Nearing the home stretch. New Teacher's road to 1st post.

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MedellinHeel
Posts: 169
Joined: Wed Jan 01, 2014 1:59 am

Nearing the home stretch. New Teacher's road to 1st post.

Post by MedellinHeel »

I just passed my licensing exam today and will be completing my ACP (alternative certification program) within a month. Figured I would start a thread to document the process for any prospective or new teachers in similar shoes and also use it to ask for advice. I am hoping to land a job somewhere by August, if unsuccessful I suppose I will head back to Asia to teach ESL for 6-12 months. Although I am hoping I can find something and not have to go to plan B.

So at present, I need to go ahead and start the document gathering process. What all will I need? I realize this varies by country but I figure I will get everything done and apostilled to be on the safe side.

Diploma Apostilled
FBI Background Check Apostilled
References (How many?)

Anything else I need to gather or have on hand?

Thanks
gibwise
Posts: 29
Joined: Wed Dec 11, 2013 9:16 am

Re: Nearing the home stretch. New Teacher's road to 1st post

Post by gibwise »

3 professional references and a parent one if possible. I have had one school ask for four professional and quite a few places ask for two. It is typically better to have people who will write you one for each school that you apply for than have them as an open reference.

Birth certificate and marriage certificate apostilled (apostiles typically have to be done once you know where you are going though). For some countries the police check also has to be less than three months old.
MedellinHeel
Posts: 169
Joined: Wed Jan 01, 2014 1:59 am

Re: Nearing the home stretch. New Teacher's road to 1st post

Post by MedellinHeel »

I think I am gonna stick with 4 open references. I will be applying to a million schools all over the globe and cant be asking for school tailored references every other day. How many schools ask for a parent reference? Never heard of that before.

Will I need to bother getting transcripts with having a diploma? Seems redundant and overkill.
eion_padraig
Posts: 408
Joined: Sat Dec 11, 2010 8:18 pm

Re: Nearing the home stretch. New Teacher's road to 1st post

Post by eion_padraig »

The parent reference is asked for by Search Associates. It doesn't sound like you'll have the two years they'd want for you to register for them. Maybe other schools ask for them too. I haven't seen that myself.

Confidential references tend to be held in higher regard than non-confidential ones. However, you might be okay because it will probably be lower tier schools that will consider you as a NQT anyway so their expectations will probably be lower.

It sort of goes without saying, but a valid passport with at least a year left. A few of my colleagues ran into passport expiry issues this year when trying to travel.

Good luck.
MedellinHeel
Posts: 169
Joined: Wed Jan 01, 2014 1:59 am

Re: Nearing the home stretch. New Teacher's road to 1st post

Post by MedellinHeel »

I started the registration process filling out all the info and questions for Search. I saw the 2 years but did not get the impression they wouldnt take you on without it. I just want to go to the Bethesda fair, hopefully they will work with me and look past the 2 years thing.

Can you explain the confidential thing? How does one get a confidential letter of recommendation? Seems you would have to ask someone or be privy to the atleast who was writing it.
gibwise
Posts: 29
Joined: Wed Dec 11, 2013 9:16 am

Re: Nearing the home stretch. New Teacher's road to 1st post

Post by gibwise »

Confidential references are ones where you dont see what the person has written. For Search they are filled in online. for many schools the ability to actually contact your referees is more important than the reference itself however. Many schools asked for transcripts but not all. (my uk Uni didnt ever issue me with transcripts so I always get annoyed when schools want to see them). Most of the time it is a VISA requirement when they want them.
eion_padraig
Posts: 408
Joined: Sat Dec 11, 2010 8:18 pm

Re: Nearing the home stretch. New Teacher's road to 1st post

Post by eion_padraig »

Search Associates may take people with less than two years post-credential teaching experience as interns, but those seem to be rare and are probably not ideal. It wouldn't surprise me if they took experienced private school teachers who only recently gained a teaching credential, but I don't know for sure. But previous ESL in language schools, foreign schools, or universities doesn't get counted.

I'd sign up for TIEonline if I were in your situation. People also talk about joyjobs. You probably won't have a chance to go to a job fair this late in the hiring seaon, but people get jobs via phone/Skypd interviews all the time.

Gibwise is right about confidential recommendations.

One last thing, if you do go to plan B and return to Asia. I would suggest taking a job where the teaching schedule allows you the time to be a substitute teacher at an international school. One, this gives you contacts with people working at IS, who might know of job openings at other international schools and can talk you up with friends. Two, it gives you some experience working with international school kids. Not as good as full time teaching, but it's better than nothing. Finally a school may need a mid year replacement for various reasons and they might look for a person from their sub list. You'd probably be a local hire, which isn't great but it gets your foot in the door and experience towards the two year requirement most IS have.
MedellinHeel
Posts: 169
Joined: Wed Jan 01, 2014 1:59 am

Re: Nearing the home stretch. New Teacher's road to 1st post

Post by MedellinHeel »

So stressed right now and dying of boredom.

I have completed all of my program except the final culminating week of student teaching for which I just learned id have to wait till June 2-6 to complete due to "testing". Was planning on having this stuffed finished by the end of this month. It takes like a month or more for all the paperwork to get sorted and get my actual license mailed to me. So I am looking at getting all my documents ready around mid - late July.

I am thinking just to go ahead and start sending out my resume with "June completion" after my license. I will be looking for a Middle School math position for Fall 14'.

If you have any recommendations for tier 2 or 3 schools which might hire a newbie late would love to hear them.

Should not have traveled this Winter and came home and finished this bloody thing. Bad planning & timing smh
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