Advertising teaching positions in Ontario becuase ‘it’s the rules’

June has arrived in Ontario, and with the coming of summer also comes the postings for September teaching opportunities. A number of the boards have begun to post their vacencies, full time and contract, thus opening the flood gates for resumes from hopeful teachers. Sadly, what these ambitious young newcomers will face is litte in the way of satisfactory employment. From my conversations with teachers at schools who have postings online for ‘vacancies’ in September, 4 out of 5 of these positions are already filled by a promise to a current supply teacher or LTO contract worker.

By all means these individuals who have worked in the school, who understand its politics and methods of business, should be at the top of the list. If I was in their position I’d appreciate the priority treatment. I’m also confident that these teachers are being promised the position because they are good teachers. And that is part of the conundrum — if you are already in a school then the system can work in your favour, but if you are trying to get in, the system is only able to block your way. This creates frustration for teachers seeking a ‘foot in the door’ as they are forced to cling to these false hopes of employment that border on outright lies. I’ve talked to a number of newly trained teachers who express joy in the fact that 4 new math positions were posted online today, or 2 new science positions, or maybe a grade 7 core. The sad truth is they’ll be lucky to get an interview let alone a job offer.

Why must we post these positions when the schools have little to no intention of actually hiring an outside individual? Why waste the resources, not to mention the demorailzing effect it has on new teachers. Why promise the carrot that dangles on a stick just out of reach?

Jim Grieve claims hiring boom in Peel Board, but new teachers still under-employed

The Toronto Star today discusses the increased need for teachers representing minority groups in Ontario schools. With 40% of the population representing visible minorities, and 7 in 10 high school students (at least in the Toronto District School Board) being non-white, school boards are looking to foreign trained teachers to fill the gap.

In booming Peel Region, where the public school board is hiring hand over fist to serve an explosion of new Canadian families, schools need more diverse teachers than universities can churn out, so they’re turning to foreign-trained teachers to fill the gap, said education director Jim Grieve. (The Toronto Star)

That is a confounding statement when one looks at one school in Peel, where for the first time in 20 years, 7 teachers have been declared surplus. In total 57 teachers in the secondary panel have been declared surplus by the school board. They are all contract teachers and have to be placed before anyone new can be hired. In the midst of this ‘hiring boom’ we have 57 surplus teachers who will be placed before any new teachers can be hired.

What gives Jim Grieve? when you say ‘hiring boom’ are you talking about hiring teachers in general, or specifically a hiring boom for foreign trained teachers? The goal of hiring teachers should be to hire the best teachers available, regardless of other considerations. A good teacher can motivate, teach, and connect with students regardless of race or creed.

‘Apply to Education’ is the thorn in the foot of teacher employment in Ontario

Now that we have looked at a few over arching reasons for the surplus of teachers in Ontario it is time to look at the day to day problems faced by teachers seeking work that stem directly from policies and techniques put in place by school boards to deal with the endless surge of applicants.

The major problem affecting the hiring process in Ontario is the use of Apply to Education, a website that facilitates the posting of employment opportunities, and the distribution of required documents from applicant to school. Apply to Education removes all the personal connection that should exist in the application process and turns applicants into numbers. It allows schools to ignore applicants and grant interviews to individuals who can craft the resume full of the current most popular catch phrases. Don’t get me wrong, this is the same problem that exists with other employers who use Workopolis and similar websites. Apply to Education charges $10.50 for each region an applicant would like to have their package submitted. I am entirely against having to pay to apply for a job and think it is immoral. They justify the cost by claiming it would cost an applicant that much to mail their documents to a school. I understand the desire to manage candidates, and track their path through the system, but this is not being accomplished with Apply to Education. All it does it send a nicely formated PDF to the school. The real frustration with Apply to Education is that if you want to apply for positions in different regions in Ontario then you will have to spend $10.50 times the number of regions. An applicant who is open to working anywhere in Ontario can spend upwards of $200.

Another common problem with websites like Apply to Education is that because it is so easy to apply to jobs (just click apply) applicants tend to apply to any and every job that is posted. Applicants start to subscribe to the mind set that if I send out enough resumes, if I apply to enough jobs, I’m bound to get an interview. This process results in positions receiving hundreds of resumes, and real applicants are lost in the crowd. No one has time to look at 100 resumes, so hiring managers tend to skim resumes, and when they find 4 or 5 they like the rest never get looked at — if they even look at that many, because we all know most teaching positions are posted because they have to be, while in reality the school already has a candidate lined up.

Those candidates that like to go out, meet the principals and investigate the schools where they might like to work, are currently not able to do so. To many schools in large Ontario markets turn away potential teachers insisting they ‘visit the website’ for all employment announcements. If I was were in a position of hiring I’d much rather hire someone who takes the time to understand my schools culture and inner workings rather than a candidate who sits at home and sends out 15 applications while eating their bowl of Maple and Brown Sugar Oatmeal.

Schools are in a tough position because the reality is that there are hundreds of applicants for jobs, and it is not practical to have those 100 applicants stopping by a school disrupting the day. The solution must first start with schools only posting jobs that are actually available, instead of following ‘union rules’ and posting positions because the rules say they have to. When a teaching position has been fully qualified as open the school should set up a hiring panel that meets to read all the application packages received. For candidates that are not selected for an interview a short automated form email should be sent out, so that the candidate at least know their package was received and read by a human. If a candidate wants feedback on their application they should be able to contact the school and have a short conversation with someone on the hiring panel. Since proper notes should be taken on a resume documenting the reasons for and against granting an interview it is a simple task to relay this feedback.

