Should I stay or should I go?

[kjbar]

About me: Single, elementary certified female, seven years experience.

This past school year was my first teaching overseas. I'm assuming it's preferable to sign on for a third year since this is my first international job, but I'm wondering how some of you have decided whether to sign on for a third year at a school or whether to move on after your second year. I don't have many people to discuss this with who have been in similar situations, so your perspectives and opinions would be helpful. If I decide to leave I want to get an early start on getting recommendation letters and deciding if I should sign up with an agency.

Pros: I enjoy my job and the people I work with. My class size is smaller, I have a full-time teaching assistant, and I get double the planning time I'm used to. The salary is better than I made in the U.S. and allows me to save a good amount of money.

Cons: I don't like the city I live in. It's somewhat dirty and it's hard to get around. I am often pulled over by the police when driving because I stand out, which makes me a target for bribes. Staying for a third year would also mean moving into the new teacher housing that my school is building on campus and I don't know how I feel about living on the school grounds.

What are some reasons that some of you decided to move on? What would you do in a situation similar to mine?

[bish180b]

mmmm yes... this is a conundrum and something lots of us have been through..

very difficult for us to answer...

Are you happy?
What are your goals?

If you're not happy in your outside life I would be considering looking at other options..it can't hurt to have a crack and see what comes up..

I was once in a city I loved but I hated the school and the money wasn't brilliant...I decided to leave in the end because of the school. I loved the day I left the school but I missed the city and the life I had a lot....

Now I have been at a school that I absolutely love with great people and great money..but life outside of work has bored me to tears..just nothing there for me. So I have made the decision to move... I feel extremely sad about it.

But life is short and you can not base your life around your job.

You got one shot at it kiddo... go with your gut.

Do you live to work, or work to live?

[PsyGuy]

It is a myth that you "have to do a third year" to prove longevity, or anything else. If you complete your contract and get a positive reference that is all that matters, and staying a third year will not create any efficiencies in your next job search. that third year doesnt buy you anything and ultimately costs you by lengthening your IT pathway through the years and loss of coin as you seniority levels on the salary scale. The sooner you move up in tier or over in region the better. The third year myth is just perpetrated by recruiters and leadership who want to stem their rate of attrition. It costs a lot to bring an IT in for two years, they get a better ROI if they can get a third year.

Almost all your pros are common differences within IE when compared to a public maintained DS. It is not like where you are at this jewel of an IS and the rest of IE is what you remember and experienced in DE.

In regard to your cons, I always advise choosing location over IS. If your IS sucks at least you have your location to fall back on and at worst your like everyone else who basically hates their job but has a fulfilling personal life. Thats what work is supposed to be like, if it was entertaining you would pay them and not the other way around. When your location is bad than everything about your life revolves around your IS, and you essentially are living to work, because there is nothing else for you.
If you live in on campus housing you will never get away from work and you will be living in a fish bowel. Its great to enjoy your colleagues its another to be living some reality show of all of you living together and everyone knowing everyone's business. You will also have to be "on" all the time because ultimately what would be personal conflict will become a leadership issue.

This isnt a difficult decision, you dont have a lot to stay over, its basically fear that your next IS will be somehow worse and you will look back and have regrets.

[Tyshine]

Tough call. I'm in a very similar situation and will likely stay to finish my masters before looking for my next position. However, seeing that you don't really want to stay and are more so worried about finding a worse place I suggest leaving. You will probably find a better place because you are more experienced, have a clearer picture of what you want/don't want, and you can get started finding your next position early. Best of luck.

[Thames Pirate]

It's not a myth that you need 3 years--but it is true that you don't need to stay for that 3rd year early in your career. If you have a string of minimum contracts, then you are not attractive to better schools. If your early contracts in IT are 2 years, though, it isn't a red flag.

You are going to find pros and cons at every school--good and bad admin, staff, students, etc. are everywhere. It's just a matter of ratios of each, and to some extent that is a crapshoot and a matter of personality (yours and that of the school) that cannot be predicted.

So you may as well roll the dice on a school in a place you like IMO. But that's just me.

[mamava]

We left a school after 2 years and it was really hard. We had hardly gotten settled after a year and then had to turn all our energy and attention to the job search. We are a family with kids, so maybe it's different for a couple or a single with fewer considerations to deal with.

If you, like PsyGuy, chose location over school, leaving makes sense. We are the opposite--since we spend a lot of time at school, having a great school "fit" is more important for us than location (within reason). When we were in the ME, it was a challenging place to live for sure, but made all the harder by how unhappy we were at the school we were at. At our current school, we love the work and the fit, so living in the city we live in (a place we're really not crazy about) is much more manageable and finding that fit again at a new school would be a big deal as we were looking for locations. There's no right way to think about it--it's just what clicks for you.

I agree with Thames Pirate and PsyGuy about the magic "at least 3 years." When we left a school after 5 years, no one asked many questions about moving on. When we left the ME, we had several questions. We had reasons for leaving that were outside the school itself, but I think it helps to think about what you'd say to that question that makes sure you're framing moving on in a positive light.

