Finding the Right Fit (eBook)

Introduction

This book has been written over the past twenty-one years. As of 2022, there are still very few books about international teaching. When I was preparing for my first job fair in 2001, there were no books out there. The only information I could find was published by the job fair that I attended, and I couldn’t access it until I had paid the $150 for the job fair. I didn’t even know what questions to ask. I vaguely remember someone telling me about exchange teaching. That description couldn’t have been further from reality. It went something like this: “You do a total switch with a teacher in, say, Australia, and the two of you exchange jobs and even live in each other’s houses.” Where could I start with that? I was still in college, renting a crappy apartment, and the only Australian I knew was Steve Irwin on Animal Planet.

Yes, teaching overseas is the best-kept secret in the world. Life in the United States can be very geocentric. Our colleges and universities in the U.S. train us to teach in local schools. Many excellent teachers go through their whole lives not even hearing about teaching around the world. If they do hear about someone teaching overseas, a number of images immediately come to mind.

What do you think of when international teaching is mentioned? Many of my friends back home still think I teach in a hut. You’ve seen it in movies. A thatched hut is set up in the middle of the village. A lone blackboard is attached to the front wall. I’m sweating through my grimy t-shirt as I explain how to say different greetings in the English language. Between thirty and forty eager, smiling village children are raising their hands to answer my question. In the afternoon, I kick a worn-out soccer ball around with laughing, barefoot boys and girls. When the day is done, I sit with the tribal leaders in a larger hut eating a nondescript bowl of something. Am I close? Can you see it? It doesn’t seem that farfetched, does it?

Wrong. Every bit of it. I might do this on an outreach program set up by my school or on a vacation for a week or two. The reality is much different at the schools where I teach. It’s 7:30 a.m. and I am on recess duty on the playground. For the next ten minutes I observe more than 100 students playing tag, playing four-square, and arguing about whether the last ball was out or good. I also keep a watchful eye on the playground set as kids, of all different skin colors, take turns on the slide or competing to swing higher than each other on the swings. Backpacks are strewn about in front of classroom doors. Each backpack has one of the latest cartoon trends pictured on it. One of my parents walks up to me and explains their child will be absent after lunch because she must go along to their embassy and renew her resident visa or passport. The first bell rings and the playground exodus commences with a flurry.

I stand at my classroom door and shake hands with each of my eighteen students as they enter the class. High five here. Fist bump there. A little girl from India holds up the line and says “Mr. Lemoine, did my mom email you? I have a dentist appointment at 9:15 so I’ll miss math. But I’ll be back after lunch.” My smile is enough of a reply as she rushes into class with her Winnie the Pooh backpack half open. I send in my attendance on my iPhone as I make a note that my third graders are making their way to the colored carpet square for our morning meeting. Susie is changing the daily schedule. Juan is feeding the fish. Margaret is unlocking the laptop cabinet. Muhammad and Ivanna are sorting the homework folders. Just another day!

Later in the day, the bell rings and I’ve just finished explaining equal fractions to a small group at the smart board. Everyone closes their MacMillan Grade 3 Math books and puts their pencils in their pencil cases. My students line up for library and I have to defuse a quarrel about this week’s line leader. Patrick is finishing up his last MAP test with a specialist. Two of my girls want to volunteer for his line-leader job, and I randomly pick one. Just before we head into the hallway, Philipp breaks the ranks and holds out his hand with his latest baby tooth and smiles with a hint of blood on his lip. “Hooray, Philipp. The nurse’s office is right on the way to library. Stop in there as we pass by. The nurses will give you something to keep your tooth in.” Just another day in one of the many international schools around the world.

There are many different schools out in the world. Suffice it to say, there are opportunities out there just like the previous scenario and there are many teaching positions quite different. For the past twenty years, I have described my teaching experience something like this: Take a rather wealthy pre-k through twelve school. It could very well be an elementary, middle, or high school instead. Take that school and put it in another country. We use a lot of the same textbooks. The school year is similar, starting in August and ending in early June. Students have gym class, music, art, and computer lab. The biggest differences are the students and where the school is located. That’s the quick, elevator-style description of teaching overseas. Usually, that’s enough. “That’s cool,” is the usual reply, followed by the conversation turning away from me. Most people just cannot relate.

I know. I know. For some of you, this kind of conversation wouldn’t end there. You have a thousand questions. Great! You want to know more. You think to yourself: Is there any way I could do that? How? Impossible! That would be cool but …? This book is your guide. International education is educators’ best kept secret. I’ve been doing this for almost twenty years now, interviewed hundreds of overseas teachers, and had thousands of conversations about job fairs. Finding the Right Fit is my way of sharing what I have learned over the past twenty years.

This book is the most comprehensive guide to success at a “face to face” international educator job fair. Yes, there will still be “face to face” recruiting fairs again. When they do, this book will be in your hand. Few, if any, books about international teaching unpack the process of attending an international educator-recruiting fair. Let me stand up and shout “These job fairs are unique.” State – and district-educator job fairs, from what I hear, don’t even compare. These fairs are simply different.

The first part of this book describes a face-to-face job-fair format common to the most well-known international fairs. I refer to them as the Big Three. International Schools Services, University of Northern Iowa, and Search Associates are the three most popular U.S.-based fairs for international educators and administrators. Read this book before you sign up for a fair, and bring it with you when you go!

This book will also entertain you. Join me in the second part, as I share snippets of experiences around the world. My life overseas is like an unfinished painted canvass, permeated with colors that span across continents and bleed over borders. These experiences include several of my own job-fair successes, paying off Cambodian police officers, touring the Pyramids of Giza with students, and having my car stolen in Venezuela. Let my experiences permeate your life’s canvas and spark your interest in the world of overseas education. Life can be stranger than fiction.

I have been living and teaching overseas for two decades now. It’s difficult for me to keep track of how many questions have come my way. Most of the conversations start with a version of how to get a teaching job overseas. Usually, one of my friends from home has a friend of a friend that wants to contact me. I agree with open arms. Bring it on! But they seldom follow through with the contact. Either my information isn’t passed on or the individual just never contacts me. The questions stay out there. This book is a way to pass on the lessons I have learned over the span of a career.

The most important sources of information for this book come from the countless teachers and prospective teachers I have had conversations with at job fairs. An overwhelming number of candidates at any job fair, recently, have never taught overseas before. Many of those former newbies have become friends over the years. They just needed someone at the fair to bounce questions off of or a stranger to just listen to them while they made up their own minds. Sometimes, I feel like a priest or counselor helping a parishioner or patient work their way through a personal struggle. Hah! I am far from a priest. This book contains it all. It is meant as an entrance into the international educator world.

Are you a student who is graduating next year (or next semester) with a teaching degree, with no teaching experience, with no clue as to what is out there waiting for you? Perhaps you just plan on waiting for your education school too set up some mock interviews. Perhaps you’ll just go with the flow and wait until June, after graduating, to put your name in the local district hiring pool. Maybe you haven’t even thought about that yet.

Are you a current teacher? This book is meant for you teachers out there who just can’t stand that same classroom you’ve inhabited for the past ten years. When is the last time you went on a vacation? Chances are you have two or three jobs in addition to teaching. Do you feel stuck in your routine? Are you waiting...