I believe Central America has a number of 'environmentally aware' schools. Cloud Forest School in Costa Rica, for example.

This thread's a couple years old- Any recent info about working at GEMS World Academy-Dubai? How's the work/life balance for teachers, overall atmosphere? (in the Middle and High School) How’s the housing? And do you need a car in this area of Dubai (Al Barsha South)?

Any thoughts at all would be appreciated. Thanks very much.

Definitely pay your annual fees. I'm not from Ontario but had colleagues who were and they always paid their annual fees as they planned to return. I never thought I'd return to my home country, so stopped paying my fees. Well, I did return, and let me tell you, it was a huge hassle (paperwork, more paperwork, and alot of $$) getting my certification re-instated. So yes, pay the money. I will say, though, that the int'l schools I worked at never checked if I kept my certification current.

AnneBar,

I don't have direct experience teaching in Cape Town or Jo'burg; however I did teach at an international school nearby in the region. I travelled extensively (backpacker-style) throughout S.Africa including Cape Town and Jo'burg. While there is loads of very interesting things to see and do within the country, the thing you need to be fully aware of is the crime and racism. It's ever-present and always talked about. There's a reason why there's so many South African teachers now living in the UK and Australia.

The students I taught (mostly wealthy locals) were lovely and really enjoyed going to school, but there was an uncomfortable undercurrent of racism among the staff. Having said all this, if I had to choose between teaching in Cape Town and Jo'burg, Cape Town would win hands down.

Thanks very much junglegym for that info. And I agree with you, chilagringa, Queretaro looks like a great place.

junglegym: Ideally I would be interested in the elementary school; however, they don't seem to have any specific openings listed on their website anyway. I was a bit worried about it being more for local students as opposed to a 'true' international school. I've heard wealthy Mexican kids, especially in the higher grades, can be a bit spoilt and unmotivated??
Do you have any ideas as to the class sizes? And lastly, do you need a car there to get around the city itself or is public transport an option?
Thanks again for all the info- much appreciated.

Does anyone have any recent information about this school in Mexico? I'm looking for any info regarding school reputation, working conditions at the school, the students, housing, safety and life in general in Queretaro.
Thanks very much in advance.

BookshelfAmy- can I ask how you made your 'web resume'- is it public or private? Do you use a free blog hosting provider? I've looked into making one but got overwhelmed by all the choices and the fact that so many of them seem to be public...

Any current news about this school? The reviews I found seem to be very mixed.

Glerky: do you use a specific company to ship your goods? I've also done the nightmare shopping trips to IKEA- sans car and carrying it on public transport is not fun.

I'd also like to mention that when joining a new school, try to contact staff who are leaving and see if you can buy some stuff off of them. I bought various large furniture from departing staff, so it was already moved into my flat when I arrived in the country. They just emailed me photos and prices and it was all quite straightforward. Very convenient if you know you're going to have a flat available but it is unfurnished/minimally furnished.

In terms of flight and shipping allowance, I've had to pay for it myself at all of my schools, and then I got reimbursed after showing receipts- about 1-3 weeks later, depending on how organized the school was. So you definitely need a chunk of change to get you by the first three months or so.

In terms of shipping, most schools have encouraged me to go the 'extra baggage fee' route as opposed to shipping. They says it's easier (it's not imo) and you're less likely to lose things. I have also used the good old-fashioned regular national post office (cheapest method- surface mail) to ship my non-urgent school supply stuff (posters, etc...). I just wrap it in brown paper and then wrap the crap out of it in clear packing tape so it's 'waterproof' and fairly indestructible. Then, depending on the country, it can take between a month - three months to arrive. I've mailed big packages this way over 5 times in various continents and the only time something didn't arrive, was when mailed from Western Europe, of all places. Of course I 'misplaced' (aka-lost) my receipt so wasn't able to track it's whereabouts...

While I don't know anyone personally who has worked there, I have only ever heard good things about the school in recent years.

I did visit the school about 5 years ago when I attended a workshop there. As I recall, it's a really big, fairly new campus but located quite far outside the city center. Taking a taxi into the center of the city took between 30-40 minutes. I believe there is a high proportion of wealthy Romanian students who attend the school.

Bucharest itself was, errr, interesting. Nutty traffic, a wide variety of interesting architecture downtown. Seems like a place someone would either love or hate. Romania had just, or was just about to join the EU when I was there so there seemed to be loads of building/construction and general improvement projects going on at the time.

Looking for any recent information regarding working at this school and life there in general. I am aware that salaries in Italy tend to be low.

The campus seems to be located 10 km outside of Turin (in a town called Chieri), so is having a car necessary?

Thanks in advance to any and all replies.

I'm wondering if anyone out there has experience or knowledge about working in the 'international' section of a public/state Dutch school.

It seems many Dutch schools have these smaller international schools connected to them (for example Intl Sch of Almere, Arnhem Intl Sch, etc)and I'm wondering how similar (or dissimilar) the working conditions or atmosphere is to a regular international school. Do they offer your typical expat packages (a flight at least?) or are you essentially working as a 'local hire'? I've checked out the specific websites and there isn't much information given in any vacancies in terms of the hiring of foreign teachers.

Thanks very much for any information.

At all the international schools I've worked at, all the language teachers were native speakers. Even in remote schools, the French teachers were always from France.

Great question.

My one big misconception (or perhaps it was more a 'hope') was that I would be able to pick up the local language just by living there and without having to take classes. Once there, I quickly realized that teaching in an English speaking environment and socializing mainly with English-speaking expats wasn't getting me any closer to learning the local language. I am not a language person and have always struggled learning them, and have been in awe of some of my colleagues who seem to pick it up so easily.

Going about your day to day life shopping and all that, I found it much easier to read the local languages just by visually seeing it, but in terms of conversation- specifically listening, I really struggled. I've had to come to terms with the fact that I have to take classes, a fact that I resisted for two countries but now accept.

Thanks for the references info- that helps alot and seems straighforward enough.

I left international teaching simply because I felt the need to 'settle' down in my home country- is that allowed? Sorry, no secrets, Psyguy. But it's been next to impossible to get back into the public teaching system here as jobs are so scarce (my teaching area is Art) and I've also found my overseas experience isn't really recognized/valued. But I did enjoy international teaching, so look forward to hopefully getting back into it.