10 January 2003
With a shortage of suitably qualified staff, New York's education bosses this week revealed details of a drive to recruit more than 10,000 new teachers. They plan to interview interested staff in England, Scotland and Ireland.
It is the first time US schools have attempted to recruit staff en masse from Britain, but they have already run up against problems, not least the fact that they have targeted the subjects where there are already teacher shortages here – maths, foreign languages and sciences.
A spokesman for the Department for Education and Skills said there had been no formal contact with their counterparts in the Big Apple. 'There exists now a global market for the best teachers and many of those are British,' he added.
One major disincentive for UK teachers looking to cross the pond is the rising level of violence against education staff in the US.
PFjan2003
