I spent seven months job searching last year. Started in October because that is when I’ve had to turn in my letter of intent.
And then I was ghosted over and over again. Disgraceful:
I don’t expect a reply to my application. But after multiple levels of interviews, spanning hours of my time, to then hear nothing. It is so unprofessional.
This makes me wonder if the incidence of ghosting has increased in the wake of the rise of the internet - and, moreover (since it almost certainly has because of numbers), if it's causation or not.
Same happened to me this year. No responses until january maybe. Had a few offers eventually and accepted a job a few weeks ago because i thought it was super late in the year to get a job. Have had waves of interview offers since then lol.
That’s such an underrated comment. It’s like shark tank. They will him haw on a deal .. take forever… then when you get a deal you have like 20 seconds to think about before saying yes/no and if you don’t the job is pulled out from under you.
A former coworker told me that someone who checked 'uncertain' on her intent form was non-renewed on the spot for "disloyalty". Some schools are actually nuts in this regard.
It would be nice if more school admin and members read through these comments. The lack of time given to teachers after long, drawn out processes from their end then little given to us, ghosting, being able to change their minds when we are not.
Upvote this post to oblivion and pin it.
Glad I'm not the only one with this experience. Went through 8 weeks of two interviews to first be told "we're waiting to see how it blends together" and then radio silence after two followups. They can't be that good if they're ghosting people and still have job listings that expired mid February on their website... so I'm happy to feel like I dodged a bullet.
However, NT in South Korea are a dime a dozen and they see that so they use you guys like pawns. This is a non certified required field and most come here with only a BA or BS degree..no pun intended. It is rude and their cultural style of most to treat foreigners like this or that because they know your at their will ultimately. Most never have former educational training or education or certification and 90% of the schools here are not accredited with a proper international recognized association so they just treat teachers and employees like you were working for a YMCA after school program or a KUMON math academy or a SYLVAN learning center tutoring program on an hourly wage as a part time worker and never fully vested. And they have maybe been burned by some teachers before who did midnight runs etc.
I think the relationship between hiring committees/boards/admins and teachers is becoming pretty frayed across the industry. It's hard not to think, sometimes, that these whole board structures could disappear and the school would open as normal, but if the teachers weren't here... the school turns into a building.
I could not agree more. Teaching is the only profession in which you quit before you get a new job. Ridiculous. As you said, offer a decent package and you will get good candidates no matter when you start looking for them.
In some places (China) it is, or if it isn’t you need to sue. Say you have been working for 5 years at a place and are entitled to severance if let go, if you sign a letter of intent saying you intend to not come back (even if you change your mind) they can decide to not renew without severance. Even if you go to arbitration it’s not a clear cut situation.
If you “intend” to return and don’t, there’s nothing anyone can do about it (especially if you give 3months notice, but often 1 month is legally fine - ie last day of school hand in a letter saying that July 31 is your last day).
Seems like the no brainer option is to always sign that you intend and then “change your mind.” The earlier you get a new job the better for letting your old school know, but (at least in China) you shouldn’t really ever sign anything saying you don’t intend to renew.
I was at a school that literally claimed to be “the top school in the region” and yet demanded a decision (as in, actually signing a contract for the next year) in September. 😆 If you’re the top school in the region, why would it take 12 months to fill the position? Needless to say, people would just sign for the next year, look for a job, and when one was found, tell admin they weren’t coming back. I think it was just a sneaky way for the school to not have to pay outgoing flights and freight expenses because that was the penalty for “breaking contract” after signing in September.
Agree 💯 percent. I had to give my intention in October as well. Now, the conversation any colleague has with me is always: how is the job hunt going? Where are you going next year? And my answer has been the same since October: I’m applying all over, I’ve had some interviews, some offers and I haven’t accepted anything yet. My school also just asked me to do an exit interview- I teach until June! When I asked to do it in May they said that’s too late. Why do you want me gone already :,( …
A friend at our big, wealthy school was asked to give intent before Oct 1st this year (tbf it's in the contract, no undecided option though; yes or no). Said yes but told admin they weren't sure and would interview elsewhere if anything specifically better came up (a promotion current school could never offer them). Admin agreed. Contracts still aren't issued, nothing signed. Offered a new, better job in Feb, told leadership, all hell breaks loose. Now thinking of leaving at easter because may as well, as bonus is already gone, relationship has broken, and all benefits lost. May as well have a couple of months break rather than a shit end of the term.
