Observations from Australia

[PsyGuy]

Happy to be back and to have caught my breath. I just wanted to come back with some admin Point of View observation from the Australia Search Fair.

First, the market is getting bigger. I was really expecting the Austrlia Search fair to be slow and quit and well SMALL. It really wasnt. Im not saying it was as big as BK, though (havent gotten to touch base with our principals that went yet) but from previous years the global economy and recession is really growing the teacher candidate pool. I think Cambridge is going to be REALLY big, and if anyone can land a contract before then, you would be well advised to do so. I have mixed feelings this year about what part of the race Cambridge will be. A lot of schools this year are "waiting" for the 2 big fairs to sign, from what I experienced Cambridge might be the end of the race this year. Then again with so many candidates it might be the middle of the race, if schools hold out.

Second, I saw a lot of newbies, a lot of newbies, and I really believe that one of the problems as a profession we have to deal with is Teacher Training and Educational programs. I have to think thats the problem because I cant imagine what media outlets some of these teachers get their expectations from??? I kept thinking back over the interviews "did i have that kind of ego when I was starting out?". These schools (colleges/universities) really fill their students heads with very high employment expectations, especially career changers. Their really is an inflated idea of what it means to be an international teacher. A couple examples:

One really enthusiastic candidate, after wed done the Q&A list, and asked if he had any questions, on his second question asked "If we provided a signing bonus, and if he could have the check before leaving?", after telling him we didnt I asked why and his response was "my mates said they got bonuses when they were hired overseas". I asked if these were other teachers, and he said no. I told him for future reference it is uncommon for a school to provide a signing bonus, and no school i knew of could issue a check at a fair.

A really assertive candidate asked if we would help her pay her bills. She had a car loan of $400, student loans that were $1100, and credit card payments that were $250 a month. I told her we provided a standard and competitive salary and what it was, and she said "Oh I mean in addition to my pay packet" (pay packet = salary). My coworker said that "it might be difficult for her to meet her financial obligations and meet her living expenses on our salary" because I was stunned, and still processing.

My last example was an older candidate asked quickly if the school would reimburse him for the cost of attending the fair if we hired him. Now thats not unreasonable to ask and I said we provided a relocation package that may defray some of the costs. He replied curiously that hed funded the entire trip on his card, and he didnt have a way to pay it back as he was still in school. I was curious about this having read his resume, and he clarified that he wouldnt have his certificate or degree until June (which makes him an intern) and this was the curious part but his university career counselor advised him to "act in the interview as if he had graduated and had his certificate, because no one would be interested in hiring him otherwise". I said that was perhaps an error of judgement on his counselors advice, and that one of the first things a school will check if they are offering a contract is his certification, and finding none, will ask for his transcripts, and seeing he hasnt graduated will put him in an awkward position to have to explain. I then directed him to talk with his search associate as soon as possible, but for the remainder of the fair (as his resume couldnt be redone and printed) he should bring those to the schools attention first in the interview.

I dont know what the solution is to this problem. Colleges of education have a business to run, and their success within a university is dependent on enrollment and the tuition dollars it generates.

Third, is what i can only describe as "pernicious ignorance", I get the feeling and my coworker and i talked about his over lunch, and agree. That a lot of new and entry level candidates dont WANT to find out about international education, and dont want to embrace a different cultures methods and pedagogy of education. They want, expect and plan on going to whatever country and school hires them and teach 'the way they were taught'. we got that answer a lot "well thats what our instructor said" or "thats what we learned". From a university standpoint this makes sense, I suppose that you teach to the environment that your located in and for the community that is expected to be served by the college. Their are also regulatory rules that need to be observed when training and indoctrinating new teachers (so maybe an elective in "international education", fixes that problem easily enough) BUT my deeper issue is the underlying feeling that these teachers were NOT open or disposed to thinking outside the educational structures they had learned. The sense I and my coworker got was that "their way (what they learned) was the best way to teach". Now pride is one thing, but arrogance to the point of closing oneself of to other POV's and seems from the standpoint of an educator as being pernicious to ones own professional standards and expectations. How can you develop creativity and flexible learning in your students if you cant do it yourself?

So stepping off my soap box, does international education just attract the teachers with the bigger egos or do you have to have a certain level of arrogance to be perceived as having value to an international school?

