Hi all,

My girlfriend is a local Chinese who works in a firm. Her salary is not the greatest (around 3000 rmb, or 600 Canadian).

The main reason my girlfriend wants to go back to Canada to study is because she wants a better paying job. if she obtains a Canadian international business degree, and comes back to China to work, her salary increases drastically (from 2000 rmb, to 30 000). Her way into Canada's post secondary education system would be through marriage with me, which essentially grants her all there rights of Canadian citizen if I am not mistaken.

I am a bit conflicted, because I don't know what I should study (or if I should even study at all) when my gal and I return back to Canadian tundra. Here is my rough plan right now:
1) Get four years international teaching experience, while my girlfriend also builds experience in her field of work. I am currently employed at a tier 2 (or some would argue tier three) international school.
2) Study a masters degree in educational assessment, "because I like it"
or
2.1) study an undergraduate degree in biology and chemistry " ".

According to BC I can teach K-12, but in Ontario I can teach English and Chinese (haha). In other words, I only did post secondary training in Chinese and English (these two subjects are my teachables). Since I plan to work in China for a very long time, I don't think having Chinese as a teachable is very useful to me. My rational for doing another undergraduate degree is to hopefully open more subjects for me to teach. I may have the opportunity to teach some science courses at my school...

The turnover at my school is pretty high (about 25%), and because the school is not top tier, I would be given a chance to teach subjects outside of my areas of expertise. There is a chance I could teach chemistry, biology, or even a coding class next year. Would you recommend I take the opportunity to gain some experience teaching in these subjects before I go back to school to receive a "scroll to teach science?"

I do have experience teaching science from both of my practicums, and I also ran summer camps through a program called DiscoverE, a STEM advocate.

I should also note: I would be able to complete a bachelor of science degree in two years through the after degree program at the University of Alberta.

Please share your advice and wisdom, helpful ones!

Be well!

PsyGuy wrote:
> It depends what you mean by a zero. Can you issue a zero as in a circle
> around the square in the grade book, sure. A permanent zero, no. You cant
> really issue a zero. If you do it will eventually be changed, either the
> student will have a right to makeup work, or submit extra credit, or
> retest. Parents will get something worked out with the admin. Its not
> uncommon for an admin at mid tier and lower tier schools for an admin to
> just tell you to change a grade. Even then you dont control the transcript.
> A couple years from your grade, the admin at the time can put whatever they
> want on the transcript.

I've issued "permanent zeros" before, without receiving any heat from admin. I justified it with my professional judgement.

My school's policy is this: zeros go into the grade book at the end of the year (or term).

PsyGuy wrote:
> @klooste
>
> Legally yes, but they can give you local policy that doesnt cover much of
> anything.


My advice, then, would be to research the insurance company before you sign the contract.

I went under the knife in China, and everything was covered by the insurance company. I am actually quite pleased with Maple Leaf's medical insurance (MSH-China) and the Chinese hospital I visited. I love China though, so I'm probably biased! =D

Taiwan is a paradise. I studied Mandarin there for 8 months, and despite being forced to write Chinese characters with my right hand (I'm a lefty, btw), I still fell in love with the city.

It rains a lot, but it honestly helps keeps everything fresh and lustful. It gets grossly hot at times, but then it'll rain cats and dogs to cool everything down. I used to wear sandals on purpose just to feel the water on my toes during a rain storm!

I think you'd have a good time there. I could give you more information on Taiwan if you'd like, but I think I'll share what I know in public if thats ok? Just to appeal to other's curiosity cogs (please don't judge my grammar, or writing, as some of you know I teach English, but I drank way too much cha (tea) at my girlfriends family reunnion, and the odd leaves have kept me awake it seems):

Hit up Shi da night market (??????its a great place to get some cheap munchies, or even a nice Albertan grilled steak (licks lips).
YOU MUST MUST MUST visit Hualian ???? during a not so hot season (maybe fall)? Its beautiful! Ever wanted to wake up see a mountain in your backyard with perfectly groomed grasses, and natural palm trees in the distance? Oh, and you can also walk into a cave which has a waterfall entrance. The water will touch you gently, and make your neck prickle, like a sweet kiss from nature!

Then, when you're in beach mode, you should head down south to feel the warm sand beneath your toes. The rain isn't so bad in the south, and everything is still so green.

Taipei is super developed. Missed your train? No worries, the next one will arrive in 1 minute! Want to sit a bus? Sure, but be ready to ride in comfort.

Taiwan is basically a clean China, with a better writing system in my opinion (traditional Chinese for the win)! Its also a romantic city I think.. so if you're going single, be prepared to.. .well you know, I'll try to keep this post somewhat professional! I met my second most important woman in my life, next to my mother, in Taiwan.

