The International Schools Review Forum

Any experienced International educators have any recommendations for a good stateside teaching certificate that either never expires, or is really easy to renew? I currently have an AZ certificate, and it's a real pain to keep current. I had to fly back to the US for a weekend "ESL refresher" course two years ago, and don't want to jump through that hoop again. I'd ideally like to find a state with reciprocity with AZ so I can just roll my certificate over.

I had the same issue, and moved my certificate to California. Two bennifits, 1) The CLEAR certificate is good for 5 years, and doesnt require any PD to renew. 2) Most international schools if they have USA accreditation are WASC accredited, and pretty much adapt the California curriculum.

Apparently Washington State has a certificate that doesn't expire (as long as you stay out of WA schools). I'm going to investigate this summer...

Does AZ belong to the interstate reciprocity agreement? If so, it should be pretty easy to transfer over.

I'm debating on doing the same - transferring to another state - as I am sure KY will be a pain in the butt when it comes to renewing from overseas. They've certainly been annoying enough when it comes to getting an extension to add high school bio onto my middle school science certificate. It wasn't even possible to do so until this past year, and of course that's JUST long enough that I have to take the Praxis again (I majored in bio and got a 198 on the Praxis when I last took it - shouldn't that be enough?).

Check carefully and don't be too surprised if the forever certificates are no longer available.
My state (PA) used to be a forever state, so long as the teacher avoided teaching in a PA public school. The certificate was good for 5 years of PA public school teaching, but otherwise would not expire. It worked for me for a good many years.
And then they changed the rules. Now I need to keep the certificate current by getting a certain amount of PD every 5 years. If I don't do that, the cert will expire.
I believe other states are doing similar things. It prevents misuse of certificates by people like me, so we can't claim we're PA certified when in PA that means we've been taking top-up courses, but outside PA it means we attended classes decades ago.

My state (Cali) used to have a lifetime certificate, but not anymore. The current CLEAR (5 year certificate) doesnt require any PD though. Just fill out the renewal application and pay the fee. Another nice benefit is that most international school that have "American" accreditation are WASC accredited, and adapt pretty much the Cali curriculum.

@Sid-- You might want to take a look at the Pennsylvania Dept. of Education website. There is currently a 2 year moratorium on ACT 48 requirements in PA, which will extend your current "due by" date for professional development hours by two years.

PsyGuy, that's good to know about the CA certification. I will check it out for my specialization. I never used to think all the required PD every 5 years was a big deal because I always have tons of it. But now that I'm going abroad and don't know what the PD opportunities will be like and how exactly they issue credit for it, I'm forced to think about how I will keep my certificate current. This thought never entered my mind until following this post. It would be nice to just pay money to keep it current.

Its pretty inexpensive too. You can find the fee schedule here:

http://www.ctc.ca.gov/credentials/leaflets/cl659.pdf

Its basically $55.

Heres are the links for the removal of PD requirements:

http://www.ctc.ca.gov/credentials/FAQ/f ... rowth.html

http://www.ctc.ca.gov/credentials/FAQ/f ... nated.html

Thanks, @doubtful. I'm still good though. I already finished the ACT 48 hours in the first 6 months of my current 5 year cycle, which means I have 9 years and 6 months before my cert expires, even if I don't take another hour at all. But I will. I'm a PD junkie.

In my experience, most ISs provide plenty of PD, the difficulty is getting the presenter, trainer, admin to provide you some sort of certificate or record. Most iSs record PD internally for IB, Accreditation, or Government requirements. The second issue is sometimes getting your home authority to accept the PD.

[quote="PsyGuy"]. . . The second issue is sometimes getting your home authority to accept the PD.[/quote]

That is my concern. My state can be kind of picky about what they will accept. As soon as this time of interviewing and hiring frenzy dies down, I'm going to look into this some more. I am really appreciating the input on this topic.

PA is very picky.
PA public schools can certify anything they want to. If they offer a PD at school, they can give it a title and a number of hours, and submit the list of attendees to the state registry. If you attend a conference, you just bring home the certificate, get your school to certify it, and submit it. Done deal. Easy deal.
If you don't work in a PA public school, you're almost on your own. You don't have a school that can certify things for you, so only 2 things count.
1) Graduate level courses from any accredited US university.
2) PD given directly by a provider approved by the PA dept of ed. That approval process is ridiculously difficult, and most providers just work directly with schools anyway (so the schools can certify it), so there are almost no such approved providers.
Which means us PA-ers need, in effect, to keep attending grad school forever.[/list]

I would also imagine that the third . providers that do provide PD, probabley do so at a cost thats about equal to college anyway? Id look at that list and see if the IBO is recognized as a provider, and if your at an IB school (and before I go any further this is what i used to do) print up some certificates with the IB logo (which IB schools are permitted to use) for all your in house PD, and then just keep your fingers crossed that they accept it....

Another option Id explore is looking at my network of contacts back at your old district/school who can "help you out" by using their school as sort of a clearing house for your PD. You know they help you, you send them back 20 pounds of Danish Chocolate, or some anime DVD from Japan, or wine from France, or you know whatever they are into, or hard to get.

Its been mentioned before but ultimately what i did was just move my certification to a state (Cali) that doesnt have any PD requirements, or a lesser option would be to a state or country that has lower PD requirements. I cant say much about it, but several teachers ive worked with just moved their certification overseas or across the boarder (Canada was popular at the time, and even with the new $88 a year, id rather just pay a fee, then go through the PD nightmare).

If your a single subject teacher, you could also explore an NBTS certification, good anywhere in the world pretty much. Every state recognizes it. It would be some work, and money but compared to college classes, once its done your done.