Fourth, is what I can only describe as a "lack of fundamental skills". From this I dont mean lack of methodology or pedagogical training, I mean skills such as organization, preparation, etc. We had a number of candidates who didnt know what school they were interviewing for, where we were located, where Denmark is on a map or what the IB/IBO was. I mean these are things that could be googled from your phone. It would take a couple minutes. Peripheral to that my coworker brought up how "well dressed" the candidates were (and shes a woman and Im a guy so she notices those things, where as someone has to tell me) but how a number of resumes were printed on regular copy paper (that I did notice). Which brought us to discussing job search and interview skills. Now its been a while since Ive attended a career counseling session, but my experience is that universities really emphasis these, so i have to think that schools/departments of education and teaching need to really conduct their own. I have to think the generalized approach to job seeking in the corporate/private sector is different then in education (though they got the dressing for an interview right).

We saw a lot of resumes that had skills sections, objectives at the top and "References available on request" at the bottom. We also saw a lot of "inflated" job descriptions. We know your proud of your on campus position watching the education desk at your school, but to say you made coffee and unlocked the meeting room equals "Facilitated workspace collaboration with directed service interaction" sounds like BS, and it sounds like BS because it is BS. Maybe that kind of "creative license" flies in the corporate world, but not in education.
Going back to skills and experience (and my coworker feels different about this then i do). I feel that you should list your job history even with non-teaching education related experience, but you leave off the descriptions and bullet points "2010 - Retail Sales Associate, H&M - Sydney, Australia" tells me all I really need to know. My coworker thinks you should have a separate and completely education focused resume where the above position isnt even listed. What we both agree too is that you dont need to list ant accomplishments/achievements at such a position, its irrelevant if you increased your direct sales by 32%.
The one size general purpose approach to job search just doesnt work very far once in education (and probabley many fields). The second issue is the lack of sensitivity to regional and cultural standards of practice. In some countries its standard to ask for some combination of age, gender, race, marital status. In others that would be prohibited, but again a lack of organization/preparation can solve this.

Fifth, is what it means to be qualified. Many candidates we saw ignored the the position requirements. I dont know who to fault for this, maybe the schools for preaching that you should apply for every job you can, or the candidates desperation, but you cant "talk" your way into a qualification.
We have a MYP/DIP science position open and we had a number of middle school/lower secondary teacher candidates who only had a generalist certification, which might allow you to teach 6-9 science but not upper science. What they fail to understand is that no matter how good a teacher you may be our regulatory and accreditation rules would not consider you certified or qualified to teach the upper secondary/DIP level courses. This is a BIG PROBLEM. It also happens when your certified/qualified in biology but not chemistry. Being a great biology teacher may make you a good teacher overall, but unsuitable/unqualified to teach chemistry. In education, no matter where you are in the world there is a minimum standard to teach, and the accrediting agencies, education ministries determine what that is, and its not negotiable. About half our interviews were throw away interviews because the candidate wasnt qualified.
On the same note, what we heard from several other schools was the concern of what a Native English Speaker is. While different schools will have different definitions (some I agree with some I dont) if your not one of those nationalities, then dont sign up for an interview your just wasting time. There were a number of Filipino candidates who insisted they were native english speakers, and while I agree with them that they are when the school puts in ALL CAPS that ONLY nationals of USA, UK, AUS, NZ will be considered, they mean it (this one young Filipino woman was so mad, she looked like she was going to crazy murder someone).
This also applies to westerners as well however, if the position requires having valid working papers or EU citizenship, it doesnt matter how good or qualified you are, your not eligible. One guy we overheard sounded like a great candidate but the school was an all girls school in the middle east, and no matter how good he was they were only hiring woman. He actually got upset and started talking about illegal discrimination, etc. Which in some places of the world, isnt discrimination.

Really, and my coworker and I talked about this, but if you dont meet the experience, certification, degree, nationality demographic requirements why are you applying? Whats the reason, is it a misunderstanding of global labor practices, desperation, or ego (you just think your that good)???

Well thanks for the space to rant. I'll update this post later with my positives, which there were several.

[Nomadic Teacher]

That's interesting to hear PsyGuy.
Strange how so many candidates seem misguided about the whole thing!

