Enily, where I'm at, teachers need to be certified by the Provincial Dept. in order to be able to teach in public schools. Certification confirms their education, experience and any professional development training they receive and determines their pay class.

I think there's also National Board Certifications in the US, isn't there?

"Certificated" is the preferred regulatory term. It's a bureaucrat thing.

Dude, seriously? That's just tragic. Reminds me of how, in New York State, everything is "Personal" instead of "Personnel," presumably because of one dopey person years ago.

I'm afraid I give up on this paper today. Between the good weather and the identity theft? Bah. Someone did, in fact, have my social security number and stuff (and parents' address) and use it to open a charge account with Neiman Marcus. It should be in the process of being cleared up already, but STILL.

Yes, but there's also state certification, which is what they're talking about. Still, getting certification means you're certified, no? I suppose there's a distinction between being certified and having a certificate, but I'm not sure it's a significant distinction.

To confuse it even further, people will say certified teachers are licensed.

I have never seen the word certificated before. Huh.

Glad the identity thief got caught, Jesse. That's creepy, aside from the practical issues.

Someone did, in fact, have my social security number and stuff (and parents' address) and use it to open a charge account with Neiman Marcus. It should be in the process of being cleared up already, but STILL.

I understand the pain, Jesse. I got a call from Nordstrom's on Saturday. A woman had a driver's license with my name/address and her picture as well as my SS#. She tried to charge stuff to my Nordstrom's account, but they thought it was suspicious. Called me at home and ended up arresting the woman.

V. freaky and disconcerting. I've been chatting with the police off and on since Saturday about the case. They're charging her with a felony and they may need me to appear at the hearing, but don't know yet.

Jeesh, glad they caught your identuty stealer, too, ChiKat!

ChiKat, did you ever figure out how she got your info?

It's so crazy, ChiKat! Apparently they were going to go to the address where "my" identity thief was having stuff shipped, but could someone really be that stupid? We'll see. I hope I get to talk to the cops! So far, I've just had a postal inspector.

I am having a momentary school-related I RULE moment, so I thought I'd better share. I was all fucked up trying to make this data say stuff it just wasn't saying, and I stumbled across really good backup for excluding some of it, and now it's saying all kinds of fun things!

Also I just told two women to shut up in the computer lab, and one of them was all, "The sign says no eating or drinking, not no talking! This isn't the library!" But they are quiet now. Awesome.

That's a creepy random coincidence, with the two attempted identity thefts being caught by alert store personnel (or do I mean personal?). And the stores both have names starting with N.

Okay, that part's less creepy, more random.

Do you know what triggered the store people to doublecheck?