Where Have You Been?

I haven't updated my blog in a while. And now I am back again. So, where have you been, Peter-o?

For the past few years, I was a busy, busy boy working full-time, followed by a somewhat lazy-boy.

From 2008-2011, I worked as a tutor and then a teacher's assistant at John Muir Charter School, on the site of San Jose Job Corps Center (SJJC). It was a great job! I worked mostly teaching Algebra I, and preparing the students to pass the California High School Exit Exam (CAHSEE). I also worked with the staff of the Nevada County Special Education Local Plan Area (SELPA) to ensure that the necessary subset of our students had their Individualized Education Programs (IEPs) or Section 504 plans up-to-date and reviewed, ensuring they qualified for the new exemption to the CAHSEE under California law. It was the kind of work that made a profound difference in the lives of many at-risk young men and women.
 
However, in June 2011, I was let go due to a decision made by Muir to ensure all their teachers at the site had K-12 Single Subject Secondary Education credentials. Since my credential is in Adult Education (not K-12), it meant the end of the line for me. Now, almost a year later, I look back at it as a wonderful experience that I dearly miss. I hope that everyone at the Muir site, indeed, the whole the Job Corps Center are doing great this year! I miss all the teachers and students there.

Since then, I have been doing personal tutoring. I had a wonderful opportunity over the summer to act as a docent and English tutor for a visiting foreign exchange student from France. More recently, I have been doing tutoring in AP US History, English, and Geometry for Los Gatos high school students through TeamUp! Tutors. And I've also snuck in some private consulting for a creative principal in the movie/animation industry.

For those familiar with my work and efforts of recent years, most of those initiatives are on hold: Flowers in the Cracks, the Global Understanding Institute, and many other wonderful ideas just tailed away into silence, or were shelved due to circumstances. I reserve the right to revive them at any time, but for now, they are sleeping dreams. There are other ideas I have percolating, but it is not yet time to mention them.

But one thing I can talk about is my new web site: petercorless.com. I've just begun to flesh it out. With the recent changes in policy now allowing Californians to again be part of the program, I've rejoined as an Amazon.com affiliate. So I started putting links back to the old Green Knight Publishing products. Expect that to flesh out over time. And also expect to see more links from me under an Arthuriana topic, and eventually a section for history, etc.