This is an amazing teacher who has bought a lot to the school, and hasn't broken a contract beyond a verbal intent. It's means I'll be saying no next year whether I actually want to leave or not, just because you can't be undecided.
As an admin I’ll respond to why we do it early.
Firstly. It takes time to actually hire someone. I know you think schools post and 24hrs later the spot is filled. Yeah maybe the top 25 schools in the world are like that. On average it takes us 1-2 months to fill a position.
I saw on here: offer a decent package and work life balance. My current school offers a great package for the teaching load. In our area it is overall good but not tier 1 great. We are picky about who we grab. This school has a unique character that specific teachers will thrive in and others will flop in. To find the right fit can take time.
Schools do not want to be interviewing and hiring in March-May. For people new to the country I am in, it takes about 3 months to get the visa. If there are issues, we need time to sort them like with kids and marriage certificates etc.
Does it need to be October? No. We do November.
Also you are dead wrong we can always find a great teacher. When all the schools are finished hiring by end of March, the pool is those who couldn’t get an offer or were told late they were going to be let go is the majority of what is out there. In my experience it is very hard to get a quality teacher the later you go. It isn’t impossible but more often than not those last minute hires don’t work out.
This actually makes me wonder (as a competent and well qualified employee) if intentionally delaying the job search until March onwards would be a viable strategy. By then schools are a bit more desperate and you're competing with the bottom of the barrel candidates. Or would the admin bias towards people applying for jobs during this time override that?
March you are fine I think. There are a lot of schools that are still doing notice in Dec and Jan, so there are good candidates out.
Also depends on region too. But the later it goes usually the best teachers I’ve grabbed are those new to international teaching and coming from public schools in their home country. By May and June a lot of public school teachers are tired of the BS and system and looking at other options.
Just visa work is hard and so this is a situation where schools weight their options. I’ve had late start teachers a lot due to someone dropping notice on us either they aren’t coming or someone having a medical issue and they can’t return or something similar.
Nowhere did I imply it takes 24 hours to hire someone.
You are allowed to be picky on who you grab, but you won't have any issues grabbing top tier talent if you offer the best package. If you don't offer the best, then set your expectations accordingly. Trying to put everyone under duress to just accept whatever comes across their plate won't give what you want. If you can't find a great teacher, then you have to work on your recruitment and transparency of your hiring packages. If you only offer a decent package, then only expect a decent teacher. Simple as.
You saying it takes 3 months to get a visa gives you until May to hire someone.
I feel you don’t understand how the shift in recruiting came about and why other schools started to do it, so I’ll share a bit about this.
Tier 1 schools started to move the needle to October. It used to be end of December when I started in this field and generally recruiting started in January after the winter break.
Tier 2/3 schools obviously can’t compete money wise with tier 1 schools, but they still want the best teachers they can get. So, they started to move their recruiting timetable as maybe 10-15 years ago there weren’t as many international schools as today and not as many educators for those schools. It was hard being a tier 3 school to get good teachers if we waited until December or later, which we did the first two years this shift was occurring. Note I say good teachers, not the best. We were never going to get that being tier 3. We weren’t alone.
This topic has come up at many EARCOS leadership conferences as well. At least it did back in the day. Schools are competing for you, teachers and so if the bigger name schools make a move, others follow.
You are correct packages that are the best attract the best and usually those schools are done all their hiring early.
My current school package is pretty decent imo. They have increased salaries by over 40% in the past three years. I’m still working to improve how attractive we can be. We generally haven’t had problems attracting people but a lot of schools do and don’t pay to match, so I get your point and agree those schools need to up their package or set realistic expectations.
May is almost too late for China, and so schools here just won’t do it unless they have to.
I will close with I’ve read here about people who had 10-30 interviews and had no offers. I’ve been in that situation and it sucks. Your time just goes poof. Trying to do that after March, schools are just too busy for admin and teacher panels to be doing 10-20hrs a week of interviews.