These suggestions relate directly back to the ways teachers conduct their classrooms. A teacher would never return an assignment to a student with a simple percentage grade sitting alone in the top right hand corner of the documents final page. A teacher provides feedback so that the student understands why they were assessed in this way, and how they can improve on future assignments. Teachers submitting their applications deserve the same treatment. Does it take time? Yes, undoubtedly yes, but if we want the best teachers working with our students then these are the steps that must be taken. Apply to Education provides little in the way of benefits to the hiring process in Ontario, and appears to an outside observer to be nothing more than a cash grab supported by school boards who are already overworked and making $4 in funding spend like it was $6. Teaching is a very personal profession, so why are teachers forced to navigate a very impersonal hiring process?

Why do we have so many underemployed teachers in Ontario?

It has been a challenge to decide where to start this criticism of the current state of teacher employment in Ontario. I do want to discuss the front line problems with hiring, but a lot of those idiosyncrasies are the same ones that exist in every business that has ever existed. To understand why it is so challenging to obtain employment as a teacher in Ontario I think one must first look at simple economic principles of supply and demand. In Ontario there are currently to many teachers for the number of positions available — supply is dramatically out pacing demand. This leads to an obvious question: why are teacher preparation programs continuing to increase enrolment for an already saturated industry, or better still, why are students continuing to enter a profession that currently yields a 41% chance of finding regular employment?

One thing that could be said is that if the teacher employment crisis ever rights itself Ontario will be well served by teachers who want to teach, because it should be a safe assumption that those who enter a profession with such a bleak outlook for employment must really love their job. I do question how many of these new teachers grasp the true state of the employment situation. It is my assumption that no one is telling these potential students how difficult it is to find employment, and that these new teachers are making decisions based on old outdated employment data. Speaking from personal experience I can say that I was aware of the employment struggles, but I was lead to believe they existed in elementary school and the arts. As an intermediate/senior science teacher I’d have no problem securing a full time position at the first presented opportunity. Add to that the fact that I’d be willing to work in any school board in Ontario and I should have principles knocking down my door. I can now confirm that this was not the case, and all disciplines are essentially saturated with teachers. The data I was reading may have been true three years ago, but in 2008 it held no water.

The Ontario College of Teachers printed an article ‘Emerging employment crisis for new English-language teachers‘ in the December 2007 issue of their magazine Professionally Speaking. They report the grim statistics facing newly graduated teachers in Ontario. In 2000 there were 8,857 newly approved teachers in Ontario (from Ontario training programs, American border training programs, and International programs). These teachers were faced with a retiring teacher population that was creating some 7,096 positions, a difference of 1,761. Those 1,761 teachers would be able to find supply positions that could turn into contracts or full time work. Fast forward to 2006 data, where we now have some 12,434 newly trained teachers and only an estimated 5,325 retiring teachers, leaving 7,109 teachers seeking employment. Add to those numbers the recent announcement that 60 of the 72 school boards in Ontario are experiencing declining enrolment, and the question continues to be: why do we have so many teachers?

I have no data but I hear in conversation that teacher training programs in Ontario continue to increase enrolment. The anti-establishment retort is that they are in business to make money, so if students want to throw away $8,000 we’ll be happy to help them do that. There is a definite push from students who want to get into these programs, but at some point a line must be drawn and enrolment must be cut to get the employment crisis in line. Many people blame the acceptance of American and International trained teachers as the problem, but I think this is a short sighted critique. Some Ontario students consider these options for their offer of living life in a different culture, and being able to bring that experience back to Ontario to incorporate into their teaching. To deny students this option would be a blow to the country Canada is perceived to be on the world stage. So what is the answer? I think it has to start with an honest discussion of the current state of teaching in Ontario, and letting students know that it will be a challenge to find employment, that they will be lucky to get supply work, and they will have to win the lottery to get a full time position. If you really want to teach then go forth and fight the good fight, but if this is just something that you are doing to extend your time in school, or as a fall back, then perhaps you should consider a different course of action.

We could have worse problems than to many teachers. It is difficult to complain and try and place blame on a group of people who want to teach, who want to care, and who want to prepare and educate the next generation of Canadians.

Welcome to teaching in Ontario: to do what you love will require sacrifices no one told you about

Teaching is one of the most rewarding careers available today, and all those who walk it’s hallowed halls — who seek to help the leaders of tomorrow understand and question the world they live in — feel in at least some small way the enormous responsibility that sits on their shoulders. That being said, teaching is also one of the most competitive careers bogged down with an archaic hiring system, hidden within a labyrinth of hiring criteria, defined by the age old mantra ‘it’s who you know, not what you know’, and dripping with bias, contempt and hypocrisy. Sadly, there is no single problem with the teaching profession in the province of Ontario; it is hampered by a laundry list of small problems that cause the system to grind to a halt.

It is my goal to document and explore these problems, perceived or otherwise, and attempt to start a conversation to either categorically disprove my observations of a system in failure, or to suggest ways in which we can improve the hiring process in Ontario.