In episode 166 of the Teacher Career Coach podcast, Rachel Johnson talks about her transition from teaching in the U.S. to teaching internationally.
Rachel shares her motivations, the unique experiences she gained abroad, and the challenges she faced, including her return to the U.S. during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Elizabeth and Rachel discuss the benefits of international teaching, such as cultural diversity and better resources, and offer practical advice on finding international teaching jobs through sabbaticals and job fairs.
Rachel’s journey serves as an inspiring example for teachers seeking new career paths outside the traditional classroom.
Listen to the episode in the podcast player below, or find it on Apple Podcast or Spotify.
Explore the course that has helped thousands of teachers successfully transition out of the classroom and into new careers: The Teacher Career Coach Course
Mentioned in the episode:
- Use code “TCC” to get 50% off of everything at Aspireship
- Our career path quiz at www.teachercareercoach.com/quiz
- Explore the course that has helped thousands of teachers successfully transition out of the classroom and into new careers: The Teacher Career Coach Course
Episode Transcript:
Elizabeth: Hi everyone, and welcome back to our next episode. Today, I’m excited for you to listen. We get to know Rachel Johnson, and Rachel spent seven years teaching in the U. S. before transitioning to teaching internationally. She was looking for ways to increase her travel opportunities and explore the world.
What originally was planned as a two year stint overseas turned into eight, and she had no intention of returning to the U. S. But when COVID hit, she had to return back to the States and transition back into the U. S. working environment. She found the Teacher Career Coach, which helped her transition into educational consulting.
We’re so excited for you to listen and hopefully get inspired if you are looking to travel. And we can’t wait for you to hear Rachel’s story.
Well, welcome back, everyone. I’m so excited to have Rachel with us today. Welcome, Rachel.
Rachel: Thank you. It’s so nice of you to have me here.
Elizabeth: Well, we appreciate your time today and we can’t wait to learn about your teacher transition journey. And we’d love to start out by hearing a little bit about what got you into education in the first place.
Rachel: So I like I’ve wanted, I wanted to be a teacher from a very young age. I loved being with younger kids. I really was inspired by my younger brother who struggled in education, but really found a lot of help with some teachers that he connected with deeply to help him through that education journey. And I just, I wanted to be one of teachers for the next generation of kids. So I knew that I wanted to be a teacher from very early on. I just didn’t know it was going to take so many different forms throughout my career.
Elizabeth: And then what, um, what did the environment look like? Were you in public school? What grade level?
Rachel: I started off in public school as a special education teacher, and I did that. for six or seven years before I guess my first transition that I took where I went then into the classroom became a classroom teacher. So throughout my career, I guess I’ve had a couple of mini changes and a couple of bigger transitions as well.
Elizabeth: That’s so interesting. What brought you to move into a classroom? To kind of transition from special education into general education.
Rachel: At that stage, I was looking to really develop. Diversify my resume. I wasn’t sure what exactly I wanted to do next, but I knew that if I added a variety of experiences to my resume, it would open up more doors for me in the future. So at that stage, it was my very first job out of college was in special ed, and I knew that if I wanted to do something else further on down the road, it would help if I had something else that I could add on to my resume as well.
Elizabeth: That makes sense. And can you tell us a little bit about, you know, you have a couple transitions here throughout your journey. So what is the reason you left traditional public school?
Rachel: So what happened in my story is that I worked in a school district that had a really cool program that after you had worked with the school district for six years, you could take a sabbatical. And so I knew that I could have a sabbatical, which would guarantee me a job to come back with. And the sabbatical was a one year sabbatical. With option to extend up to five years time. So after I had worked my initial six years and I qualified for that sabbatical, I I wanted to try something different. And at that stage in my life, my husband and I didn’t have any kids and we really love to travel, but I had two personal days a year to travel with and he had a typical day job where he had two weeks of vacation a year, it just wasn’t enough for us at that stage. So what we decided to do is we wanted to live overseas. We thought if we can’t travel as much as we want to, What if we actually placed ourselves in another country and lived and got immersed in that culture and got to experience things on a bit deeper of a level. So as we began researching, we realized that following my job as a teacher was going to be far easier for us to follow internationally than following his career. So we took the leap. We both. Quit our jobs. We sold all of our belongings. We sold our home. And I got my first international teaching job after going to a job fair. And we packed up a few suitcases and we headed off to the Middle East. I
Elizabeth: There’s so many things here that I want to unpack. Um, the first is you touched on that your district offered a sabbatical and I’ve heard that, you know, From a few different districts. So for those who maybe are unaware of that offering, where would you go to learn more about that?
