Teacher needs advice, direction looking for a job in Miami

[ms.placed]

Originally Posted by ray1945

Happy to help...

If you had settled in central or north Florida, you would probably have found more of a demand for your certification area. However, Miami is a majority Hispanic city where Spanish is a first language for many, so our students often choose to study other languages in high school - resulting in less of a need for Spanish as an elective.

If you are not Hispanic, chances are you would not be hired to teach Spanish. Same for ESL/ESOL.

For the past few years of diminishing budgets, principals have put off hiring new staff until the end of July/beginning of August - another reason why you might not have gotten any bites on your applications.

A list of technology magnet schools: Miami-Dade County Public Schools - Division of School Choice & Parental Options

And a list of high schools with career academies in Office and Information Technologies
Miami-Dade County Public Schools - Division of School Choice & Parental Options

As you can see, there are a number of "schools of choice" focusing on technology that draw students out of their home schools to centralized locations, which results in less of a demand for technology classes in their home schools. Combine that with school budgets not able to support small classes and the previously mentioned mandatory double dosing of core subjects, and it becomes clearer why technology ed is disappearing from many local schools.

My recommendation to you is, if you can afford to sub for a while, do so. Get on the sub list with the county and then personally go to schools in which you would like to sub. Very often temporary positions open up and good, fully certified subs usually get a first shot at them. If I were you, I would focus on technology magnet or AOIT schools.

Good luck!

Thank you so very much. I greatly appreciate all the information and the links. I only wish I would have come across your information a couple of months ago. I didn't realize how differently things work here. I am Hispanic, and I can understand the idea behind only hiring Hispanic ESOL/Spanish teachers. I do believe substitution will be a gateway in making more professional contacts. It's been very difficult to do that, as of now.

Are you an educator/former educator? If so, what subject(s) or fields?

[ray1945]

Originally Posted by ms.placed

Thank you so very much. I greatly appreciate all the information and the links. I only wish I would have come across your information a couple of months ago. I didn't realize how differently things work here. I am Hispanic, and I can understand the idea behind only hiring Hispanic ESOL/Spanish teachers. I do believe substitution will be a gateway in making more professional contacts. It's been very difficult to do that, as of now.

Are you an educator/former educator? If so, what subject(s) or fields?

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