China's international schools hit by exodus of teachers...
People stand outside the entrance of a Harrow International School
campus, which is closed amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak
in Beijing, China May 18, 2022. Picture taken May 18, 2022.
REUTERS/Carlos Garcia Rawlins
International schools in China
are facing an exodus of foreign teachers and students,with some in the
industry saying certain schools will not survive Beijing's pursuit of
covid zero. Travel curbs, lockdowns and increased regulation are all
contributing to the woes of the sector.
About 40% foreign teachers may leave jobs in China | International News | WION | News Today. Source : WION Youtube Channel
About 40% of teachers are expected to leave mainland jobs this year, up from 30% last year and 15% before the pandemic.
Aleksa
Moss is the head of early learning at an international school in
Guangzhou.She says they are struggling to replace the teachers who are
leaving:
"Now
we are in the 2022 recruiting season, we are finding a new pattern
emerging of teachers and leadership and basically all constituents in
international schools are choosing to leave China, so that candidate
pool within the country has shrunk. So it's harder to recruit within
China and it's harder to recruit outside of China. So that finding
quality staff has just been really tricky, particularly in this
recruiting cycle."
International schools can be lucrative businesses with fees sometimes exceeding $44,000 dollars a year.
They
are seen by middle-class Chinese parents as a way of improving their
child's chances of winning a place at a top global university. But in recent years, some have avoided emigrating as China, unlike elsewhere, was largely free of COVID.
Now, as the country faces a resurgence of the virus, foreign families are choosing to return to their homes. Others are put off moving to China altogether.
Tom Ulmet is executive director of the Association of China and Mongolia International Schools:
"Many
heads have told me that they have been spending up to three hundred
hours or more, trying to recruit teachers to come to China. But now,
people around the world have been reading about the lockdowns and just
don't feel a need to subject themselves to that. So they take jobs
elsewhere."
On top of this, Beijing has moved to limit foreign influence in the education system. This has meant that some schools have had to grapple with changing regulations.
Recently, a Beijing school affiliated with the English public school Harrow was forced drop its famous brand name and London's Westminster school has dropped a plan for schools around China.
SHANGHAI, May 20 (Reuters) - After teaching for three years at an international school in Shanghai, Michael is preparing to break his contract and leave, worn down by stringent measures against the coronavirus.
Following
two years of nearly-shut borders, onerous health checks and quarantine
norms, a decision at the beginning of April to lock down China’s
commercial centre proved the last straw for the 35-year-old.
"It
has reached a point where the economic benefits of working here don’t
make up for the lack of freedom to come and go," the science teacher
said, declining to give his full name for reasons of privacy.
Michael
is one of hundreds of international teachers heading for the exits as
the COVID-19 pandemic and new rules on education reshape the working
environment in China.
The
situation is prompting international schools that proliferated over the
past two decades, as China opened up to foreign investment and talent,
to sound warning bells.
Some find their survival is now on the line, while the quality of education stands to suffer in the long run.
About
40% of Michael's peers will leave mainland jobs this year, up from 30%
last year and 15% before the pandemic, says a group of 66 schools in
China that employs about 3,600 teachers.
And hiring replacements for them is getting harder, said Tom Ulmet, executive director of the group, the Association of China and Mongolia International Schools (ACAMIS).
"People around the world have been reading about the lockdowns and just don't feel a need to subject themselves to that," he added.
ENROLMENT FALL
Apart
from the departing teachers, international schools face a drop in
foreign student enrolment as the COVID curbs led many foreign families
to leave, while others stay away.
This
has changed the make-up of the student body in many schools, boosting
the numbers of Chinese with at least one parent holding a foreign
passport.
While
middle-class parents long saw international schools as a way to improve
their children's chances of winning a place at top global universities,
some have avoided emigrating in recent years as China was largely free
of COVID.