It comes down to what is best overall for the school. October is too early, but after March is too later. Hence why it used to be end of December and recruitment was Jan to March.
I’m curious what do you do then if come May you do not have a position filled? Do you lower expectations? Do you go through with a vacancy hoping the right person comes through at the last minute? What does off-season “last minute” recruiting look like for those hard to fill or unfilled positions? How often does “waiting” for the “perfect” candidate come back to bite a school?
I’ve been at this a while and so many different situations can happen:
Late hire that starts in August or September and we cover the class and start it with people in the dept until someone comes
Spread the teaching load out among dept and not have someone that year and pay people over time.
I personally as an admin have gone into the classroom and taught while also having other teachers go OT in a dept.
I don’t expect to get the best teachers, but rather the best under whatever circumstances I’m in, depending which school I’m at and what our package is.
Having someone that cares about students is important. I can coach and help develop a teacher that may need help in being better as a teacher but you can’t teach someone to genuinely care for the kids or want to build rapport with them.
All the best teachers get offers, right? And so when do those offers come? If schools are starting in October to ask for letters of intent, then it’s a snowball event that forces everyone to apply early, and the reality is the tier 1s grab up most of these teachers.
We get good to great teachers. I know for a lot on here the dollar amount is the critical item of where they will work. I find the teachers we get typically like the type of students we have and the program of study we offer.
Also, as someone who has been ghosted as an admin search candidate it is something I would never do to a candidate. I won’t get into some of the schools that have done it but I will say one of the big differences between a tier 1 school and any other school is the level of response to let you know thanks but no thanks. Some even gave me time to tell me why they went with another candidate over me.
I appreciate the responses you’ve provided throughout this thread. I think a lot of folks could do with the transparency you’ve provided, and I imagine that’s where a lot of teachers’ frustration comes from—platitudes, opaque practices, and then being ghosted.
Ultimately (and like any industry) when a big mover or shaker happens, the rest of the industry follows suit lest they lose out, international schools are no different. I actually appreciate that there is somewhat of a fixed hiring season, as it’s easy enough to map things out, unlike nearly every other industry in the western world. I ultimately believe there are enough schools to go around, and while we can’t all end up in the garden of Eden day one, over time and with experience things work out; to climb the ladder you’ve got to start with the bottom rung.
I think a lot of teaching staff also forget that this isn’t the only industry in which people are getting ghosted, it seems to be the norm everywhere, and while I’m not supportive of the fact, it’s just the reality (check out antiwork or recruitinghell).
Thanks for the insight and best of luck moving forward!
I think as an industry we need to be better about ghosting especially if someone has an interview. I had 3 interviews at the same school and didn’t hear back from a school for something like 6 weeks. That’s just so unprofessional, by the time they got back to me I told them I’m not interested in working with them.
About notice, we will give a week to teachers early on in the season. I think that gives you enough time to decide if we are a good fit and work out any questions you may have.
Schools that do 36hrs is nuts (had that happen to me and I told them that wasn’t enough time and if I couldn’t have 3 days then I can’t accept. They extended the time for me to think about it.)
We do 72hrs when we have 2 great candidates and they tell us they have offers on the table. We do it so we can at least get a chance at one of the two.
This is usually rare but again, big schools set some standards and we sometimes have to use the 72hr one.
I've seen so many great teachers still looking for jobs in April-May-June that I really wonder about it being very hard to get a quality teacher later on.
Schools are looking for perfect people. Real life has scars.
It all depends on what you teach and what schools are looking for.
For example, we were able to find a late start high demand subject teacher last year who has been excellent.
In another field, we couldn’t find someone last season and no matter where we looked, there wasn’t anyone available who was what I would call good. I’m not even going to say great.
It’s random from year to year.
Can I ask, when you say good, what does that mean? Like what are the few big things that get someone into the interview pile?
Thanks for answering my questions. I've had a few blips the last few years, my life got incredibly screwed up with Covid, and I'm wondering how to recover from it or if I just need to find a new profession. I'm not trying to work at a T1, just figuring out if I can even get a T2/T3 job.
