Typically, in years past, scores for National Board are released right around Thanksgiving. Usually the week before. If that holds true this year, that means in just about a month, I will either have the best day of my life or the day that signifies I have some more growth to make.
I was chatting with a colleague not to long ago and she said to me, "Oh you'll pass. You are SO smart."
But some days, I do worry about what I'll do if I didn't make it. Was my writing good enough? Did I cover every single aspect of the prompts in the assessment center? Did I...? Did I....? Did I....?
It's so easy to second guess and question yourself. Most of the spring and summer, after taking my test, I put it out of my head. The relief in being done was tremendous. Most of this fall, it hasn't bothered me too much. Yes, I think about it now and again but I'm so busy trying to keep my head above water at school that I don't often have time to think about it.
Someone on the ecgen.org forum (which I would TOTALLY JOIN if I were you and you're a new candidate in Early Childhood Generalist, Middle Childhood Generalist or Early/Middle Childhood Literacy--best $40 you'll ever spend!), said that when they were a CIW (Candidate in Waiting) they went into the new school year, before score release, and prepped to start all over, just in case they didn't make it. In other words, they did the permission slips, prepared to videotape and do all of these things over again. I thought that was kind of crazy. I mean, more power to her, but no thank you. I am not going to stress myself out over it until I KNOW I have to redo something.
The confident side of me thinks there is just no way that I WON'T pass. I killed myself on those portfolios, analyzing, overanalyzing, reanalyzing. There is just no way that I didn't get a minimum 2.75 on each one. That's what I tell myself anyway. The assessment center exercises aren't worth as much (40% overall compared to 60% for the portfolios)...but I went to a ton of chats and really felt like I nailed those questions. I answered them just the way we practiced. I felt good. Confident.
The pessimistic side of me doesn't want to get that score release and see that I failed to make it this time. Because with as crazy as my school life is right now, I don't know HOW I could possibly do National Board again, even if it was just for an entry. I pray that if I didn't make it for some reason that the only things I need to redo would be AC exercises because they aren't classroom based and pretty much zero stress involved.
The confident side wins most of the time fortunately. I have run so many scoring "scenarios" through based on feedback I got from readers of my portfolio and the chats I attended at ecgen.org that I will probably be shocked if I don't pass. I'm not a perfectionist in much but in stuff like this, I totally am. I would never submit something that didn't have my 150% best effort put into it. My name is out there, you know?
The good news is, the way the process is scored, they add a 12 point uniform constant to every score. So if you DO receive a 2.75 minimum on everything (basically a B-), you will pass because your raw score would be 275 and the uniform constant will increase you to 287 points. The minimum passing is 275.
I think this is a good way to do it so that if you are someone like me...who has ZERO experience working with super young students (K-1 age), you have some leeway to do much better on another area to bump up your score. I know I only feel good about the Emergent Literacy AC exercise because I practiced with a kindergarten teacher for 3 months!! The other exercises were much more in my comfort zone so I'm not as worried about those.
I'm sure that much of this will slip my mind over the next few weeks as we have more going on at school with conferences and the busy month of November. Once I get that coveted email telling me when scores will be available...my heart will likely lodge in my throat until I know I passed or need to reassess and decide my next step.