With
fees that can exceed 300,000 yuan ($44,000) a year, the total annual
value of tuition paid to international schools is estimated to be 55.4
billion yuan ($8.2 billion).
And international schools nationwide numbered 821 by 2019, says education website Xinxueshuo.
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Some
international schools for younger children have also had to grapple
with changing regulations, as Beijing moves to limit foreign influence
in the education system.
That
resulted in the recent removal of the name of Britain's Harrow School
from an affiliated school in Beijing, while Westminster School dropped a
plan for schools around China.
Both
Hong Kong-based Asia International School Limited, whose subsidiary
operates Harrow-affiliated schools in China, and Westminster declined to
comment.
In a May flash poll of European businesses by the European Chamber of Commerce, all respondents from the education sector said increasingly tough COVID curbs had made China a less attractive destination for investment.
QUALITY CONCERNS
A man wearing a face mask walks past the playground of a closed international kindergarten, amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak in Beijing, China May 17, 2022. Picture taken May 17, 2002. REUTERS/Carlos Garcia Rawlins
Parents
with children at international schools told Reuters they were
increasingly concerned about the quality on offer because of the
strictures and the lockdowns caused by China's zero-tolerance policy on
COVID-19.
Melanie
Ham's daughter missed International Baccalaureate (IB) exams in May,
along with her entire cohort, after the Shanghai lockdown held up
delivery of question papers arriving from overseas for the IB and
Advanced Placement (AP) exams.
Her
daughter's school was trying its best, Ham said, but she was still
worried about the future. "I think they're just scraping by with
whatever they can, as far as resources and planning and emotional energy
(are concerned)."
Such
woes meant the death knell for some schools in southern China, said
Aleksa Moss, the head of early learning at an international school in
the city of Guangzhou.
"A couple of the lower-tier international and bilingual schools closed down here," she said, adding, "I'm sure it’s happening in Shanghai and Beijing."
The turmoil is fuelling demand for teachers who have opted to stay on, however.
Jessica,
a middle school teacher with almost 20 years of experience in China,
said she was flooded with interview requests at a recent online jobs
fair.
"I
was offered so much money," she said, adding that one school in the
capital, Beijing, dangled a base starting salary of more than 50,000
yuan ($7,361) a month.
After 65 days, American leaves China's lockdown
STORY: "I am on my final leg of my journey here and I just wanted to say a quick goodbye to everyone in China. There’s a lot of really lovely people here and I hope that you guys survive this lockdown with as little pain as possible."
For the last 65 days, American Laura Hudson has been on a mission to leave China. She
quit her teaching job in China's northeastern city of Changchun on
March 8 for reasons unrelated to the global health crisis. But the city announced a lockdown three days later.
This kept Hudson confined to her apartment for most of March and April, without a functioning hot water heater.
She spent most of her time writing a book, figuring how to buy food and working out ways to get a flight out.
After
Changchun lifted its lockdown, and multiple plane ticket cancellations,
she flew out of Changchun on Wednesday morning (May 11) to Beijing to
catch another plane that afternoon that will eventually bring her to Los
Angeles.
"I don't think I will leave the United States for quite a long time after I get back, to be honest."
The
zero-COVID policy has placed hundreds of millions of people across
dozens of cities under various degrees of movement restrictions.
Most dramatically in Shanghai, which is now in its sixth week under a sweeping lockdown.
Official said on Wednesday that half the city had achieved "zero COVID" status. But restrictions would remain in place.
In Beijing, many businesses have been closed and large numbers of people were told to work from home.China's Palace Museum, or Forbidden City, will be shut down temporarily from May 12.
Source:
1.Reuter, By Casey Hall,https://www.reuters.com/world/china/chinas-international-schools-hit-by-exodus-teachers-dejected-by-covid-curbs-2022-05-20/
2.https://uk.news.yahoo.com/chinas-international-schools-hit-teacher-051631050.html
3.https://uk.news.yahoo.com/65-days-american-leaves-chinas-162533688.html
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