[PsyGuy]

Strongly disagree with @Thames Pirate. Its an absolute myth that you need to stay for three years regardless of what stage in your IE career you are in. The real question is why your moving around later in your career, and its easily explained by you like to travel, new opportunities or just about any answer. Its not a red flag or anything at all.

[PsyGuy]

I dont really disagree with @mamava, the issue I have is that it assumes all factors and variables are known. You arent likely to know if an IS is a good fit for you until you are already there and have had some time to both adapt and feel out your fit into the IS, and thats not something you can predict really well in advance. You instead have to depend on a few short, brief exchanges with a recruiter and leadership and make large assumptions and predictions based on what they tell you, and every ISs leadership and ownership thinks their IS is awesome. and that they are "first tier". Whereas your location is more what you make of it, and a lot more data about a particular location is available to you. if you need or want a vibrant and active social scene, than you can much more easily source that a rural area is going to meet your expectations less than a capital city is. You arent going to be able to determine fit essentially until its too late to do anything about.

[sid]

Even PG admits how admin want teachers to stay for longer than 2 years, it being so expensive to hire new teachers. Very true. Which makes it odd that he denies that teachers overall should build a record of staying 3 and more. Your past is used to predict your future. Three plus is a better sign than two.

[PsyGuy]

@Sid

@Sid is also in leadership and one of those leadership that is fear mongering this myth. I've never denied its expensive to recruit ITs, do you have a reference indicating otherwise?

Three plus is a better sign of what? What exactly is three years predicting better than two years?

The answer and you already know it, is absolutely nothing. Its not predicting longevity, the IT still left. What it is, is cost to an ITs career. You are still going to get the same reference, a positive reference is a positive reference. That IT is going to be in lower tiers of IE longer. An IT can generally move over in region or up in tier at the conclusion of each contract, that makes the typical IT career 6 years, three moves and your around the first tier. Make those contracts three years and all youve done is take 9 years to do what should have taken you 6. Those extra third years dont buy you any efficiencies. That third year doesn't allow you to accelerate or skip a move. Its not going to give you a special pass to go from third tier to first tier, there is no "third year" special recruitment fair, or early entry or anything.
Further those extra third years cost you seniority steps, because of the salary cap. ISs only allow you to use so many years of previous experience in determining salary:

Lets look at the following career path: We want to look at a 7 year career path for an IT moving from DE into IE. Our IT has 3 years of experience in DE at the time they enter IE. The first IS, Acme AS a third tier IS in Asia. The IT stays at Acme AS for two years and then the IT leaves for Genovia IS, a tier 2 IS in the WE that has a 5 year salary cap on entering ITs. We will also assume that $ and £ are equal:

Acme AS has a starting salary at step 1 at the IE average salary of $30K and $1K for each year of credible experience up to the entry cap of 5 years.
So our IT with 3 years experience in year one at Acme AS is making USD$33K, $30K at step 1 plus 3 years of DE experience at $1,000 each year. The second year at Acme AS they go up a step and are now making $34K.
Year 1 = 33K
Year 2 = 34K
33,000 +34,000 = 67,000
Total earnings at Acme AS is $67K
At this point the salary cap at Acme AS is irrelevant.

The IT then moves to Genovia IS in the WE. Genovia IS also has a 5 year cap, which isnt a problem because our IT in this example has 5 years experience. This is a second tier IS and starting salary at step 1 is £35K with £1.5K for each year of service up to 5 years. So our IT enters Genovia IS at 5 years (the entry cap) for a 2 year contract. Their first year at Genovia IS the ITs salary is £35K + £7500 at step 5 on the salary scale and the second year its £35K + £9K at step 6 on the salary scale.
Year 1 = £42,500
Year 2 = £44,000
42,000 + 44,000 = 86,000
Total earnings at Genovia iS is £86K
To compute total career earning over these 7 years we add $67K + £86K = 153K
Their total earning from both ISs is 153,000.
At this point the salary cap is also irrelevant, the IT entered at the maximum salary at cap at Genovia IS and got to step 6 after 7 years in edu.

Now lets hit the reset button and change the matrix for a 3 year initial contract at Acme AS. All other variables remain unchanged, importantly were still looking at a 7 year career, and all starting salaries and step increases remain the same:

Acme AS starts at $30K plus $1K per year of experience, our IT comes into Acme AS with 3 years of DE experience and stays for 2 years plus a renewal 1 year. The earning in years 1 too 3 at Acme AS are as follows:
Year 1 = $33K
Year 2 = $34K
Year 3 = $35K
Total earnings at Acme AS is $102K

Moving to Genovia IS with its 5 year cap on experience and a starting salary at step 1 of £35K and £1.5K for each year of experience. We are already at 6 years in our model so looking at our 7 year career will allow for only one year at Genovia IS. So starting salary at step 1 is £35,000 plus the maximum of 5 years experience is £10,500
Year 1 = £45,500
Total earnings at Genovia iS is £45,500
To compute total career earning over these 7 years we add $102K + £45.5K = 147.5K
Their total earning from both ISs is 147,500.
At this point the salary cap is relevant. The IT in this matrix lost a year of experience moving into Genovia IS. They lost step 6 on the salary scale entirely.

