As some of you here may recall, I'm a teacher by profession. I've been in education for more than 10 years and hold an advanced degree plus another 45 credits. I've been both a teacher and, for the past three years, an administrator. If you'll allow me to indulge in a little self-promotion, I have a CV that just about anyone with my length of service would be proud to call their own.
Ive been here in Chch for a little over four months now. I was lucky enough to have been able to time my arrival to be here for hiring season. If you don't know (or haven't ever really thought about it) most openings in education are advertised during the last term of the school year. That's when the schools find out who's coming back and who isn't and what their needs will be for the coming school year.
I've applied for every education job in the Chch area that my experience would make me qualified for, from long-term relief teacher to deputy principal. I've sent out over two dozen resumes and cover letters. After studying the websites, school reviews, decile ratings, and mission statements, each was crafted to highlight the skills I believed to be a match for the school and position to which I was applying.
I have had exactly *zero* calls for interviews.
If I go back two or three years to when I started the process that led me to where I am today, I can recall visits to the
Teach NZ website. There I saw a special section devoted to the recruitment of overseas teachers. At the time, if I recall correctly, they were offering a one-time stipend of $2,000 to overseas trained teachers who took teaching positions in NZ--I see that they have doubled that to $4,000 now. The site features personal stories of teachers from around the globe, including the US, who extol the virtues of NZ and its schools.
So, seeing that the welcome mat was out and that NZ would be a place I could apply my skills and make a difference, I decided I wanted to apply to come to NZ as a skilled migrant.
As you all know, that process is demanding. I had to prove my qualifications and skills to the NZQA, the NZ Teachers' Council, and NZIS. I demonstrated that I had comparable degrees, extensive experience in a comparable labor market, and that my supervisors would vouch for my ability to teach--and that's not even half of what was involved in getting those invaluable blue stickers.
In July the boys were getting restless at the AirNZ gate, running back and forth between the seats where we had set up base camp and the windows where they could see the planes. Evan, my older son, struck up a conversation with an older Kiwi who was sitting by the windows. We got to talking and, as fate would have it, he was a former teacher himself from Wellington. 'You'll have no trouble finding a job,' he told me. 'There's a teacher shortage and we really need more male teachers.' This only served to confirm what I had been told time and time again as I researched my move to the other side of the globe. It assuaged my fear of going to another country without a job because I had skills and experience that were in demand and, if I was going to go to NZ to be a teacher, there really was no other way to do it but to prove my commitment and go.
After arriving, whenever I told anyone I was a teacher, I got the same response: 'You'll have no trouble finding a job,' they told me. 'There's a teacher shortage and we really need more male teachers.'
So, here I am now, looking at dwindling job prospects in my chosen profession--the one to which I have devoted the past 14 years of my life.
I've gotten advice from people, which has ranged from 'move to another city' to 'just bring your CVs to schools' to 'work as a casual relief teacher.' I accept the advice graciously, but as someone who has hired teachers, I know a few things about how schools work that most people don't. Schools are not like businesses--barring extraordinary circumstances, they don't have openings out of the blue, and they can't just make a place for you. Moving to Auckland or Wellington or out to remote places sounds like good advice, until you hear from other people who are in those very same places and in the exact same position you are.
So I think I will end up either trying to find work as a casual relief teacher--which, to be honest, I don't have much hope for either, since because of the way the master agreement for teachers works, I will be the most expensive relief teacher on their list. Casual relief work isn't a steady source of income, either.
The advice that I find most infuriating, though, is 'it isn't what you know, it's who you know.'
There's a part of me that wants to run through the streets with a gas can and matches and burn this place to the ground, because if 'it isn't what you know, it's who you know' then why put immigrants through what was for us a year-long process of proving what we know? Why not just have one #$%*^& question on the immigration form: 'Who do you know?'
The other side of me, the more logical and, well,
sane side is left pondering the nature of NZ society. Is this a meritocracy? If I have proven my worth, my value as a human being, to be able to come here, why must I humble myself to take a job barely suitable for someone just starting out in the profession?
The problem, though, is that 'humble' isn't the right word. It doesn't have anything to do with ego. If it came to it, I would put produce on the shelves at New World or sweep floors or do whatever I needed to do to feed my family. (Thankfully, it hasn't come to that.) I wouldn't feel that being a relief teacher was beneath me as much as I would wonder at the
wastefulness of it all.
That's the problem. That's my frustration. From what I've seen, that's the complaint many of the disgruntled migrants seem to have. We've been told, 'Come here! We need you!' and for whatever reason we've chosen to answer that call, packed up, moved to the other side of the world, spent thousands of dollars, endured bureaucracy like most of us have never before known, proven our worth ... and been told none of it matters.
Believe me, I didn't think it would be easy. I knew I'd be adjusting to a new culture, a new lifestyle. I knew I'd be giving up a lot of material comforts. I new this wasn't America and I was glad of it!
But to not be given a chance, a 'fair go'. To be told 'We only want the cream of the crop ... to work their way back up from the bottom.'
It's a waste.
At least I've learned some valuable lessons here in NZ. I'm not going to be made more cynical by this experience. In fact, when I go back to the US, the life I live will be very different from the one I left behind. I will do whatever I can to help any migrant or minority who I have the power to help.
And, yes, it is
when. I'm not giving up yet, but I think this has just been too much for me. If I got a job as a teacher tomorrow, I'd always carry with me the memory of this experience and the knowledge that I'd come here to find the same fundamental injustice that I thought I was leaving behind. If I don't find a job as a teacher, I don't think I could bear to throw away the all the work I've done to excel in my profession.
I don't mean this to be a sob story or pity party. I don't want anyone to think I haven't enjoyed my time here--I have--or that I hate NZ or Kiwis--I don't. But I just keep coming back to the idea of the wastefulness of it all.