Immigration.ca - Canada Immigration News - November 2009
The province of British Columbia is now actively recruiting in Europe in hopes of finding the teachers needed to teach French in both the English and French school systems.
The recruiter, Janet Stewart, will be travelling to job fairs in Paris and Brussels at the end of the year. Stewart works as director of one arm of the B.C. Public School Employers Association. The trip is to be “paid by a federally funded group that promotes francophone immigration.”
In the past, Quebec had been the top source of B.C.’s French teachers. However, just as the supply of teachers has dwindled from Canada’s most francophone province, the demand for French teachers and schooling has been steadily increasing throughout B.C.
“If the teachers were available, I think you would see a much bigger French immersion program in British Columbia because the demand is really there,” said Robert Rothon who is executive director of the B.C. Chapter of Canadian Parents for French.
Yet, despite Rothon’s assertions of a high demand for teachers in the province, foreign teachers are not yet flocking there as they did for other in-demand employment. The province has yet to iron out some of the bureaucratic complications in getting re-certified as a teacher. At the same time, it could be more difficult to attract civil servants from Europe, as the benefits they receive at home are highly competitive.
Recent school reports show that the shortage of French teachers is just one of several specialized areas which are lacking, including special education, music, physics and school psychologists.
Source: Vancouver Sun