Rachel: feel like I was fortunate because I had a friend who kind of paved the way for me. He had done this exact thing. And I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa. Like, How did he do that? I want to know more about what he has, he had done. And we worked in the same school district. And he just told me like in our contract, like we need, like, check out this section, particular section of your contract. And it was a very small section of my contract that just said teachers are eligible. For sabbatical after six years of service. So if I was a teacher in another district, or if I was telling people to look into this deeper, that’s the first place that I would start looking is I would dig through the fine print of my contract to see if there was any option for sabbatical that existed, because that was really the safety net in this whole plan of both of our jobs.
selling our house, moving overseas is we always had that little cushion of if this doesn’t work out, I can always come back and a job is waiting for me. So I just felt like I could take the leap and I had that safety net that was ready to catch me if it wasn’t a good fit.
Elizabeth: That’s amazing. And so teachers look in the fine print of your contract and then, you know, check with personnel, check with your district. And I’m curious to know, just like on a personal level, how did it feel? When you were selling your things and getting rid of your belongings, what was that like?
Rachel: You know, there was fear that went into that of, gosh, are we doing the right thing? But there was also so much excitement that was wrapped into it as well. And one of the things that really on that excitement for me was to think about, Oh, Where are the places that we could travel? So when we moved to the Middle East, we now had this new travel bubble that when we had a long weekend, if we had a four day weekend, we could fly to Egypt and go to the pyramids. Or if we had spring break off of school, we could go to the Maldives. And our world kind of shifted in that way, where even in those moments where I was feeling nervous and scared and, uh, apprehensive about taking this leap, I would just kind of reframe my thinking of, think about these other things that are now a possibility where I couldn’t on a four day weekend living in the U S head to the pyramids in Egypt.
It’s just, wasn’t a possibility, but these things opened up in my world after I had made this change.
Elizabeth: That’s amazing. A whole new world of opportunities. And I’m curious to know, um, so how did you find international schools? I mean, and this specific one, you know, a lot of teachers in the U. S. have teaching credentials in their state. So what’s the process like and where should they look? What was it like for you?
Rachel: So there’s. kind of tiers of teaching overseas. So there are teaching positions where you are teaching English to local children in kind of like an academy type setting where you maybe just need a four year degree to be able to do that. And that happens in lots of countries the world. And then there are Also like local public schools that teachers can teach at where they are the English teacher working at a public school and lots of those are often open to people who don’t have traditional teaching credentials as well. But what I opted for was to work at international schools and international schools are as if you have taken a school from The U.
S. or from England or Canada, and you have dropped them into another country where the full day course load is all in English and it the whole day runs in English as if, you know. You were in a school down the street from you here in the U S that’s the route that I went and how I found jobs is I went to international job fairs.
And so they have these job fairs in different cities across the world every year and teachers can go and you have like nine, 10, 12 interviews in a day. And then all of a sudden you’re choosing between, you know, Do I want to move to Dubai or Morocco or Buenos Aires and you have all of these options that exist and you’re making a decision on the fly.
Elizabeth: Wow. This is really helpful. I think, you know, I didn’t even know about these job fairs. So Okay, look up the job fairs in your area and I’m curious about the community. So in these international schools, is it? Is it diverse? Is it a mix of just different people living in this community? Is it a lot of english language learners?
Tell us a little bit about your unique just the culture and the community of the school.
Rachel: So I’ve had, because I’ve lived in a couple of different countries, that’s looked different at different times. So the first location that I went to in the Middle East, our school I think had representation from over 70 different countries. In the student population at the school. So it was very diverse and had students from all over the world that had come to live in this country for a variety of reasons. And because they’re oftentimes their parents are having a job in that area. But the school looked very diverse with the student population as well as the teacher population. So we would have Teachers and friends that we’re working with that are from New Zealand and Australia and the UK and Canada and a variety of countries that have all come together. So another real big bonus for us is we now have friends in lots of different corners of the globe that we get to visit as well.
Elizabeth: That’s amazing And would you mind sharing just what are the other countries that you taught in as well?
Rachel: So I taught in Kuwait, in the Middle East, and then I taught off of a little island off the coast of South Korea called Jeju Island.
Elizabeth: Oh, how cool. Well, I’d love to learn a little bit more about some of the differences between U. S. public schools, and I know, you know, you went to many different schools internationally, so maybe think about, about one specifically, but were there things that you noticed that were different from how the structure is here and there?
