Shortage list subjects are not on general tier 2 and won't have to meet the minimum salary requirement.

Visas will be a barrier unless you are in a shortage subject as new rules mean that you must make a minimum of 35,000 to qualify for tier 2 genral visas starting next year, and unless you are HOD will not be able to reach that threshold.

Lots of Australian, South African, Canadian teachers about because of visas they are eligible for.

It is tough, less prep/plan time and often more grade levels to teach. The national curriculum has just changed, as has how work has to be graded and not a lot of guidance has come out. You spend ages on exam prep. Ofstead pressure is high, you pretty much have to ignore it I think to manage. We've been expecting a visit for a while, but it's not happened yet. I'm in from about 7 to 5 and still don't do everything Ofstead would look for and with already spending such a long time there I can't care anymore beyond that. I have to leave and have at least 6 to 10 to myself.

Use an agency, they will know the schools likely to be able to sponsor applicants. You will pay a lot to move though and it will all be out of pocket. I had about 5000 in visa fees, plane tickets, and settling in costs for my move this summer.

Arizona is a place that has enough difficulty getting teachers that you would likely be able to get sponsorship to come and work in a public school.

But, the reason they have a hard time is they get the least per pupil funding in the country, so pay is correspondingly low.

Recent articles state they have taken to recruiting in the Philippines, so perhaps check into Arizona and state schools?

Can I inquire of others if being a non-native speaker of a second language will be a barrier to the poster? Would international schools be more likely to go ahead an hire a Spanish speaking person for these hypothetical roles?

Could you share what your responsibilities are with your 300 students? Are you teaching virtual sessions, calling, e-mailing, grading? Creating assignments or differentiating? Just curious. Are you paid per student or a salary?

Check in with TimePlan, a recruiting agency. I have had an e-mail about some principals coming to the US soon to do interviews in a few major cities. It may be a good opportunity to get that face-to-face for a school.

I think you'll easily find a math position and be able to not fret much over the quality of schools. I think some remote areas need to recruit because they don't have the population locally to fill all roles, it can depend otherwise. My former school has good Ofstead reports, but not many applications and they aren't sure why.

For a one off lesson they'd tell you what to prepare ahead of time. For example I had a 1 hour lesson on a GCSE topic for year 10 at one school and 15 minutes on subject specific terminology with year 7 at another.

Quality varies greatly, as others have noted, and it may be very hard to tell without a visit to the school. I was lucky when I interviewed several years ago to have back to back interviews, one on each side of the city, and the visit told me everything I needed to know about where I wanted to work. Teaching a one off lesson is common as part of the interview, and with a whole host of upper management in the room, at the school I later declined an offer from, students were chatting and not getting on with anything. No one spoke to me from the staff and I was made to wait, for someone who later never turned up, in the lobby for ages. Fast forward to the second school, the entire department made sure to stop by the staff room to greet me and the behavior was good in the short lesson I taught, while not being obviously all the best students.

I'll echo that there will be a range of behavior. I had classes I adored whose worst behavior was getting loud because of over enthusiasm, and classes that were fairly openly hostile to me attempting to get work done. If your wife can get a visa you can be much more choosy about where you will go because you won't have to worry about sponsorship. I can't speak to the experience in independent schools at all. Seeking out some info from current teachers about managements response to behavior can be a good indicator of how you will fare in that area. You will probably end up with a big range of grade levels to teach, and unlike the US schools I have been in, no guaranteed planning each day, more like 3 per week, plus the pastoral care part of being a form tutor.

What subject area are you in? What area are you interested in?

Check with your agency and be sure about the breaks. I'm fairly certain they will mean no income, but they could have some scheme in place to even out those times. If you worked the 190 days at 110 a day you'd have 20900, which was more than my salary my first year, but I lived in a cheaper area. You could probably find shared accommodation for less than 500-600, but you'll have to look carefully and maybe not in St Albans (I know nothing about the cost of living there). You may have to scale back travel plans, but there is really so much to do in and around London, and lots of it free, that you can have a great experience without travelling every single break to the continent. (I only went twice during the first year, one small 4 day trip and a longer 10 day). The pub culture really is great, and if you are at a school with behavior issues you'll likely find lots of staff headed out to show you the best ones. I found that the school with poor behavior meant lots of bonding between staff, while my school with better behavior was very pleasant, but didn't do a lot together outside of school. Your mileage may vary :)

Also see if your agency will put you in touch with other people who are coming to your school or area for when you need someone to commiserate with about whatever thing is bothering you about England. And figure out asap once you get to the school who really knows their stuff and is the best person to ask for help.

There are definitely good career building aspects to UK curriculum you'll open your marketability to British International Schools who continue to use British curriculum. If you do decide on the UK, be sure to study up on the exam board your school will be using for GCSEs and A-Levels before you go, plus check out the TES resources that are available on the site that other teachers have made. See if the school will send you the schemes of work ahead of time so you can plan some units and create power points ahead of time while you aren't in the midst of jet lag and culture shock.

Oh my goodness, yes to behaviour issues. I was seriously shocked by how poorly behaved students were, especially for new teachers. I was working with two other new teachers in a suburb of a small city, and we all struggled immensely. Students would act completely crazily for us, and just be normal and reasonable for veteran teachers. You really must establish those routines, check out Tom Bennett's behavior blog on the TES for some ideas. It will really depend on the school as to whether you get much support at all. Some think its completely your issue to deal with, others will have behavior plans in place.

It sounds like you really want to be in England, and it is difficult to pass up an opportunity when you are not always sure it will come up again. (The immigration routes have become very narrow and they weren't letting in anyone who wasn't a Physics or Maths teacher. I know there is some possibilities otherwise, but much more difficult in than in the past.) I would just echo shadowjack's expense concerns. It is very expensive. Using public transport to commute to work each day is another expense to add, or paying your fair share of a carpool. I didn't realize how poor the pay was until after I left, and it was my first job, so I had never experienced a salary to compare it to. In the end, if you are willing to go the ME anyway after your time in England, then perhaps going from living on less, to getting more is the better route than scaling back after having more. And you can perhaps then do better than ADEC and hope for better behavior.

Be careful with planning for the holiday time where pay won't be coming if you are being paid by the day vs a salary. The frequent 1 and 2 week breaks mean a loss of income every two months or so. 'm not sure your take home will be quite that high because of those term and half term breaks. And you may find much cheaper rents by staying nearer Luton, in addition to spending less time and money commuting.

I found UK-Yankee forums to be very helpful. I know you are Canadian, but there are few of those about as well. The threads aren't all that active anymore, but you can get ideas on making the transition. Best of luck in whichever route you decide!

What is the compensation through Impact like? Are you working full time in a school or doing supply work? Do you know which area you will work in and if you will be paid on the qualified or unqualified scales? If your main goal is travel the UK will be closer, but depending on pay scales combined with rent and other living costs you might have more money to travel on by going with ADEC. My first year working the UK my salary was pretty low and housing can eat up a lot of the income.

You can use: http://www.worksmart.org.uk/tools/tax_calc.php to calculate take home pay in the UK. And you can get an idea of rental costs via gumtree or rightmove.

Do be sure that they look into some of the blogs by women living there - I found helpful when researching Susie of Arabia, The Blue Abaya and Foreign Girl. The first two are westerns married to Saudi men and the last is the stay at home wife in an expat couple. I find the second two more straight forward for differences and addressing issues in a helpful way. There are others of course, I found some defunct ones that still had useful info.

I think that because you know exactly what you are up against you can mentally prepare for those big things like abaya's, prayer times, not driving, etc. You know, at least intellectually, what you are up against.

Thank you psyguy, that is very helpful!