PTC | Welcome To My World

The NEWS and moving forward..

The bell rang and recess was over. I was walking up to my class and settling my students down so I could begin my lesson, when my class phone rang. It was the secretary telling me to go down to my superintendent’s office, and that he needed to see me at that very moment. I waited for the substitute to come to my class and hurriedly left. My legs couldn’t move fast enough! This is it … this is the moment that I’m going to find out whether or not I got the job; the dream. If not, what’s plan B? Do I apply anywhere else or wait? So many scenarios went through my head as I walked into his office. He walked in, sat on the couch in front of me, and was about to tell me the news. As he was saying, “Thank you for applying for the ES position…”, my stomach tumbled into a million knots and I expected him to say, ‘we are sorry but…’ Instead he said, “I am happy to offer you the ES AP position for 2017/2018”. I froze … I wanted to scream… jump… shout. I remember looking at him in a daze, as in, did I hear correctly? I’m sure he read my face, so he repeated it again, and the second time around, I was sure he said what he said.

I asked if I could scream! I couldn’t believe my ears! He showed me my new contract to sign and asked, “Do you still want the position?” Do I want it? Are you serious? Of course I do! I read the contract, asked a question and then signed. He congratulated me, we shook hands, and I literally ran back to my principal to share the news. I then ran to my AP who was leaving the next year, and then ran to my class to continue teaching. How I taught that class, I have no idea. I was on cloud nine.

I quickly called my husband and family, excitedly screaming the amazing news into the phone. I ran to one of team members and just put my thumbs up on her glass door because she was teaching. She ran to the door, hugged me and ran back in. I simply couldn’t believe it! My dream was coming true, and there truly is no better feeling in the world.

When I found out having my PTC on my CV made a huge difference, I was so grateful. I couldn’t wait to enroll for PTC 2017. Slowly news traveled, an email went out and everyone started coming to congratulate me in person, by email or phone. It probably took a few weeks for it to fully sink in that I got the position, and that I wouldn’t be in a classroom anymore. Ten long, beautiful, exasperating, and soul shaking years in a classroom; years spent working myself to the bone, planning my vision, pushing myself forward, and finding ways through one challenge after the next. However, I still had months ahead of me of a workload that would be the heaviest I had handled yet.

Two days after signing my new contract, I received an email from PTC saying the schedule is out for Summer 2017. I had written down which two courses I needed in order for me to graduate. Right then and there I logged on, enrolled, secured my place and paid. I was now all set to go and couldn’t wait to travel.

January hit and everything was becoming so real. I was doing three jobs at once: teaching, team leading, and shadowing my current AP whenever he was free. All my free periods would go to being with him. He showed me the ropes and was so patient with me. I was going to all the ES leadership meetings every Sunday and Wednesday. I would stay after school to catch up with my grading and planning. Time was flying and next thing I know it was June. As I was packing my classroom up for the next teacher to take over, I felt so strange. So many mixed emotions zapped through me while I was packing up. I barely took anything with me, and left and reorganized everything for her. All I took to my office was a box with my personal things.

Time for a change…The Interview

By 2016 I marked ten years of teaching, and felt I needed a new challenge. I started to grow bored of being in the classroom. Having already done two PTC courses and knowing that I had two more to complete the following summer meant to me that I needed to begin applying for assistant principal (AP) positions anywhere in Kuwait.

Luckily there was an opening at the school I was already working in for an AP post in the upper Elementary Grades 1 – 4. I updated my CV and applied for that position. I applied thinking I wouldn’t get it but wanted that interview experience. My interview was during the same day as the 3rd grade assembly, so it was day full of excitement and anxiety.