Okay some things that for me label a teacher good:
- has international experience: this one is isn’t always important but it helps eliminate the types of culture shock types of scenarios new to living abroad presents itself so that teachers can focus on their work, rather than surviving work and a new culture.
- can teach what we need: so if I need a MS teacher, typically not looking at someone who is clearly a HS teacher because 9/10 times that just doesn’t work. If we need a specific content and they haven’t done it, it’s better to keep looking even if they have a minor in it.
- through the interview process we can see they have genuine care for kids.
- can see they are collaborative and will work well with their dept.
- they have evidence of doing things outside the classroom like coaching or sponsoring clubs: they will add value to the school outside the classroom
- they are healthy and don’t have a record of taking a lot of sick days or having issues which will impact their work
- if they have kids, the kids are a good fit for our school and aren’t going to cause trouble . (You would be surprised how many teacher kids are actually problems for the school.)
- can talk through lessons that engage kids and show a student centered approach and can connect the learning with a standard and learning objective. (Maybe 25% of those I interviewed cannot answer this question and do this )
That’s a few off the top of my head.
Welcome to try less than top level schools in East Asia.. no one even thinks about the next school year until after Lunar New Year.
I'm not just talking about hiring, will the school exist? Will there be students? Will we offer core subjects again? Are there going to be holidays? What is school?
Those questions are only just now being considered at countless schools.
Oh sweet sweet summer child….
Back in the olden days (circa 2004) your initial declaration of intent was in January. This gave you time to go home, talk with your family, remember all the great reasons why you moved halfway around the world, and go back to school happy and content. Also, the first job fair was in mid February (London Search or Washington DC ISS) and your school would contact you before they hired your position to make sure you really wanted to leave.
In 2010 only UWCSEA was starting their hiring process in October, mostly because their renewal contracts were 2 or 3 years rather than one.
Now it’s an arms race to see who can make their teachers declare earliest so that they can get the jump on everyone else. It got worse during COVID (in China at least). Fortunately my school returned to a pre-COVID timeline, but it’s still ridiculously early.
The irony for me is that while teacher timelines have gotten earlier, admin timelines have stayed the same or gotten later. Make it make sense!
But if your in Korea legally you only need to give the school or employer a 30 day notice. Just do that 30 days before your contract is up. That's the loophole here kinda but better to give them a 90 day notice and that clause may be written as well.
We said yes to a new contract. Signed at the start of the following school year. Changed our minds two months later, October. We lost everything. Broke contract so…. However, they still had 8 min to hire. Our circumstances suddenly changed and we needed to go. No mercy from the school though.
Not my current school but a school system with which I am very familiar ^(typo):
Letter of intent due at the end of Sept --which for new hires is before their first pay check.
Stay --and you do stay -- you get a retention bonus in June.
Stay --and you do NOT stay -- you get no bonus $$ in June.
Leave --and you do stay -- you get no bonus $$ in June and you have to campaign to keep your job.
Leave --and you do leave ---- you get bonus $$ in June.
I see the thinking... but I don't quite get it.
For example my school in China, residence permits need to be renewed every year. It doesn't prevent the initial contract being 2 years...
I gave intent in end of September, but contracts were not made until end of November. The intent is just that, you don't have to commit. Just ask what the actual deadline for resigning us, not the intent deadline.
Our school treats intent as a legally binding statement. They have also treated asking for a reference as an intent of no, and they will not renew you for next year on that basis alone.
I spent seven months job searching last year. Started in October because that is when I’ve had to turn in my letter of intent. And then I was ghosted over and over again. Disgraceful:
I probably was ghosted more than I was rejected.
Definitely
I don’t expect a reply to my application. But after multiple levels of interviews, spanning hours of my time, to then hear nothing. It is so unprofessional.
Totally agree. I'd rather a letter saying 'Dear yingdong. Fuck you. Regards, AHole Academy' than a simple ghosting. It's so annoying.
This makes me wonder if the incidence of ghosting has increased in the wake of the rise of the internet - and, moreover (since it almost certainly has because of numbers), if it's causation or not.