Rachel: So a few things that I noticed as a difference is In terms of the teaching aspect is the class sizes were significantly smaller than what I was used to in the US, and I will preface that saying worked at a very wealthy, you know, very wealthy community here in the US that was well resourced and was a great school, the school, the class sizes are still significantly smaller internationally. As well as the budgeting that we, I had as a teacher to spend on resources for my classroom was significantly higher. Where in the US I was oftentimes purchasing things for my own classroom out of my own budget, um, with my own wallet, where that was never happening when I went internationally. On a personal side, the pay that I received as a teacher. Was significantly higher internationally than it was here in the U S well as countries that I worked in, I worked at a tax free, um, uh, tax free pay structure. So every dollar that I made, to keep because I lived in a tax free environment and in the postings that I have been on and all the jobs I have taken, housing has been included. So all housing was included. All of my utilities were included. I got to keep all of my salary that was significantly higher than I made in the US all completely tax free, which just really changed the game for my family in our, Ability to financial plan for the future because of these shifts that had happened in pay structure.
Elizabeth: That’s very helpful to know, and it sounds like those are just. That’s a plethora of benefits. Like everything you said is a benefit and,
Rachel: Every school obviously is going to be different. So different pay structures at different schools. But my experience was it was higher pay across the board for me.
Elizabeth: and then on a level, let’s say like a stress level, what was that like with classroom management behaviors, talk us through some of the differences of like the actual day to day in the classroom.
Rachel: One huge difference that I felt at, from being internationally to in the U S is when I taught internationally, each classroom also had A second fully qualified teacher that was in the classroom as well. We call them teacher interns. They were oftentimes brand new teachers straight out of college, but also fully qualified, teachers. And so from when I would be in a classroom in the U S I would have a higher caseload of children all by myself, or when I was internationally, I would have a co teacher that I would work with. And a smaller class size and our ability to divide and conquer workload as well as small group instructions for Children was just so much higher internationally than when I could pull off on my own here in the U.
S.
Elizabeth: That makes sense. You have a whole other body and person and qualified person with you throughout the day. Well, so we talk a lot about with, um, the teacher career coach community, you know, just trying out different environments. So, you know, this. It’s to me sounds like, you know, if you’re not ready to leave the classroom, it could be an alternative option to explore and then especially if your district has that sabbatical program, you know, it’s kind of like you have that spot to come back to if that works out.
And then,
Rachel: 100%. I completely agree with that. If for me, it wasn’t the teaching was driving me to want something more. I loved the teaching part of it, but I felt just too restricted in what that schedule looked like. And so by just making the change of, I’m going to continue to teach. But I’m going to do it in a different part of the world that really opened things for me in that pathway.
Elizabeth: and you mentioned like in the US, you had about two personal days. Um, internationally, was there a time off as well with your contract there?
Rachel: Yeah, so in different schools that I worked at, not only would we have, say, uh, American holidays recognized in our schedule, but we might also have local holidays recognized as well. And so we just found ourselves with um, time on our hands that we could travel with and explore. So it was very common for my husband and I to take our kids on or five international trips per school year where we would zip off to different countries and go and explore things there.
Elizabeth: Wow. And then this is kind of a specific question, but it could be helpful to the audience. What does it look like with the visa situation and the, the paperwork needed? Cause you, you know, you brought your husband with you, kids. So walk us through that.
Rachel: Yeah. So initially it was just my husband and I that went overseas and our initial plan was, we’re going to go overseas for two years and then we’re going, we’re going to go play and travel and have fun. And then we’re going back to the U S and we’re going to have kids and we got overseas and we’re like, there’s no way we’re going back.
Like we are loving this way too much. And so we ended up having both of our sons born internationally as well. And. there was a whole process of paperwork in terms of getting us visas into country, getting birth certificates, getting passports. There was hoops to jump through for all of that. But at every school that I’ve worked with and that all of my friends I talk to, every school really has people that can hold your hand. that process. So when you initially get hired on with the school, they will have an entire department of HR personnel that are taking you step by step of, these are the things that you need to do to receive your visa, or these are where you need to send your passport to, or this is how you get a birth certificate. So even though there’s plenty of hoops to jump through in terms of, paperwork wise to make it happen. I have never had to do any of it independently. And I’ve always had someone giving me a checklist of here are the things that you need to do for this to happen.
Elizabeth: That’s great. And that, that makes sense. You know, there They’re fully aware, and all of their teachers are coming from everywhere, so it makes sense that they have a good system in place for that to support you.
