looking for teaching job - moving to Tampa-St Pete-Clearwater area in July (home, neighborhood)

[skolarkev]

Anyone have an idea for the demand for teachers in Hillsborough/Pinellas? My girlfriend and I have taught for 10+ in Illinois and we've received our Florida Teaching Certificate and have our application on Pinellas and Hillsborough website. We wish to move this July provided we can land a teaching job. We our certified to teach ESOL, Spanish, and elementary education.

When do districts start hiring for next school year?

Any opinions about working in Hillsborough vs Pinellas?

Any more advice on applying besides online apps?

[MortonR]

Originally Posted by skolarkev

Anyone have an idea for the demand for teachers in Hillsborough/Pinellas? My girlfriend and I have taught for 10+ in Illinois and we've received our Florida Teaching Certificate and have our application on Pinellas and Hillsborough website. We wish to move this July provided we can land a teaching job. We our certified to teach ESOL, Spanish, and elementary education.

When do districts start hiring for next school year?

Any opinions about working in Hillsborough vs Pinellas?

Any more advice on applying besides online apps?

Take a look at my posts here and here.

RM

[Concert D Major]

Being a teacher in Florida sucks.

[ilikepizza]

Originally Posted by Concert D Major

Being a teacher in Florida sucks.

It does if you hate having lots of vacation time.

[skolarkev]

What sucks about teaching in Florida more so than other states? (I teach in Illinois)

[MortonR]

Do you have tenure? Doesn't exist in Florida. Everyone is employed at-will. No teacher's unions.

In Florida, every county has its own school district, so there are huge bureaucracies to deal with. Some of the larges school districts in the nation are in Florida as a result of this arrangement.

Everything else is pretty typical for the profession.

RM

[Candh07]

You should have a good shot with Hillsborough county, they have lots of positions available. My husband was able to get a position when we moved to the area this past July, after posting his resume on the website for months with no reply. As soon as we came down, he was hired on the spot 2 days after moving to the area, in the month of July. The only thing is they don't pay much, if you can live with that.
Maybe it is that once you're in the area, you have a better chance to be actually hired, as we heard that out of state applicants may change their mind about the move and have defaulted showing up when hired.

[mcharas]

Originally Posted by MortonR

Do you have tenure? Doesn't exist in Florida. Everyone is employed at-will. No teacher's unions.

In Florida, every county has its own school district, so there are huge bureaucracies to deal with. Some of the larges school districts in the nation are in Florida as a result of this arrangement.

Everything else is pretty typical for the profession.

RM

If I can add to this... The county schools system...

I'm not a teacher, so I cannot say what you will experience from the teaching end in a county-run system if you aren't familiar.


But, as a parent... (maybe a parent's viewpoint makes a difference for you as a teacher? I know I'm not the only one that feels this way about county schools). :

We came down from NY where each district is funded based on the taxes that a town's residents provide. We MUCH PREFER the town system. We were able to see exactly where every dime we spent went, which in turn created a very strong and committed district for, with, and by families, faculty, the board, and students. It created such an environment of accountability, too. There were still diverse families with diverse incomes and diverse housing, and yet ALL schools in our surrounding area had less disparity because the kids in each district had money spent on them directly, rather than a county spreading it thin... It created better schools by creating competition among them to all perform better. People talk a lot about "school choice" these days, and I truly believe that the best way to create school "choice" is to get rid of the county school system and have parents pay directly for their neighborhood schools. (But that brings up the problem of areas that aren't incorporated towns or villages, for which there are many in FL, and that requires a deeper discussion.)


Maybe there are teachers that can reply here some evening or weekend, or a retiree. I am intersted to see what teachers have to say myself, because I haven't found one down here in two years in a private or public school that will outwardly discuss their opinions- perhaps because of the lack of unions, which MortonR references. In any case, good luck and I hope you get the answers you're looking for.

[skolarkev]

You guys are quite a wealth of information. I've actually never had tenure, because I've changed districts a couple times. I know in Florida teachers make way less compared to where I'm teaching now. In fact, in the worst paying district around where I'm at now, the starting salary here is where Florida caps teachers salaries pretty much across the state. That's unfortunate, but something we will deal with.

[John Alecci]

My wife taught in Maryland and got a job in Pasco 3 years ago. She makes just a little less than she did in Maryland, but since there is not state income tax she takes home a little more. She found it easy to get a job quickly. She didn't really get all of her paperwork filled out until June. She had not heard or received any calls, so she started calling specific schools she was interested in towards the middle to end of July. Once she did this and starting calling about these positions she interviewed and got a job within a week. She was very picky about which schools she would call. She had her masters, but did not have ESOL, so I feel that may give you an advantage. This is the website for she used for Pasco at least. I am sure the other districts have something similar. https://mss.pasco.k12.fl.us/ESS/empl...s/default.aspx

I can't speak for the counties you are looking in, but I would image it would work similarly. There always seems to be a demand for teachers. Best advice I could tell you is to have all of your paperwork set up, and start reaching out about these positions yourself instead of waiting for someone to see your resume.