Can you tell me if there were many Secondary Art teachers at the fair? How was the general quality of the art teachers?

Cheers!

Nomadic

[overseasvet2]

Thanks, PsyGuy, for this unique perspective. Looking forward to reading about the positives. I wonder if your experience would've been different if the fair had been primarily made up of experienced international teachers?

[PsyGuy]

@Nomad

Sorry, I cant really speak much about art positions. Except that there were some.

@overseasvet

No doubt, but since the experienced teachers were in Bangkok, I got the feeling that the Bangkok fair was the "grown up" fair, and Sydney was the "kids" fair. Really, I think Search would benefit if they had a power point presentation or something for newbies about preparation BEFORE the fair.

[mantissa]

I went to London Search fair last year and it was also flooded with newbies. I guess lack of teaching jobs in the US and Britain had to have an effect on international teachers market. My question is would a school hire an experienced teacher without international experience over less experienced teacher but with a lot of international experience?

[tgrear2008]

Pretty good information on the fair process. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't fall for most of those newbie fair mistakes. I didn't know about resumes on printer paper though. Thanks for the heads up on that.

As for researching the international experience, I've devoured any resource I could find on the web. I couldn't imagine doing it any other way. What- fly to the other side of the world with incomplete info?

So, do you have any advice for staying ahead of this increase in numbers, or will many of these people drop out and go back to their country when the economy gets better?

[lightstays]

Fabulous comments, psyguy. I think we have entered the "officially ugly phase" of globalization.

One thing that strikes me is that your time seems to have been wasted. This is not good for anyone at a hiring fair with its very foreseeable time constraints. If candidates are allowed to come through the door with qualifications that are extremely unlikely to get them a job, coupled by a skewed view of what international ed, is then Search is not doing their job. I hope it finished better than it started.

Now about that Middle School English/Humanities position you have open...

[overseasvet2]

@ Mantissa

From my experience, schools will lean towards teachers with previous successful overseas experience. This demonstrates that the person can cope with things "not being like home" and has been through the culture shock experience. The only hesitation is if the teacher has been at a big school with everything provided and then they are interested in going to a smaller school with more limited resources. It makes the school nervous that the person will be unhappy and have unrealistic expectations.

Having said this, there are other schools that seem to prefer people straight out of their home countries - perhaps because they are more in touch with current curriculum???

[nikkor]

Thank you for the write up. It's great to get an admin's perspective. Did you go to Bangkok for the hiring fairs? That would be the one I would love to hear more about. I heard that the Search fair had about 4-5 times more candidates than the ISS fair this year. Any thoughts?

[PsyGuy]

@nikkor

I was at the Sydney, Australia fair, our principals went to Bangkok (Our principals filled the 4 vacancies we had for Fall.). From my past experience, the Search fair is bigger (more crowded) then the ISS fair. ISS just represents fewer schools, and has stricter admission criteria for candidates. The same is true for the Mass fair.

@mantissa

From my POV, a school would prefer a teacher with international experience then one with many years of local experience. Culture shock just hits families differently, and for a school its more a problem to have a teacher that cant handle the lifestyle change and leaves (which there is little they can do about it) then a lessor experienced teacher, who requires some more classroom mentoring (which they can do something about).

@lightstays

I agree with you, but the Australia fair is really intended for the newbies, who arent competitive. I hear all the time (including this forum) about candidates whos associate pushes them into the Sydney or San Francisco fair, because they arent competitive for Bangkok, or even Cambridge.

Most of our time was really wasted, but we dont know for sure what positions we have to fill until June, so we got a couple candidates that we may contact over the summer if we have a vacancy. It didnt finish better then it started, a lot of the candidates showed up expecting to leave with a job, many of them left without a contract.

Search is a business and their focus is to generate revenue. Its not really in their business model to turn down clients. About 20% of Search clients exhaust all three years on their membership without accepting a position, and the top reasons (in order) are: 1) Overly selective candidates, 2) Too expensive to place, 3) Lack of experience.

@tgrear2008

This was the first fair for the vast majority of newbies, and I see it all the time. There is a certain attrition rate you get after a candidates first exposure to the competitiveness. They have high hopes, and expectations, and they realize either 1) No one is really interested in them (mainly because the fairs are typically mid year, and many of them arent certified, or have their degrees yet, and they have no experience). 2) They cant get into the regions they want too (Japan for the young newbies, and Europe for the older newbies). 3) The only schools they are interested in are the "american/british" schools which is typically the elite school in a region.

