New Teacher Orientation Must-Haves at International Schools: A sit-down with an admin to go over each part of your contract

In this blog series, we will talk about the ins and outs of an excellent new teacher orientation programme at an international school. A new teacher orientation programme can really play a very important part in the start of your new school, in your new host country. What are all the must-haves then? Check out our blog series here to read all about the ones that we have discussed so far.

Must-have #14: A sit-down with an admin to go over each part of your contract

Contract details can be easily overlooked. They are not overlooked because you are not interested in them (because of course you want to know ALL the details when you are in the initial stages after being offered a contract), but because there are too many fine details to fully understand everything you see.

Contracts can also be easily misunderstood. Maybe you already “read” the contract, but it would be safe to say that you would not completely understand everything you “read”. International school teaching contracts definitely contain parts that use language you may not be familiar with. If it contains parts that are specific to the rules/laws of the host country, then it is very possible that you might not be so familiar with that jargon in terms of what a certain part is really trying to say.

Another reason that contract details could be easily overlooked is that you also might be looking at the contract with rose-colored glasses, meaning you are just focused on the more positive aspects of the contract instead of the parts that might actually give you cause for concern.

There might even be additional things that are NOT on your contract that you are entitled to. For example, in Denmark you are entitled to take off a certain number of days to be with your children, but it might not necessarily be spelled out for you in the contract. Good idea to ask around or have an admin tell you about these entitlements straight away during new teacher orientation.

So, if an admin did sit you down and went through your contract sometime during the new-teacher orientation, it would be nice if they went over the following parts:

Duties and responsibilities – Making it clear what you need to do is exactly what all new teachers want to know. Sounds simple, but they can be easily forgotten to be explicitly explained to you. Admin might think the duties and responsibilities that you will have will be implied or learned about by talking with your colleagues. Of course, if that is the case, new teachers often find themselves just learning about these things last-minute! Also, it is good to know up front what is required of you so that you don’t feel obligated to do the extra things an admin might ask of you.

School year and work day – It is important to know how many work days you have in the year; well, you can look at the school calendar for that. But what about what is required of you for each day of the week? Maybe you need to arrive 30 minutes before school starts and 30 minutes after school ends. Some days you might be required to stay longer for meetings; which days are those? Are the meetings optional? Some international schools are doing that now. All important details to know before you get caught not following those rules.

Workload – How nice to sit down with somebody who can give you an honest picture about how much you will be expected to work. How many reports will you need to write each year, and how often will they be sent out to parents? Even more important is what the reports look like. Writing multiple reports in a year definitely increases your workload. The admin could also give you an honest picture of how much the other teachers are putting in extra hours.

Other parts of the contract you would most likely want to discuss with your admin are salary, retirement, housing benefits, settling-in allowance, insurance, curriculum duties, etc.

So, does your international school set up a time for you to thoroughly discuss each part of your contract? Please share your experiences!

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Luckily, on International School Community, we have a new comment topic that specifically addresses this issue of getting reimbursed. It is called: Details about the teaching contract. What important things should prospective teachers know about?

We have 387 comments so far in this topic. Here are just a couple of those comments:

“Read your contract carefully. Do not sign an unsigned contract. Contracts signed by the teachers have been changed and then signed by the owner. If you have issues with the owner, his first and only reaction is to tell you to take him to court, where he will happily drag the case out to cost you a lot of money.” – Makuhari International School (Tokyo, Japan) – 22 Comments

“They reserve the right to interpret, change, and manipulate dates, and avoid transparency when dealing with staff regarding their contracts. A teacher who recently left at the start of the year discovered there were several things in the contract that actually conflicted with Japanese labor law. Fortunately for them, they consulted with an attorney and were able to avoid paying a one-month penalty for leaving on short notice. By the way, they left because they lost several thousand dollars due to mistakes the school made regarding visas that they were unwilling to rectify.” – Seisen International School (Tokyo, Japan) – 72 Comments

If you currently work at an international school or have worked at one in the recent past, share the information and details about the contract that you have at your school. You can find easy access to all international schools on our Schools List page.

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We also have a useful Comment Search page. Using a keyword search of ‘Contract‘, we found 1655 comments. Here are a few comments from those results:

“This has changed a LOT. Flight in and out at the end of contract. No mid-contract flights. No settling-in allowance; it is a repayable loan. Lunch is free.” – UWC Thailand(Phuket, Thailand) – 112 Comments

“The school will help with negotiating a contract if you don’t read Spanish. Your apartment will either come with a phone or you’ll use your cell phone. Cell service is cheap, usually less than $15 US a month; data plans cost more. Be careful with smartphones because they are easily stolen.” – The American International School of Guatemala (Colegio Maya) (Guatemala City, Guatemala) – 91 Comments

“Airfare for initial contract to Panama and departing flight for end of contract(typical initial contract 2 years). When renewing contract “home leave” flight per yearly renewal as well as renewal bonus. You can also ask for the funds from your annual ticket so you can use towards the “summer” travel you wish. Settling in money of $1000 (all), moving allowance between $500 (single) and $750 (dependents/family). When leaving said to also get some “departing” relocation money, your “retirement fund” of 1.5% annual salary school sets aside for you per Panama Law, and money for your airfare if wishing to buy your own ticket.” – International School Panama (Panama City, Panama) – 198 Comments

New Teacher Orientation Must-Haves at International Schools: Getting access to the internet AS FAST AS POSSIBLE!

