My journey from north to south: APPLYING FOR JOBS

Pictured: me with Nanna Betty and Grandad Bob at graduation

I started my PGCE 10 years ago back in 2011 at Sheffield Hallam University. At the time I was living with my parents and 3 younger siblings in Doncaster and sharing a bedroom with my teenage sister, who was going through her "emo" phase. ​

I’d met my boyfriend (from West Sussex) whilst doing my undergrad degree and he had just managed to secure a town planning job down in Southampton, so I decided to apply for jobs down there too. I would be in school teaching in Yorkshire and would be invited for interview in Hampshire a couple of days after. I would come home from placement, very quickly book the trains down South for the next day (I was only just learning to drive that year. By the way, I would 100% not recommend learning to drive at the same time as learning to teach), spend all evening planning my interview lesson, preparing and printing off resources and packing my bags, before making the long train journey down south the next day. I must have gone through this process 5 or 6 times and it never got any easier being told I wasn’t successful. Let's not even think about the amount of money I must have spent on train tickets and taxi fares. I struggled to really sell myself at interviews and found them so stressful. Actually I didn’t have a successful interview until the October, a long time after all of my fellow trainees had got their NQT jobs. I’m still at the same school now, so as hard as it was at the time, I’m glad I didn’t get those other jobs as this one was (and still is, for now at least) the perfect school for me. I’m sharing all of this to reassure anyone who hasn’t managed to secure their first teaching job yet. It took a while, but it happened for me and it will happen for you too!