Welcome to Our World

Been to a job fair lately?

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That invariably frenetic ‘recruitment fair’, where teachers flutter their eyelashes and try to seduce administrators, where you (as a teacher) suddenly discover where the next two years (or more) or your life may be spent, with the schools of the world laying out their wares…in some cases you may find yourself with a job in a place you had never even heard of when you got up that morning.

(It’s true – I ended up teaching for eight years in a place called Moshi, but prior to the interview – which happened fairly spontaneously – I’d never heard of it).

In my experience job fairs are heady and exciting experiences, scary and exhilarating, encounters with a variety of possible futures, job offers, taking momentous decisions based sometimes on a little research and a gut feeling – OK, Yokohama – why not!?

(Again, it’s true – an offer and an acceptance all within a couple of hours).

Anyway, it is becoming more and more the rule that schools introduce themselves initially through a video presentation, through which potential job applicants get a taste and feel of the school and the location where they might be going to live and work for the next few years.

Does your school have a recruitment video? Mine does. I’m in it (for about four milliseconds) and I blogged about being interviewed for it back in November

When I was interviewed in November, I found myself trying (among other things) to define the purpose of art education and to explain the nature of the IBDP visual arts course and the objectives of MYP art.

In the actual video I’m the one saying it’s ‘a nice campus’ – but hey, that’s show biz!

Cheers!