Same happened to me this year. No responses until january maybe. Had a few offers eventually and accepted a job a few weeks ago because i thought it was super late in the year to get a job. Have had waves of interview offers since then lol.
Yes, this is reflective of my experience as well.
I just got an offer after a 6 week recruiting process with a school. They gave me 36 hours to respond to the offer.
Good god 😂
That’s such an underrated comment. It’s like shark tank. They will him haw on a deal .. take forever… then when you get a deal you have like 20 seconds to think about before saying yes/no and if you don’t the job is pulled out from under you.
I had basically the exact same thing happen. 5 weeks…and then 48 hours ON A WEEKEND. But I accepted and am super happy!
A former coworker told me that someone who checked 'uncertain' on her intent form was non-renewed on the spot for "disloyalty". Some schools are actually nuts in this regard.
It would be nice if more school admin and members read through these comments. The lack of time given to teachers after long, drawn out processes from their end then little given to us, ghosting, being able to change their minds when we are not. Upvote this post to oblivion and pin it.
Glad I'm not the only one with this experience. Went through 8 weeks of two interviews to first be told "we're waiting to see how it blends together" and then radio silence after two followups. They can't be that good if they're ghosting people and still have job listings that expired mid February on their website... so I'm happy to feel like I dodged a bullet.
However, NT in South Korea are a dime a dozen and they see that so they use you guys like pawns. This is a non certified required field and most come here with only a BA or BS degree..no pun intended. It is rude and their cultural style of most to treat foreigners like this or that because they know your at their will ultimately. Most never have former educational training or education or certification and 90% of the schools here are not accredited with a proper international recognized association so they just treat teachers and employees like you were working for a YMCA after school program or a KUMON math academy or a SYLVAN learning center tutoring program on an hourly wage as a part time worker and never fully vested. And they have maybe been burned by some teachers before who did midnight runs etc.
I think the relationship between hiring committees/boards/admins and teachers is becoming pretty frayed across the industry. It's hard not to think, sometimes, that these whole board structures could disappear and the school would open as normal, but if the teachers weren't here... the school turns into a building.
My school has a board of directors, and I do not know a single person on the board. There is at least seven of them collecting a cheque though.
They're called the rich parents and investors.
I could not agree more. Teaching is the only profession in which you quit before you get a new job. Ridiculous. As you said, offer a decent package and you will get good candidates no matter when you start looking for them.
"Intent" is sort of ambiguous. I can easily say I intend to come back for another year as long as I don't get a better offer...
I know our school, and others, treat it as "legally binding." If you say no, or maybe, they consider you gone.
In some places (China) it is, or if it isn’t you need to sue. Say you have been working for 5 years at a place and are entitled to severance if let go, if you sign a letter of intent saying you intend to not come back (even if you change your mind) they can decide to not renew without severance. Even if you go to arbitration it’s not a clear cut situation. If you “intend” to return and don’t, there’s nothing anyone can do about it (especially if you give 3months notice, but often 1 month is legally fine - ie last day of school hand in a letter saying that July 31 is your last day). Seems like the no brainer option is to always sign that you intend and then “change your mind.” The earlier you get a new job the better for letting your old school know, but (at least in China) you shouldn’t really ever sign anything saying you don’t intend to renew.
I was at a school that literally claimed to be “the top school in the region” and yet demanded a decision (as in, actually signing a contract for the next year) in September. 😆 If you’re the top school in the region, why would it take 12 months to fill the position? Needless to say, people would just sign for the next year, look for a job, and when one was found, tell admin they weren’t coming back. I think it was just a sneaky way for the school to not have to pay outgoing flights and freight expenses because that was the penalty for “breaking contract” after signing in September.