Rachel: first time doing it, but they had done it plenty of times. So I just followed exactly what they told me to do. And it all worked out just fine.
Elizabeth: And did you have a favorite place or location that you worked at?
Rachel: We spent six years living on Jeju Island in South Korea and, and really loved being, um, in Korea, the island we lived on was a volcanic island. We lived about 15 minutes from the beach. So we spent a ton of time. Our boys were little there, so they spent time running in the waves and playing there. And it was a fantastic place to be. And honestly. I think we probably would still be there or somewhere if COVID hadn’t gotten in the way of our travel situation. So we were internationally living internationally when COVID, took over the world and borders shut down. And while we were very safe and in a good place to be in Korea, The borders closing down meant that we couldn’t get to our family and our family couldn’t get to us easily. So that was truly the driving factor for us making a move back to the U S but without that unplanned situation, I think we probably still would be international.
Elizabeth: now I kind of feel like we have a second transition journey to talk about, because you’re back in the U. S. after COVID, so tell us a little bit about what you’re doing now.
Rachel: So what ended up happening with me is. My husband and I are living overseas and we’re coming back to the U. S. And we have this whole brand new, fresh start. And it’s like, okay, what’s for us? And what does this look like going forward? I. Just couldn’t picture myself back inside a classroom in the U.
S. Even though I had a really positive experience, and I love my co workers and I had great students when I was here, I couldn’t. I couldn’t see myself going back and taking a pay cut and feeling like I lost freedom of my time and choice of what that looked like. And that’s when I turned to to Teach your career coach and finding out how do I find my next step forward. So when I started exploring what can this look like and what kind of industries do I want to look in and how can I transition back to the U. S. And not teach, even though I felt like it was is who I am and this is all I’ve ever known. Teacher Career Coach really led me through that process of putting my thinking into buckets and organizing my thought process into how do I want this next stage of my life to look. And what it really led me down the path of is I’m still incredibly passionate about education and I love being in education. So I decided I wanted to look at Education Adjacent. positions. So that could still be a part of it, but I wasn’t fully committed onto a teacher And where I ended up myself in a place that fits really well is doing contract educational work. So I am currently in, early literacy coach and I travel to different states and I work with teachers and principals and superintendents to really work on raising the level of education, literacy education specifically, within a different school system. So I have flexibility and choice of when I’m traveling, when I’m not traveling, when I’m home with my family, and agency of what my time like and it’s been a really great fit. For me at this stage, I’m still not, I love teaching so much. I’m still not even ready to say I’m never going back into the classroom. But for right now, this is a really great fit for me.
Elizabeth: Oh, I’d love to hear that. Yeah, and I think it’s important, too, you know, a lot of teachers are They’re passionate about education, of course, and it’s, it’s like, how can you find If you still want to be in that realm that outside of just the traditional classroom. And so that’s really neat. And I’m curious to know, is this position, is it through a company?
Is it through a school district? Um, what does that look like?
Rachel: So what I have found is that quite a few companies hire contract workers. And at this stage I hold. positions with two different companies as a contract worker. And so they’re both part time positions. They’re both contract work. So I don’t have cons that people might say is I don’t have health insurance through those positions. Luckily, my husband does have health insurance so I can utilize that. So that part was fine by me. by having two different contract positions, I can well exceed what a teacher pay would have been if I got a job here in the U. S. And I still have the agency and control of deciding what does that schedule look like for me and how do I want to utilize my time?
Because as a contract worker, I do have the agency of making my schedule that way.
Elizabeth: And that leads me to my next question because I think this is an avenue that a lot of people are interested in doing contract work, but, but it’s kind of like, how do you take that leap? Is there, uh, Did you create a business name to make an LLC and then start looking for jobs? Or did you find the job first and then decide you were going to be contract?
Rachel: I found the job first. So what, how my pathway, I guess, led me here is. Initially, working in the US, I was a special education teacher and then a classroom teacher. When I moved internationally, I became a reading specialist, an interventionist, and then eventually I became a literacy coach where I was working with, directly with teachers. So the pathway that I had chosen while I was still working directly in schools opened up my avenues for me when I decided to not be working direct, directly through the school system. So the decisions that I had made. to leaving a school network really opened that up for me on. So I already was working directly with teachers before I left school.
And so when I was applying for contract work, which was coaching teachers, my resume led those doors to be opened for me.
Elizabeth: That makes sense. And then what was the job search process like? Was it, was this something you found through the community, a job fair? Because I know, you know, currently it’s, it’s busy out there. A lot of people are looking for positions. So how did you even find these and what was the interview process like?