Image by Welcome to All ! ツ from Pixabay

In this blog series, we will talk about the ins and outs of an excellent new teacher orientation programme at an international school. A new teacher orientation programme can really play a very important part to the start at your new school, in your new host country. What are all the must-haves then? Check out our blog series here to read all about the ones that we have discussed so far.

Must-have #10: Getting access to the internet AS FAST AS POSSIBLE!

You arrive in a new country, and things are just crazy for you; everything is crazy. Living in your new apartment or house without any internet access set-up is probably going to get you to the tipping point of your new-teacher craziness.

Please, schools (the ones that help teachers find apartments or have new teachers move into school-owned housing), the best thing you can do to help out your new staff is to think ahead and somehow get the internet set up in their houses…before they arrive or VERY soon after they arrive.

Well, we cannot say that having the internet is more important than clean drinking water or getting running electricity to your place, but it is definitely in the top five things that you would most like to have set up immediately after your arrival.

Getting the internet set up in another country can go very smoothly in some more developed countries where you can speak the local language, but getting the internet set up on your own, in a country where you don’t speak the local language, can prove to be one of the most stressful moments for you after your arrival. Maybe the internet company has an employee who can speak English for you, but their English might not be at the fluent level that you are desiring!

Let’s not forget, though, how much trouble there can be trying to get the internet set up in your home country. Things can be less than ideal there as well, and it can take weeks sometimes.

If only somehow international schools could help out their new expat teachers just a tiny bit more with regards to their forthcoming internet crisis. The solution is simple: somebody in charge of new teacher orientation gets access to the new teacher’s flat and, after calling the local phone/internet company, gets the internet all set up and ready before the teacher arrives. That solution doesn’t seem to be happening, though, at most placements. Another solution is to set up a time that a local employee at the school can help call the phone/internet company for you to set up the time for them to come to your house (of course, in the local language!).

Once your internet is finally set up, at least some of your stress will be alleviated. Then you can finally check your email, contact your friends and family, download your favorite home country TV programs, and get updated and post an update on Facebook (unless you are in China, that is, without VPN access!)

Hopefully, too, you are living in a country where they are known for having very fast internet! If you find that your internet is very slow, don’t forget to ask your phone/internet company about the specifics of their package options. In some countries there is actually an option to pay more for faster internet. Better to know that sooner than later, after a year or so of torturing yourself (and unfortunately getting used to) with slow internet.

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So, does your international school help new teachers get access to the internet AS FAST AS POSSIBLE!? Please share your experiences!

New Teacher Orientation Must-Haves at International Schools: Beginning-level host country language classes.

Must-have #11: Beginning-level host country language classes.

At times, there is nothing worse than the feeling of not knowing how to communicate with the people in your community. Many of us decide to move to countries where we do not know the host country language. People can’t know every language spoken in this world, especially really local languages that are not even possible to learn in universities in your home country. Additionally, most international school teachers don’t choose countries to live in only where they can speak the language (though some definitely do, which makes sense).

We all know that English is now being spoken in many countries. Maybe even all of them have some percentage of the local community that can speak English (especially the younger generations). Even if there are many people who speak English in your new host country, it is clear, though, that knowing the local language is very important. If you know at least some of the host country language, then you will be able to be clearer with the local people you have to interact with and have less miscommunication that might lead to tense culture shock moments for you. It is also important to start learning the local language because of how language is directly tied to knowing more about their culture. And that is what this international school teaching experience is all about: learning more about and appreciating the different cultures of this world.

So, the answer is easy. Just go and take some classes. Prospective international school teachers might be surprised, though, that many of us just don’t do it. And there are many reasons why we skip the opportunity or chance to attend those classes. One reason might be that you simply don’t know where to go. If your school is there to help you find these classes (or even pay for the classes for you…as some international schools include taking classes in their benefits package), then that can really help you find your way to sign up sooner rather than later. Another reason you don’t attend language classes is that you just figure that you don’t have the extra time to take them. It is a big time commitment to dedicate one or two evenings of your week to go and take language classes. A third reason might be that you are just not interested or ready to take on a 2nd (3rd, 4th, 5th…) language in your life then. A fourth reason is that you might think that you can easily just get away with speaking English your whole time living there. And if you are planning on only staying two years, you might justify to yourself that you won’t really even be in that country long enough to really need to know the language. There are probably even more reasons why we don’t take these language classes!