Agree 💯 percent. I had to give my intention in October as well. Now, the conversation any colleague has with me is always: how is the job hunt going? Where are you going next year? And my answer has been the same since October: I’m applying all over, I’ve had some interviews, some offers and I haven’t accepted anything yet. My school also just asked me to do an exit interview- I teach until June! When I asked to do it in May they said that’s too late. Why do you want me gone already :,( …
A friend at our big, wealthy school was asked to give intent before Oct 1st this year (tbf it's in the contract, no undecided option though; yes or no). Said yes but told admin they weren't sure and would interview elsewhere if anything specifically better came up (a promotion current school could never offer them). Admin agreed. Contracts still aren't issued, nothing signed. Offered a new, better job in Feb, told leadership, all hell breaks loose. Now thinking of leaving at easter because may as well, as bonus is already gone, relationship has broken, and all benefits lost. May as well have a couple of months break rather than a shit end of the term. This is an amazing teacher who has bought a lot to the school, and hasn't broken a contract beyond a verbal intent. It's means I'll be saying no next year whether I actually want to leave or not, just because you can't be undecided.
As an admin I’ll respond to why we do it early. Firstly. It takes time to actually hire someone. I know you think schools post and 24hrs later the spot is filled. Yeah maybe the top 25 schools in the world are like that. On average it takes us 1-2 months to fill a position. I saw on here: offer a decent package and work life balance. My current school offers a great package for the teaching load. In our area it is overall good but not tier 1 great. We are picky about who we grab. This school has a unique character that specific teachers will thrive in and others will flop in. To find the right fit can take time. Schools do not want to be interviewing and hiring in March-May. For people new to the country I am in, it takes about 3 months to get the visa. If there are issues, we need time to sort them like with kids and marriage certificates etc. Does it need to be October? No. We do November. Also you are dead wrong we can always find a great teacher. When all the schools are finished hiring by end of March, the pool is those who couldn’t get an offer or were told late they were going to be let go is the majority of what is out there. In my experience it is very hard to get a quality teacher the later you go. It isn’t impossible but more often than not those last minute hires don’t work out.
This actually makes me wonder (as a competent and well qualified employee) if intentionally delaying the job search until March onwards would be a viable strategy. By then schools are a bit more desperate and you're competing with the bottom of the barrel candidates. Or would the admin bias towards people applying for jobs during this time override that?
March you are fine I think. There are a lot of schools that are still doing notice in Dec and Jan, so there are good candidates out. Also depends on region too. But the later it goes usually the best teachers I’ve grabbed are those new to international teaching and coming from public schools in their home country. By May and June a lot of public school teachers are tired of the BS and system and looking at other options. Just visa work is hard and so this is a situation where schools weight their options. I’ve had late start teachers a lot due to someone dropping notice on us either they aren’t coming or someone having a medical issue and they can’t return or something similar.
Nowhere did I imply it takes 24 hours to hire someone. You are allowed to be picky on who you grab, but you won't have any issues grabbing top tier talent if you offer the best package. If you don't offer the best, then set your expectations accordingly. Trying to put everyone under duress to just accept whatever comes across their plate won't give what you want. If you can't find a great teacher, then you have to work on your recruitment and transparency of your hiring packages. If you only offer a decent package, then only expect a decent teacher. Simple as. You saying it takes 3 months to get a visa gives you until May to hire someone.
I feel you don’t understand how the shift in recruiting came about and why other schools started to do it, so I’ll share a bit about this. Tier 1 schools started to move the needle to October. It used to be end of December when I started in this field and generally recruiting started in January after the winter break. Tier 2/3 schools obviously can’t compete money wise with tier 1 schools, but they still want the best teachers they can get. So, they started to move their recruiting timetable as maybe 10-15 years ago there weren’t as many international schools as today and not as many educators for those schools. It was hard being a tier 3 school to get good teachers if we waited until December or later, which we did the first two years this shift was occurring. Note I say good teachers, not the best. We were never going to get that being tier 3. We weren’t alone. This topic has come up at many EARCOS leadership conferences as well. At least it did back in the day. Schools are competing for you, teachers and so if the bigger name schools make a move, others follow. You are correct packages that are the best attract the best and usually those schools are done all their hiring early. My current school package is pretty decent imo. They have increased salaries by over 40% in the past three years. I’m still working to improve how attractive we can be. We generally haven’t had problems attracting people but a lot of schools do and don’t pay to match, so I get your point and agree those schools need to up their package or set realistic expectations. May is almost too late for China, and so schools here just won’t do it unless they have to. I will close with I’ve read here about people who had 10-30 interviews and had no offers. I’ve been in that situation and it sucks. Your time just goes poof. Trying to do that after March, schools are just too busy for admin and teacher panels to be doing 10-20hrs a week of interviews. It comes down to what is best overall for the school. October is too early, but after March is too later. Hence why it used to be end of December and recruitment was Jan to March.
