Global Financial Crisis

[Traveller1]

The group that my school is part of has sent a mail to all Principals advising them that in view of the global financial crisis it will be cutting back on recruitment and internal promotions. Before I heard about this I was wondering if or how the financial crisis was going to affect recruitment this year. Is this crisis likely to have an overall impact on recruitment? Any thoughts or opinions on this?

[JISAlum]

I don't know but I've been thinking about it as well. I think it's probably affecting both schools and applicants in many ways. Personally I'd been planning on attending some of the job fairs next year, but with owning a house and probably not being able to sell it in the US- I'm not so sure I can now.

I also think that there can be substantial up-front costs for applicants that they hope to re-coup once hired in the form of relocation allowance, salary and other forms of compensation. If schools start cutting back, and applicants don't have the funds to cover these costs, then I could see the number of prospective teachers at fairs dropping. Certainly the number of teachers that can fly to some of these expensive cities and put out the cash to do so might drop.

[pikefish]

I wonder if the administrators overseas have any idea how tight things are here. I have had two ask me to interview in Bangkok, then are somewhat confused when I say I simply cannot afford to take off work for a week, jump on plane, hang out in Thailand, etc...

Going to San Francisco is gonna kill my savings, but unless I luck out, I really dont have any other alternative. I am, after all, a teacher in the United States.

[JISAlum]

I've heard of people volunteering to travel to interviews, and in some cases of US teachers going to Europe and Asia for that. While I've got the miles to do it for free, I think those days are over or many. I could understand if you were already in SE Asia, but to ask a teacher from the US to do that, for an interview is amazing. I wonder how many other professions do that.

[mobydick]

Will it change that much? "Show me the pounds" becomes "show me the dollars". The rest depends on personal situations - it will favour some and deter others, depending on financial obligations.

[doublejointeddonkey]

Pounds are dropping - you're right and the dollar US is up...will it be the safe haven currency of (literally) tomorrow?

There are going to be more than normal bankruptcies in the world...not just American and British and Icelandic and Dutch banks (hopefully your school's funds are secure and somebody is insuring the deposit insurer) but business around the world. I read that nearly 30 companies on the Chinese national stock market have recently failed (The Economist).

Are some school's going to be closing up shop? Have they expanded on the bubble too? Some of these profit making schools might have some issues in the next few years making a profit under their old packages. I'm finding it harder and harder to find school's offering yearly flights to home of record...it felt like ten years ago every school was at the least offering that with housing...Has it been the case to take from the teachers to maintain the same standards for the students and the school.

I'm just hoping for transparency from schools...that promise the world to their teachers knowing they aren't going to make it past next month because their bank is insolvent, their customers are broke and the owner's can't turn a profit so they are just going to walk away with this year's tutions and shut down.

On the positive side...these are issues that administrators as well as teachers are concerned about.

[JISAlum]

The most current version of TIE has an article advising overseas teacher to stay put until the crisis ends. With some smaller, poorly run schools getting hit hard, and some companies cutting back, I wonder if that means less turn over in positions? Teachers at more established schools might not be as inclined to leave.

[Traveller1]

I was thinking that there might be less movement on the job market, but I hadn't thought about teachers at home being less willing to take a position overseas and I hadn't thought about the possibility of schools having to close or the school's bank going belly up. Now that's a scary thought!