The 3rd reason above is the most insidious one in my opinion. Many new teachers from western countries dont realize that as far as salary/compensation goes their local native area is probably the top of the pay scale for them given their limited or non existent experience, and that the only way to maintain that compensation level is to go to one of the elite overseas schools which they arent competitive enough for. The realization that these new teachers are faced with is the reality that a IS position at a tier 2 school will mean a significant pay cut for them, in a location that isnt going to have the same western conveniences, and lifestyle for them. Thats a hard pill to swallow.

I think in my opinion, that a lot of the career changers who lost jobs and decided to try teaching will go back to their corporate professions when the economy improves. My feeling is that many of the newbies will have no better luck finding teaching positions in their home locations either for the same reasons they cant get the IS positions they want either (lack of experience).

How to stay ahead, thats a question that would need a whole book to address (and their are a bunch of job finding books already). Based on my experience the one "cheat" i would hazard to mention, is "be likable". Everyone knows you can teach, and that your smart and are (or will be) qualified, but what admins are really looking for is people that are going to care about the kids, work well with the faculty and staff, and are going to be essentially "low maintenance". Especially in the 2nd tier circuit where every admin either knows or assumes your just going to be there for your 2 years, and then move on to a bigger/better school/region. When my candidates that im interviewing start getting 'fidgety' about salary, compensation, resources, etc, I mentally start to move on to the next candidate, because the reality is that as a newbie there is very little (and usually nothing) that distinguishes you from every other newbie candidate.... I think its true with any admin, if I dont like you, your not getting hired.

[wrldtrvlr123]

[quote="nikkor"]Thank you for the write up. It's great to get an admin's perspective. Did you go to Bangkok for the hiring fairs? That would be the one I would love to hear more about. I heard that the Search fair had about 4-5 times more candidates than the ISS fair this year. Any thoughts?[/quote]

I'm at Search BKK and have heard directly from several school heads that they were very disappointed with the quality of candidates at ISS and didn't hire anyone (another one said they hired the only two decent candidates they talked to). I can't speak to the numbers, but it seems that a lot of jobs got offered and filled here in the last couple of days.

[PsyGuy]

The interpretation I got was that there might not be any real positions at any tier 1 schools by Cambridge. Everyone did their hiring there at BK...

So how is the job search going for you in BK?

[wrldtrvlr123]

[quote="PsyGuy"]The interpretation I got was that there might not be any real positions at any tier 1 schools by Cambridge. Everyone did their hiring there at BK...

So how is the job search going for you in BK?[/quote]

It's been alright. We had 6 inquiries from a range of schools for both of us, including a couple of great schools and a couple of great locations, but none were really excellent options for us for one reason or another.

I made the final cut for two great schools (no specifics as I'm fairly paranoid at the moment) and really thought I'd get an offer from the one in Asia, but got the dreaded, you're great but..note this morning. It was left open, but you just know that if they couldn't pull the trigger now, they are going to fall in love with someone else at a later fair.

There is still another school (in Europe) that has said they will need a few more days to decide whether to make an offer, so I am walking a fine line between fatalism and cautious optimism at this point.

If that one does not come through, I will be disappointed, but not totally despondent as we have some other irons in the fire for a bit later in the hiring season. This shite just comes with the territory I suppose.

[PsyGuy]

Im sorry, if its any consolation, BK was a brutal fair this year. Not the best time to be looking for a new post. i'll keep my fingers crossed for you.

Yeah, you know when a school really wants you, and they jump all over themselves to offer you a contract.

[wrldtrvlr123]

[quote="PsyGuy"]Im sorry, if its any consolation, BK was a brutal fair this year. Not the best time to be looking for a new post. i'll keep my fingers crossed for you.

Yeah, you know when a school really wants you, and they jump all over themselves to offer you a contract.[/quote]

Thanks. Yeah, it was pretty busy. I'm not holding my breath on any of the schools from fair, although some tiny part of me thinks that all of their other candidates could meet with some non-lifethreatening mishap that disqualifies them. :D