The time for the interview came once the assembly was done, so I got changed and ready with a tummy full of butterflies, and walked to my superintendent’s office. The walk seemed endless, with my heart beating so fast. I got there 5 minutes early and waited with the secretary. The door opened and my heart froze. I walked into the conference room to see all principals from all divisions, along with the KG AP. Yikes. Be still my thumping heart. I had coffee before my interview as a little pick-me-up. I am not usually a coffee drinker, but when I do have it, I’m wide awake and start bouncing off the walls. I introduced myself and shook hands with everyone there, and somehow managed to sit down without falling over. The entire interview took about 20 minutes. I asked my one question, got my answer, thanked them and left. I felt I did well, and that I gave it my best. I went back to my class to change again and planned for the next day. They told me that I would get an answer back within three weeks, which felt like a lifetime. Meanwhile I continued doing what I had to do as a team leader and teacher.

PTC Take #1

In November 2015, I was so excited to begin, that I enrolled for two courses when the schedule first came out. I had applied for my US visa and got it for 10 years. I booked my seat in the class, got my ticket, and was all set to go six months before the course even began. I could hardly bear the excitement. After six years of putting it on hold, the time had finally come for me to attend PTC!

In the summer of 2016, I started packing my bags for a 21 hour flight journey on my own for the very first time in my life. Miami was a long way away, so far in distance, and so far removed from everything I knew for 34 years of my life. My emotions were all over the place. I felt overwhelmed, anxious, excited, nervous, scared, thrilled … the list goes on. Ambivalence at its best.

After an arduous flight, I made it to my hotel room and couldn’t wait to check in and rest my aching body. But when I finally walked into the room, I was hit by huge waves of emotions which seemed to come out of nowhere, and I just broke down and cried. It was so quiet. No one was calling out “mom” every second, and no one was fighting, crying or laughing. It was just me and the four walls of my strange hotel room in this strange city where my lifelong dreams were hanging right before of me. I switched on the TV and put on my music to feel the comfort of sound around me, and I began to unpack and settle in. This will be my home for 21 days, I thought, so I had better get used to it.

I had 3 days before my first PTC class began, so I decided to use them to my advantage by getting my jet lag adjusted and also walking around the neighborhood to check out where I could get everything I needed. By the third day I was familiar with most things and seemed to be settling in smoothly, but the feeling of missing my family still gnawed at me tremendously.

Thanks to technology I was able to Face Time with my children daily. I would spend my mornings with them on video calls, and when they would go to sleep, my day would begin. The time difference worked to our benefit.

By the fourth day, it was time to register and get ready for classes, and the process went quite well from the get go. Meeting so many different educators from all over the world was an amazing experience.

By the fourth and fifth days, the pace slowed down a little bit, and I was getting into the swing of studying alongside an extremely diverse group of people. I felt slightly bombarded by the amount of information I was taking in, not to mention the amount of networking there was going on. There were so many different activities to complete as part of the program, which entailed partnering up with others taking the class. And although it was all too much too quick, it was still worth every cent spent on the courses.

The new academic school year began and I started implementing at work what I had learned from the Leadership & Team Dynamics module. Getting us all on the same page was a successful process, and I could already see the positive effects the training had on my work performance. It worked so well that it drove my passion further, and I felt fulfilled. Trying out the team building activities with my team at work which I had learnt from the PTC course took things to another level.

The Working World

2007 was the first year I joined the workforce as a responsible adult, an experience ripe with anxiety of course. I was an on-call substitute in one school, and applied for full-time work at two other schools. Meanwhile I continued subbing at KG Land for three months every day, waiting for the opportunity to teach full-time. I had two interviews and chose the offer that best suited me, which was at a very good school.One of the top 3 schools in Kuwait. I could not wait to start working there.

Come September 2007, I was a homeroom teacher. I had my very own class and a curriculum I had to teach from. I remember how afraid I was and how overwhelming everything seemed, but I loved every minute of it. Getting to know my class, their parents and working in a team of six was a wonderful experience. By the fifth month, I had formed my long-term goal which I intended to achieve after completing ten years teaching in a classroom. That goal was to become a principal one day in a private school. I didn’t see myself being in a classroom for the rest of my life. I just got that feeling right then and there. There aren’t a lot of Kuwaiti’s working at private schools, let alone any principals or assistant principals. I wanted to break that trend, and be the first Kuwaiti female to take on the challenge.