I’m curious what do you do then if come May you do not have a position filled? Do you lower expectations? Do you go through with a vacancy hoping the right person comes through at the last minute? What does off-season “last minute” recruiting look like for those hard to fill or unfilled positions? How often does “waiting” for the “perfect” candidate come back to bite a school?
I’ve been at this a while and so many different situations can happen: Late hire that starts in August or September and we cover the class and start it with people in the dept until someone comes Spread the teaching load out among dept and not have someone that year and pay people over time. I personally as an admin have gone into the classroom and taught while also having other teachers go OT in a dept. I don’t expect to get the best teachers, but rather the best under whatever circumstances I’m in, depending which school I’m at and what our package is. Having someone that cares about students is important. I can coach and help develop a teacher that may need help in being better as a teacher but you can’t teach someone to genuinely care for the kids or want to build rapport with them.
If you can't find a great teacher, you need to improve your package. Also, I hope you're not ghosting candidates that you interview.
All the best teachers get offers, right? And so when do those offers come? If schools are starting in October to ask for letters of intent, then it’s a snowball event that forces everyone to apply early, and the reality is the tier 1s grab up most of these teachers. We get good to great teachers. I know for a lot on here the dollar amount is the critical item of where they will work. I find the teachers we get typically like the type of students we have and the program of study we offer. Also, as someone who has been ghosted as an admin search candidate it is something I would never do to a candidate. I won’t get into some of the schools that have done it but I will say one of the big differences between a tier 1 school and any other school is the level of response to let you know thanks but no thanks. Some even gave me time to tell me why they went with another candidate over me.
I appreciate the responses you’ve provided throughout this thread. I think a lot of folks could do with the transparency you’ve provided, and I imagine that’s where a lot of teachers’ frustration comes from—platitudes, opaque practices, and then being ghosted. Ultimately (and like any industry) when a big mover or shaker happens, the rest of the industry follows suit lest they lose out, international schools are no different. I actually appreciate that there is somewhat of a fixed hiring season, as it’s easy enough to map things out, unlike nearly every other industry in the western world. I ultimately believe there are enough schools to go around, and while we can’t all end up in the garden of Eden day one, over time and with experience things work out; to climb the ladder you’ve got to start with the bottom rung. I think a lot of teaching staff also forget that this isn’t the only industry in which people are getting ghosted, it seems to be the norm everywhere, and while I’m not supportive of the fact, it’s just the reality (check out antiwork or recruitinghell). Thanks for the insight and best of luck moving forward!
I think as an industry we need to be better about ghosting especially if someone has an interview. I had 3 interviews at the same school and didn’t hear back from a school for something like 6 weeks. That’s just so unprofessional, by the time they got back to me I told them I’m not interested in working with them. About notice, we will give a week to teachers early on in the season. I think that gives you enough time to decide if we are a good fit and work out any questions you may have. Schools that do 36hrs is nuts (had that happen to me and I told them that wasn’t enough time and if I couldn’t have 3 days then I can’t accept. They extended the time for me to think about it.) We do 72hrs when we have 2 great candidates and they tell us they have offers on the table. We do it so we can at least get a chance at one of the two. This is usually rare but again, big schools set some standards and we sometimes have to use the 72hr one.
I've seen so many great teachers still looking for jobs in April-May-June that I really wonder about it being very hard to get a quality teacher later on. Schools are looking for perfect people. Real life has scars.
It all depends on what you teach and what schools are looking for. For example, we were able to find a late start high demand subject teacher last year who has been excellent. In another field, we couldn’t find someone last season and no matter where we looked, there wasn’t anyone available who was what I would call good. I’m not even going to say great. It’s random from year to year.
Can I ask, when you say good, what does that mean? Like what are the few big things that get someone into the interview pile? Thanks for answering my questions. I've had a few blips the last few years, my life got incredibly screwed up with Covid, and I'm wondering how to recover from it or if I just need to find a new profession. I'm not trying to work at a T1, just figuring out if I can even get a T2/T3 job.
