Just the wee Scouse woman again folks. Have been spending a bit of time looking through past posts on here - and I have to say, I have picked up SO much useful information. What a stroke of luck that I found you all

Anyway, my other half and I are weighing up the pros and cons of Calgary and somewhere south of Toronto.

Any insights you could offer in terms of things each place could offer in terms of job availability etc? I'm an English teacher and would be ideally hoping to get a teaching job as soon as poss in relation to getting there.

Anyone know what places like London, Stratford, Cambridge etc are like? That's the area of Toronto we're currently exploring.

What about areas around Calgary? Any heighbourhoods you'd recommend?

It's really hard to get an idea of what the neighbourhoods are really like without having been there you know? Once we've decided on the city, we'll be coming over to suss things out in different areas. Would be great to have some pointers though.

Anyway, hope this finds you all well - and stress free (chance would be a fine thing, eh?)

Take a look here:
http://britishexpats.com/forum/showthread.php?t=269106

The two cities have very different characters ... I thought I liked one until I saw the other ... try to visit both areas if you can

Thanks hon...you're gem

Not really areas of Toronto as much as seperate cities in Ontario relatively near Toronto. Have to get used to the scale on the maps here!

Toronto vs Calgary....hard to answer, Very different winters for sure, and Toronto weather is less extreme. Toronto much larger city, but attracts more newcommers, so more job oportuniuties perhaps, but more competition for them. Try and visit both I guess.

You know about the hoops you have to jump through to teach in the school boards here I guess???

If ESL is your thing Toronto has a much larger market for that, and its pretty much regulation free still, so could be relatively easy employement at first.

Good Luck

Iain

Thanks for the distinction there Iain - that scale thing sure does throw you off, eh? Any idea of how long a journey it would be from, say, London to Toronto? Just so's I have some sort of benchmark?

as for the: "You know about the hoops you have to jump through to teach in the school boards here I guess???" I'm starting to get worried about that. From what I've read so far, I'd been under the impression that with my UK qualification it would be pretty straight forward to get a 2 yr temporary license to teach, but that during that time I'd have to do certain things to get permanent certification. Is that right? Or am I completely misreading stuff?

Cheers

Its the other side of TO to me, so I dont do it often. Probably a couple of hours drive (120 miles), depends to large extent in where in TO (its a big place!) and how you find the traffic. To put it in perspective I would never consider my area in Toronto, and London is probably just as far from TO in the other direction Better to contact the boards and teaching authorities directly for an assesment of skills and job prospects, you can find all kinds of conflicting info here unfortunantely.
Getting the temporary license, and landing a job with it may be two diffferent animals?

In Ontario, you apply to the Ontario College of Teachers - you have to be a member of this to be able to teach in the public system. They say it takes about 6 weeks for them to issue you with an Interim Certificate of Qualification from the time they have all your police clearance forms, transcripts, qualifications, letters of rec from the GTC from England or Scotland etc.

The catch is that you can't do all this paperwork before you arrive - you have to wait until you have your SIN number which means you need to have landed etc. before you can apply. It costs roughly just over $300 to send in your application and a further $100 once you get the Interim Certificate to become a member. It used to be that once you had the Interim Cert, you had a year to sit a four hour exam before getting full certification. However, they have just changed that but haven't said yet, what they are going to replace the exam with!

Once you have the Interim Cert, you are free to apply to teach although it is difficult to get on to some of the supply lists in some school boards. I am in London and there is only a two week window of opportunity around June in which you can apply to become a supply teacher so it is a bit of a pain. The GTA is supposed to be much easier to find teaching jobs. If you can find work in a private school, you don't need necessarily have to belong to the OCT.

Here in London, we are about a 2 - 2.5 hours away from Toronto so not really commutable. We like it because it is completely separate from Toronto and has all the facilities you expect to find in a city. I wouldn't say it is a very exciting place to live although it is a good place to raise a family. We are only about an hour's drive to either Lake Huron or Lake Eerie from here which is good in the summer. The downside is that the local school board - Thames Valley District School Board is quite difficult to get into. I am still waiting for my Interim Cert so haven't been able to try getting in yet although I have made quite a few teacher friends and it's contacts that count over here so here's hoping!!

Chris

Crikey, that far away, eh, Chris? Not that it really matters in many ways, as we're not wanting to work smack bang in Toronto anyway. Just hadn't realised it was such a way away...doesn't look like a great distance on the map!

Sounds like ye olde teaching jobs are not going to be easy to come by. Might have to look into some towns in GTA. I'd originally veered towards the London area because I have an aunt that lives in Ingersoll who's a Bank Manager. Thought being within reasonable reach of her might be an advantage?

Looks like I'd have to look for any old job to start off with, eh? Would there even be any point in writing to any of the school districts, sending resumes etc? Or would it all end up in the bin pretty much anyway since I'm still in the UK and only just getting going on all this?

Anyway, thanks for your input Chris. Really do appreciate it. It's a bit of a daunting prospect overall, eh?

Thanks Iain - you're probably right

Yeah, the paperwork is a bit of a nightmare, but hopefully will be worth it in the end! Apparently teachers get quite well paid with good benefits/pension etc. over here - it's just getting your foot in the door to start with that seems to be more difficult. ;Good luck and let us know if we can help out any more.

Chris

Any they get a lot more than 2 weeks holiday

Just on the Cambridge front it's pretty good and it's only 35 minutes to get into Mississauga. Even this morning with the snow it took less than an hour. Pretty good when you hear of people who live 5 minutes away taking 45 and 50 minutes to get in.

Have a look at www.city.cambridge.on.ca/

Cool...thanks for the link Simon! Am off to have a good look as we speak

Calgary??? Are you MAD? :scared: Toronto. No debate. Calgary is less than half the size of Toronto with less than half the things to do (and Toronto ain't the top party city either!) They have cow festivals for chrissakes! Alberta is way more right wing in their politics as well (don't know which way you 'swing'). They are more Americanised.

Toronto is more multi-cultural. The city is divided (unofficially) into 'villiages': Greek Village, Chinatown ( 3 of them), Little Italy, Little Portugal, Little India, etc. The restaurants are some of the best in North Amercia.

Jobs. There's more of them in Toronto.

They wear cowboy boots in Calgary. On purpose!

Can you tell I don't like the west?