So, what are you waiting for? Sign that contract, and go, you won't regret it! =D

I'm going to bring 50. With ten of them stapled in the right corner (might impress a left handed recruiter) =D

All about presenting yourself, right? Don't forget to dress to impress (but we should already be doing that everyday, as professionals, right)?

I'm going to challenge SJ for once, lets hope I'm not wrong...

you don't need to teach in Alberta to get perm teaching certification....

if yo can somehow land a job at the Canadian international school in Macau, or some other places which use Alberta curriculum, or you check the alberta education website for certified schools abroad, then you can use that experience towards your perm.

Some schools (or at least my school in particular) required me to have BC certification, no questions. My Alberta cert was pretty much toilet paper to them.

Just my 2 cents.

If you're headed to China, then the school must legally give you health insurance.

My health insurance is pretty awesome! I've had surgery in China, was put up in a VIP room. the Chinese don't believe in pain killers, or sedation though... so I got to see the doc go inside me.

Nonetheless: 600 000 rmb was covered. Didn't pay a single penny (cent)!

??

>
> Sounds like you need to do your two years and get to another school.
>
> just my 2 cents,
>
> shad

My plan exactly, but the question is can I get into a decent international school (IB even) with two years xp at a second tierish international school?

I do teach at my school as well, in that I try to foster a student entered approach to learning in my classroom when I'm not plunking tests.

If I can't find another "mill," I'll be forced to keep sawing my current lumber! Though I can "carve" a very very fine test, let me tell ya! ;)

Interesting banter from both sides; I love when I get a discussion going in my classroom, and now I've sparked one on a forum!

Sid: you make very valid points about standardization. I am not disagreeing with you, but I think another important point has been raised: it depends on how one applies standardization.

Would I be too much of a bother to give details about how my school approaches standardization (at least in my department)? Now I'm starting to sweat because my boss may see this post... I should probably change my forum name here soon! Oh well, here it goes:

Basically, my school teaches to the provincial exam (diploma exams, SATS, or what ever else you may call it), and our students score pretty damn high (at least in math and science). In English, however, our students score 54% average on the final exam, but thats because our students are mostly English second language learners. We just plop a test in front of our students every week, mark 10 mistakes (as mandated by the standardization of my department), slap a grade on it, and move on to the next paper. It gets tiring after awhile when you are marking hundreds of essays written in a second language. its also very tiring to handout and mark assignments that you don't enjoy yourself.

I feel like the school has got the magic formula: pass the kids through the system, so they can go abroad to different universities. Are the students getting a decent education? I don't know. Would I put my son or daughter in my own school? Absolutely not. I want a school that encourages creativity.

I guess what I'm asking is this: are most international schools follow this approach? Do you top dogs, in tier 1 places, teach to the test in order for your students to be successful? Is it absolutely imperative to follow this "magic formula (as coined above)in order to pass ESL kids in an international school?

appreciate your comments!

Thanks everyone for your insights. 25% turnover doesn't seem too bad then!

Hi all!

Thank you again for taking the time to twirl my curiosity!

My school is extremely standardized (or at least in the department I work in). Every teacher must give the same summative assessments, no exceptions. We are allowed to teach however we want to teach, and do any activities we choose (though there are suggested activities on the unit plans and such), but the summatives must stay. Sometimes I give my kids five summatives a week, or I'm giving them two tests in one class. We structure our bigger summatives on Friday, so teachers can mark it over the weekend.

May I also mention the category weights, colours, and names (all to the very hypen, colon, and capital letter) all need to be the same in our gradebooks? My school is extremely academic (I think)? Or is standardization a common practise in international teaching?

Thanks in advance

Got my degree and certification, employer was impressed with STEM experience as a summer camp instructor, so I got hired fresh out of uni. 0 classroom teaching experience.
1st position: Hired in June, 2014.

Why not?

I appreciate your concern for my privacy, but I really don't think there is a need:

I've changed my private information (location, names, addresses all) to xxx xxx to denote kisses and hugs!

if you have a Facebook, the world already knows who you are anyway. Well not the world, but those creepy hackers that would use the x_x symbol to represent death.

So in sum, I don't think one should feel uncomfortable asking for resume critiques especially if my private information has already been changed.

Just my 0.02 Rmb!

Hi all!

Thank you advance for taking the time to give me advice in regards to my question.

I currently work at a very large international school that employs 100 certified teachers. I'm just curious: what should one expect for turnover? I know there are a variety of reasons for turnover rates (pollution, etc), but are there schools that have high turnover rates because of the school itself?

I think my school has employed approximately 25 new staff members this year, so I guess you could safely say that 25% of the staff are new to the school. Experiences vary, of course, some teachers are fresh from university, others have previous teaching experiences. I was one of the lucky ones to be hired without any classroom teaching experience.

Please let me know what you think, and if there are any statistics on the internet that illustrate international school turnover rates, then please post it below.

Thank you again for your insights!