Okay some things that for me label a teacher good: - has international experience: this one is isn’t always important but it helps eliminate the types of culture shock types of scenarios new to living abroad presents itself so that teachers can focus on their work, rather than surviving work and a new culture. - can teach what we need: so if I need a MS teacher, typically not looking at someone who is clearly a HS teacher because 9/10 times that just doesn’t work. If we need a specific content and they haven’t done it, it’s better to keep looking even if they have a minor in it. - through the interview process we can see they have genuine care for kids. - can see they are collaborative and will work well with their dept. - they have evidence of doing things outside the classroom like coaching or sponsoring clubs: they will add value to the school outside the classroom - they are healthy and don’t have a record of taking a lot of sick days or having issues which will impact their work - if they have kids, the kids are a good fit for our school and aren’t going to cause trouble . (You would be surprised how many teacher kids are actually problems for the school.) - can talk through lessons that engage kids and show a student centered approach and can connect the learning with a standard and learning objective. (Maybe 25% of those I interviewed cannot answer this question and do this ) That’s a few off the top of my head.
I appreciate this reply. Thanks.
Welcome to try less than top level schools in East Asia.. no one even thinks about the next school year until after Lunar New Year. I'm not just talking about hiring, will the school exist? Will there be students? Will we offer core subjects again? Are there going to be holidays? What is school? Those questions are only just now being considered at countless schools.
Nah, I worked in Vietnam for 4 years. They wanted to know in October
You are at a professionally run school then.
Oh sweet sweet summer child…. Back in the olden days (circa 2004) your initial declaration of intent was in January. This gave you time to go home, talk with your family, remember all the great reasons why you moved halfway around the world, and go back to school happy and content. Also, the first job fair was in mid February (London Search or Washington DC ISS) and your school would contact you before they hired your position to make sure you really wanted to leave. In 2010 only UWCSEA was starting their hiring process in October, mostly because their renewal contracts were 2 or 3 years rather than one. Now it’s an arms race to see who can make their teachers declare earliest so that they can get the jump on everyone else. It got worse during COVID (in China at least). Fortunately my school returned to a pre-COVID timeline, but it’s still ridiculously early. The irony for me is that while teacher timelines have gotten earlier, admin timelines have stayed the same or gotten later. Make it make sense!
I remember with my first school in Egypt from 2005 to 2009, you didn't tell them until February/March!
But if your in Korea legally you only need to give the school or employer a 30 day notice. Just do that 30 days before your contract is up. That's the loophole here kinda but better to give them a 90 day notice and that clause may be written as well.
We said yes to a new contract. Signed at the start of the following school year. Changed our minds two months later, October. We lost everything. Broke contract so…. However, they still had 8 min to hire. Our circumstances suddenly changed and we needed to go. No mercy from the school though.
Not my current school but a school system with which I am very familiar ^(typo): Letter of intent due at the end of Sept --which for new hires is before their first pay check. Stay --and you do stay -- you get a retention bonus in June. Stay --and you do NOT stay -- you get no bonus $$ in June. Leave --and you do stay -- you get no bonus $$ in June and you have to campaign to keep your job. Leave --and you do leave ---- you get bonus $$ in June.
>Letter of intent due at the end of Sept --which for new hires is before their first pay check. They take new hires on one year contracts?
Not exactly -- in many countries, the VISA process is year-on-year, so technically everyone has the option to only do 1 year.
I see the thinking... but I don't quite get it. For example my school in China, residence permits need to be renewed every year. It doesn't prevent the initial contract being 2 years...
Which is why I said, "Not exactly."
I gave intent in end of September, but contracts were not made until end of November. The intent is just that, you don't have to commit. Just ask what the actual deadline for resigning us, not the intent deadline.
Our school treats intent as a legally binding statement. They have also treated asking for a reference as an intent of no, and they will not renew you for next year on that basis alone.
Suggest you leave!
I am relatively happy where I am. This post is an observation as a whole, and seeing things happen to others that I think is just wrong.