Comparing our total earning between these two matrices we have the following earning:
2 year contract model total earnings: 153,000
3 year contract model total earnings: 147,500
A difference of 5,500
That lost salary step combined with the loss year at a higher salary scale was real cost and those losses would be amplified going forward into tier 1 as the losses in step become greater due to the cap and the shift in IS salary scales. Later in the model, wed also see losses in social insurance pension, etc.

So that third year cost 5,500 and what did if achieve, nothing, absolutely nothing. All it did was save some leadership/ownership some recruiting coin while providing our IT with nothing. If leadership/ownership wants to reduce recruiting costs, make three year contracts, no one is stopping them. ITs dont owe leadership or ownership anything in the way of charity, you complete your contract with a positive reference and thats all that matters, ITs should keep their coin.

[Thames Pirate]

A 3rd year tells recruiters a few things:
1) This teacher is willing to invest in a school or place rather than just moving on all the time (tourist teacher as you like to call them). They aren't going to cut and run as easily.
2) This teacher was at least not so bad that the school wanted to fire them (and possibly even worked to keep them).

A school knows that they are more likely to save on recruiting time and energy (and money) by keeping the position filled more than two years, and they know this is a person to whom they are more likely to offer a contract extension. That means all else being equal, the teacher with a 3 year contract has an edge.

Remember that your first few months, you don't bring as much to the school because you are finding your feet in the country, learning names and who has what clout at the school, etc. The last few months you are starting to think of your new destination and closing down rather than investing in your school. Therefore if you do a 2 year contract, the school really only gets 1 out of you--January to January. Recruiters know this, and they prefer to get more, either in terms of investment in the school or, for bad admin, just avoiding the effort of finding a replacement. So yes, that year matters.

Recruiters also know that at the bad schools, very few stay and that leaving after two might be a sign of ambition. So leaving at ForProfit IS early in your career isn't a big deal. Twice isn't terrible, either, depending on the school and location. But by the third placement, you really should stay the third year (or more) or expect you will find it increasingly difficult to find a quality placement.

Your "contract-per-tier" rule is one I have not found to be true. Otherwise anyone with 4 years under their belt would be in tier 1, and we know that this just isn't the case. There is no "formula" for hiring. There are only guidelines. Thinking like an administrator, though, helps you plan your approach to resume building as well as developing a plan to get where you want. Administrators want to see constancy and investment in a school that does not cost the school additional investment in the position.

All that salary cap nonsense is smoke and mirrors.

[PsyGuy]

@Thames Pirate

1) No it doesnt. A third year isnt an extra meaningful investment. Its one extra year, its not making that particular IS a career.
2) No it doesnt, your confusing tenure with references. if an IT wasnt so bad to be dismissed it would be reflected in the reference letter, or the HOS contact.

Absolutely true an IS does realize a better ROI the longer an IT stays, this is called agreeing. All else being equal only works in a theoretical bubble. Youc ant hold all other variables constant across candidates. Even if you could, its absolutely no guarantee or even probable that an It is going to stay a third year solely because they stayed a third year at a previous IS. Nor is there any significant way to predict this.

No they dont, you stated the first few months and the last few months of your first year, thats 4 months out of a 10 month academic year, what happened to the other 6 months in the middle, they were entirely unproductive. Any IT that writes off a whole year as an "adjustment period" probably doesnt need a contract renewal.

They should stay based on what, oh because @Thames Pirate says so, thats utter bunk.

I find it to be generally true, I suppose we disagree, but there are a lot of factors. Some ITs dont want to be in tier 1 ISs, some dont want to do the work, and some prefer a location over tier.
Yes, there is a formula for recruiting, there are lots of formulas, algorithms and heuristics.

No, thats fear mongering, that has zero value and zero predictability, rhetoric doesnt displace data. Just because some population of lower tier leadership wants to stem the cost of recruiting doesnt mean it has value, or provides any type of advantage because @Thames Pirate thinks so.

No the salary cap is data, you most not know what smoke and mirrors are.

[Thames Pirate]

I love it when admin straight up come on here and say it matters, but your response is "nuh-uh" because, well, you don't like the answer or, more likely, because you don't like me.

OP, think like an administrator--what would you want to see? If you decide to go, what would you say to the question of why you want to leave, particularly if you have multiple short contracts?

[PsyGuy]

@Thames Pirate

I love it to, it allows me the opportunity to again point out the agenda and bias of leadership. If everything leadership said was true this site wouldnt need to exist.

If the LW thinks like leadership, who is going to be thinking about the interests of the IT. What answers would you use:

~ Travel
~ Opportunities for children in IS
~ Increasing instability in the region.
~ Goldfish died

Just about anything really. Its more important to have a positive answer, any answer that you can spin to your advantage.

[Thames Pirate]

It doesn't matter if leadership are all biased and conspiring against you. They have the jobs, so they get to tell us how we obtain them.