School Recruiters Turn To 'Innovative Places'

Ireneo Abadejos and Julieta Perez are among what they call the "lucky 30" Filipino teachers hired by the Prince George's County school system in October 2004 as part of an experiment to help fill a big teacher shortage.

That year the system's recruitment officer flew to the island nation and interviewed dozens of teachers, choosing 30 to come to the county as temporary workers on H-1B visas, which allow employers to hire foreign professionals and later sponsor their U.S. residency.

Filipino teachers, who are trained in their home country according to U.S. education standards, have increasingly been entering local classrooms. Prince George's County employs 110. Another 100 will arrive in the county the first week in August. They are hired at the school system's starting salary of $43,481, nearly ten times what teachers are paid in the Philippines, Perez said. The stark pay difference makes U.S. teaching slots coveted there.

And the Filipino teachers are coveted by U.S. school systems, such as Prince George's. The county has 1,000 vacancies to fill by mid-August, and it recently hired a marketing firm and launched a Web site to boost recruitment.  "We're going to continue to look for teachers in innovative places," said Robert Gaskin, the system's recruitment officer. Next year, the system may launch a search for bilingual teachers in Spain, said Randy Thornton, director of human resources.

Abadejos, 41, left a position as a science teacher at Ateneo de Manila, a boys' Catholic school in the capital city, to teach physics at Suitland High School. In Manila, he said, "you say 'do this,' and [the students] do it."

When he arrived at Suitland, a counselor told him, "You will be eaten alive," he said. Abadejos, who is soft-spoken, smiled.  "We survived," he said. "Filipinos are very pliant. As pliant as bamboo."

He is now division chairman of Suitland's physics department and last year was awarded a Who's Who Among American Teachers certificate, which he keeps in a cushioned cover and vinyl bag.

Perez, who is 35 and teaches special education at Oxon Hill Elementary, said she and the other Filipino teachers spent their first two years overcoming cultural challenges, such as learning the lingo. She often asked her American co-workers to translate such words as "joning," slang for making fun of someone.

They have since caught on. Both teachers have moved their families to Maryland and are in the process of petitioning for permanent U.S. residency, which requires them to retain their jobs with the Prince George's school system for three years.