Okay.
Rachel: I found these positions through LinkedIn, which to be honest, I had never even been on LinkedIn until I signed up for teacher career coach, which led me to sign up and I found both of these companies through LinkedIn and applied for the jobs. after I had found the positions LinkedIn, but they were not the first positions that I applied for.
I had applied for many contract positions and oftentimes was completely ghosted and heard nothing afterwards. So I totally understand when people feel a bit discouraged in the job hunt, because are a lot of people that would be interested in finding shifts and still be able to remain near education, but not directly working with students at this time.
So just encourage people not to give up and to continue to, um, send out those resumes and keep looking for those positions. And I would filter exactly on LinkedIn. I would look exactly at the contract part time positions because I wanted as much flexibility in the job as possible.
Elizabeth: That makes sense. And then. In terms of now that you’re contract, is there anything specific business wise that you do different with taxes or, you know, how that works?
Rachel: Um, yes, I hire somebody because I just don’t know enough. So I have just gotten to a stage where I’m very comfortable knowing that taxes is not going to be my forte. And I have just found a company that I, that specializes in contract workers. And I, follow, they give me a little checklist of what I need to do and I fall in line with what they say. So I also realized that when you make job changes, it is okay to say like, this is not an area that I am an expert in and let’s find someone to do that for me.
Elizabeth: Oh, that’s great. And then, can you walk us through, um, just the day to day in your new position?
Rachel: Yeah. So of the positions that I work now is exclusively virtual. And I work on a coaching model with teachers virtually where they send in videos of lessons and we reflect back on them together. And then we can do co planning together virtually. So I can be at home. working from home while my kids are at school and have total control of what that schedule looks like. My other position is I travel five days of the month. So I will be on site at a school five days of the month, but I can choose what those five days are. And so I will. Fly in, be on site, I might do, say, two days, fly home, and then I might go a couple days, weeks later, fly in, and maybe I’m there for three days, and then I fly home. And that’s kind of how I balance my schedule out of sometimes I’m traveling, and sometimes I’m just home working virtually, working with teachers, um, exclusively through Zoom.
Elizabeth: How cool! And I love hearing that flexibility part, kind of how you said it. It works for you, your lifestyle and family, so I think that would be interesting for others, too, who are just looking for a bit more flexibility in the workspace. And then, how has your work life balance changed, and let’s say, let’s take it from the beginning, like when you were special ed and general ed, and how has it changed since then?
Rachel: Significantly, um, I, I was teaching in the U. S., I didn’t have my own children yet, and I could devote as many hours as I wanted into a classroom and didn’t feel pulled other ways. But after becoming a mom and having my own kids, I didn’t want to be working at home. Extreme hours after my contract hours were up, I wanted to be home and spending time with my kids and going to soccer practice or swimming lessons and things like that.
And so after moving back to the US two years ago, my younger son was in preschool still, and I was able to be home with him for. He would go to preschool in the morning and I would be able to be home with him in the afternoons. And that option did not exist before when I was teaching on a full time basis. And so having that to be able to spend two years with more time devoted to my kids has been absolutely fantastic.
Elizabeth: That’s so great to hear. I love that. And then we always kind of love to wrap these up by asking you, what have you learned about yourself through this transition journey?
Rachel: Yeah. One thing that really, um, surprised me when I came back to the U S because I had spent so much time around other expats that I just became conditioned to thinking everyone knows that you can move overseas and everyone knows that there’s other options that exist out there. And I came back to the U S and realized we’re kind of a strange family that has picked up and moved to the other side of the world and not everyone feels comfortable with that. And I started to get so many questions about like, What if I want to teach overseas? And how do I go about that? And can you tell me how you did that? And it led me down a path of realizing that people would love to learn more about this and to hear more about this. And so I started an Instagram account where I’m sharing information and helping people land jobs internationally who also want to travel. So if there’s anyone in the audience that is interested interested in learning more about being an international teacher, they’re free to follow me at the global thinkers on Instagram, me, the global teachers on Instagram and they can hear all about to get into international teaching and that that is an option that is still exists.
And I really hope it’s an option that I head back out and travel and teach again someday as well.
Elizabeth: Thank you for sharing all of this. Like, I’m excited to follow your Instagram account, and thank you for paying it forward to people who are interested in this. And especially, it’s just, It’s been so fun and unique hearing your story and just your two different avenues and it just provides, you know, a new option or avenue that maybe someone hasn’t explored yet.
So we really appreciate your time and thank you so much for joining us today.
Rachel: Thank you for having me.