If you are interested in ‘taking the plunge’ and find that it is a good match for you, go and take some language classes; how nice if your new international school is there to guide you to where to take them (during your new teacher orientation programme). Your school and the people that work there might have some trusted references on schools/classes you can attend…and for the most reasonable prices. In some countries, though, the host country actually offers free language classes to new immigrants to their country, and your new school should be able to help you with how to sign up for those since they probably have many new teachers each year wanting to do just that.

Even though we all have good intentions to learn the host country language when we first move to a new country, it is a fact that not every international school teacher follows through with this. Many international schools have teachers who have been there 5-10 years or even longer, and they just know the very basic vocabulary. Being that the majority of their day is going to be in English, many teachers just get into a routine of not communicating in the local language and end of not effectively learning it. With all the possibilities of downloading or streaming TV programmes and movies in English on the internet, some teachers’ time after a whole workday in English becomes a WHOLE day of speaking, listening, reading and writing in English.

There are many success stories though. Just as many teachers there are who don’t effectively learn the host country language, there are many who do. They find (make) time to take the classes, they look for local friends to talk to in that language, they pick up the local newspaper to try and read that every day, they sit next to the host country language teachers during lunchtime to get in a few more minutes of local-language speaking practice, etc. It is ultimately up to each international school teacher to choose their own path in how they will learn or not learn the language, and having your school there to support and guide you in the right direction can be very helpful!

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So, does your international school help new teachers get beginning-level host country language classes? Please share your experiences!

And if you are interested in learning another language online, I highly recommend checking out our partner, Ling! There are so many languages on Ling, including ones that are not always represented on other websites. Check it out here:

New Teacher Orientation Must-Haves at International Schools: A starter supply of groceries for your new home.

Must-have #8: A starter supply of groceries for your new home.

There is nothing worse than arriving at your new home with an empty fridge. Even though you will probably be going out to eat a lot for the first few days, it is nice to have at least a few things in your kitchen on which you can eat/snack.

Luckily, many international schools out there are getting this one right. Someone in the “new teacher orientation” committee is going out to a grocery store before you arrive and getting you the necessities for you. What are the necessities? Typically, you get a carton of milk, a loaf of bread, a box of crackers, a roll of cookies, etc. You will also get a package of toilet paper and some paper towels, maybe. In countries where you cannot drink the water, you will most certainly get some fresh water supplies as well. Some international schools even provide you with a couple cans of beer!

It is possible that you will not even end up using some of these items, but it is definitely the thought that counts. You will probably end up using the unused food supplies at your housewarming party that you should hopefully be having during the first month or so.

Some might think that the new teacher can just go out and get their own groceries after they arrive; what is the big deal? Well, many times new teachers arrive at odd hours (read: your flight might be delayed!) and the nearby grocery store just might not be open. Also, just leaving your new home for the first time in the first few days can be a daunting experience. You might be a bit nervous about where everything is in the neighborhood and not be ready to “explore around” just yet. You also might be preoccupied with not locking yourself out of your new place to even think about getting up and out to the nearest supermarket!

Many people, though, who live abroad do enjoy exploring around foreign grocery stores. And there will for sure be time for you to explore all the grocery stores around the city, especially all the ones with expat products in them! Who knows what they might have that will be your new favorite thing to buy?!

So why wouldn’t an international school provide a new teacher to their school with an emergency bag of groceries/supplies? Are there any out there that don’t do this? It does take some manpower and time to get the emergency supplies all prepared and ready. Imagine if you had to get these same supplies for 10 or 20 new teachers; not an easy task (read: many international school teachers, even veteran ones, don’t have a car). But if the international school budgets for this, then they will most likely budget paying for a veteran staff member to find a way to organize getting these groceries and supplies. Kind of fun, I bet, to be one of the first people that the new teacher sees. After a long journey, it will most definitely put a smile on the new teacher’s face when they realize that his/her new school has thought about them. And that is what new teacher orientation must-haves are all about…making sure the new teachers are happy and comfortable.

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So, does your international school supply you with a starter supply of groceries for your new home? Please share your experiences!

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New Teacher Orientation Must-Haves at International Schools: A sit-down with an admin to go over each part of your contract

New Teacher Orientation Must-Haves at International Schools: Getting access to the internet AS FAST AS POSSIBLE!

New Teacher Orientation Must-Haves at International Schools: Beginning-level host country language classes.

New Teacher Orientation Must-Haves at International Schools: A starter supply of groceries for your new home.

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