I had to have a plan in order to reach my goal by the tenth year of teaching, so I visualized it and drew it out. I knew that to be an assistant principal or principal one needed their masters and a principal certificate. After researching and locating the programs I needed to enroll in, I decided to begin my masters while teaching. The school I was working in at the time offered a Master’s program, so I enrolled and graduated with an MS in Interdisciplinary Studies and Educational Leadership Certification, Buffalo State SUNY in June of 2011. I was so sure of what I wanted, that all the obstacles and struggles it took to get there felt like mere necessity. I was also building a family at the same time, and felt equally dedicated to it.

I gave birth to my daughter, and only two weeks later attended class in order to graduate with the same class I began my Masters program with. Yes, it wasn’t easy at all. Having sleepless nights, new mother and trying to recover after giving birth did NOT stop me and still went to class. It was a 2-year program and I attended classes after working hours. In 2011, I received my masters and graduated. Now all that was left was my principal certificate.

I asked around and heard about The Principal Training Center (PTC) and The Ontario Principals Council (OPC). I compared the two and chose the most feasible option. However, I put my principal training on hold for a while to focus on my children, whom I gave birth to in 2010 and 2012. Still, nothing was going to stop me from continuing along my path.

So meanwhile, I decided to save money in order to complete my principal training in two summers. I chose to do the training through the PTC in Miami. From 2012 to 2016 I saved up exactly the amount I needed. During that time I was also team leader for third grade for two years, accumulating leadership experience to help pave the way for my principal training.

Kudos

I have to say, blogging isn’t my modus operandi, nor is writing a hobby or passion that comes naturally to me. Writing about the most vulnerable and intimate experiences of my life, and sharing them with the world, is definitely not something I would call a joy ride, because it’s not the way I’m assembled. I’m a doer. I get an idea of what I want to create, and I go ahead and get it done without a lot of fan fair. But this is where I’m blessed; I have loved ones who cheer me on without me even having to ask. My husband and one of my closest friends both yanked me out of my head and pushed me to write about what it means to be one of the first Kuwaiti women to pave this road in education. What it took. How it feels. Without them, this whole website wouldn’t exist. Also, the Director of PTC Bambi Betts, was the third person to mention to me that she believes others would benefit from reading about the journey of a woman who pursued an uncommon path and dream in the Middle East. So here I am, listening to the support system whom without, I would not be the same person. I want to say thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for all the love. I appreciate you endlessly.

Get to know me!

Myself in a nutshell. Born and raised in Kuwait. I received my high school and bachelor degrees from academic institutions in Kuwait. Married with two children. My passion while growing up was always to be a teacher. As my aspirations grew, I set my goal towards becoming assistant principal and, ultimately, principal, which I have partially accomplished thus far. Growing up in Kuwait as a minority was not easy. I am ensuring that any negativity I endured as a child is not repeated in school with other students. I take the responsibility of shaping future generations very seriously in mind, body and spirit.

Name : Dana Shuhaibar

Birthday: October 5th

Nationality: Kuwaiti, Middle East

Experience in teaching: 10 years

Experience in Assistant Principal: 3 years and going

Schools I taught in: Bayan Bilingual School for seven years (BBS.) I taught Grade 3 for five years and Grade 4 for two years. I moved with my daughter when she entered KG1 to American International School of Kuwait (AISK). I taught there for three years in Grade 3 and was the Team Leader for two years before becoming Assistant Principal.

Education:

M.S., Interdisciplinary Studies and Educational Leadership Certification, Buffalo State SUNY – June 2011
B.A, English Education with a teaching certificate, Gulf University of Science & Technology – December 2006
HS Diploma, American International School of Kuwait- June 2001

Credentials

Principal Training Center-enrolled 2016 (2 courses completed)
Principal Training Center-enrolled 2017 (Graduated)
TESOL Kuwait Conference –November 2013
PYP “Introduction to the PYP Curriculum Model” Certificate – October 2013
ICDL Certification – January 2009