Apple Core

Welcome to Teach for America - Appalachia!

"Where the poo is Appalachia?" I ask myself as my excitement at the "congratulations" in my inbox turns to confusion and slight disappointment. There was no part of me that thought if I got accepted into the corps that I wouldn't be assigned to my first place region choice: New Orleans.

Eastern Kentucky. I'm suddenly filled with visions of Jed Clampett, Daisy Duke, oil, rolling hills, and coal. I'm thinking it will be like my childhood in southern Alabama, but somehow even more rural. Google to the rescue.

"What's white poverty?" I ask myself as my screen is flooded with images of white children standing barefoot in dirty front yards. Why have I never heard of this before?

AppalCorps Resource Hub. Everything I need to know about my transition to TFA and Kentucky. Except where I'll be living, teaching, demographics of the kids, and pretty much everything else I could possibly want to know. However, my "pre-work" that is due before I arrive at induction is on there. Awesome.

Do I want to spend two years of my life in rural Kentucky, earning thousands less than I make in Chicago, in what could possibly be a literal one horse town? I tentatively want to get married in the next several years. Is my husband in rural, poverty stricken, potentially racist, eastern Kentucky? Probably not. Are two years of penny pinching and potential lit crosses on my lawn in eastern Kentucky coming my way? Sweet chocolate chip cookie dough I hope not.

However, I do want to be a teacher, the area seems to be beautiful, and I get to teach science. Pros and cons to every decision. I just hope this is the right one.