanding my job outside of my classroom. Earlier this week I gave training on the ESL program to the rest of the faculty, and I'm planning on conducting several more training sessions before the year is up. I'm also organizing a parent summit meeting that should take place in the next few weeks, and I think I'm going to have the ESL math teacher present in English while I present in Spanish. Presentations (especially in a foreign language) and increased leadership on my campus should help my application I think.
I'm still reading The Economist and slogging through my audiobook about postwar Europe. I finished reading an annotated version of the U.S. Constitution and some selected Federal Papers. I also completed my MOOC on 'The Changing Global Order' through Leiden University in The Hague, which was fantastic. It's part of a series, and the next course is on economics, but I'm not sure I'll be able to find the time to continue with my job kicking back into gear next week.
I'm in the process of registering for the October offering of the foreign service exam. I don't think I'll ever feel prepared for the exam, but I know that taking it will help give my studies more direction.
Lastly, on the language front, I'm still trying to decide whether to focus on French or Korean next. I think my Spanish is good enough to pass the language exam right now, so I'm going to just try to maintain that while working on the next language. French is useful for my job, and I've already been studying it with some success. There's also an Alliance Française here, so classes and resources are easy to come by. However, French won't gain me any points with the foreign service if I'm already using Spanish. I love Korean and have studied it a bit in the past, but there are far fewer resources and it's much more difficult. But it's also worth a huge amount of points on the register. BUT it's not very useful to me unless I pass orals and can learn it well enough to gain language points. Thus my dilemma. I like French and Korean both, but if I want to be serious about Korean, it's going to take all of my focus. I'm leaning toward Korean right now, but it's a constant struggle to know if I'm making the right decision.
Okay, so that's my quick update. I have a lot to do to prepare for the new school year, but I'm working hard to keep the foreign service in sight.
