Hello,
I'm hoping please that someone could give me some advice.
I am in the very early stages of considering a move to Canada so have not done much research yet, and am hoping you will be able to point me in the right direction.
I am a UK qualified primary school teacher, working in a private school and my partner (not married) is a gas and air conditioning engineer and plumber. We have a 1 year old son. We are both late 20s, have good professions, so I'm hoping this would go in our favour! I wonder if you could help me with the following:

-Are there any british schools in Canada? I think it may be easier for me to apply to one if possible as they would aid me with a visa. A private school would be my next aim for a job, as I've read that it is extremely competitive and difficult to get a job in a state school. Not that I'm presuming I would be given a job easily, I'm just hopeful that my experience would help me somewhat!

- What visa would we apply for and from the small amount of information I have given does it seem as though it would be possible for us to gain working visas?

- We would seriously consider going where the work is, but we enjoy warmer weather, are all very outdoorsy and enjoy walks etc - is there anywhere you could recommend we look at moving to from this info?

- Would we need to both secure work before we go, or could one of us get a job, both get visas and then the other try to gain employment once we are there? I know the USA has very strict rules about this so I am wondering if Canada is the same?

Thanks in advance for any help you can give me.

Laura

Hi, and welcome to BE.

Well, it would go in your partner's favour, but unfortunate despite teaching being a good profession, it's unlikely to be one that will get you a visa. Teaching in Canada : British Expat Wiki

There are loads of different visas for Canada, you would need to research them all and see what would suit as it's really impossible for us to say without knowing a lot more about you.

Possibly the Federal Skilled Trade program might suit your partner, or if he can get a job offer and TWP then a work permit would be an option, or PNP depending on the province you wish to go to. IEC is also an option.

Canada's not known for it's warm weather! That's not much info to go on, I think you'd need to be more specific to get useful recommendations of at least a province to narrow it down to. Canada is such a vast country, and to give you a comparative, if somebody said to you 'we like warm weather and enjoy walks, where in Europe should we move to', it would be hard to suggest somewhere right?!?

If one of you gets a job, and assuming that when you say 'partner' you mean you've lived together for at least a year or more as husband and wife, then both of you would get work permits or PR, as you'd go on the same visa application.

But as the Wiki link above, realistically, you'll need to be prepared to live on one salary for quite some time, as teaching just isn't likely to result in a job quickly.

HTH a bit, best of luck.

Thank you very much for your reply, that's a great starting point for us and give us some things to think about.

Unless you're prepared to adapt to cold winters (generally November-April) your only real choice of location is Vancouver/Victoria (British type climate). They are both extremely sought after cities so employment prospects are going to be a major issue.

We certainly have a nice climate out on the Island, but as Shard has said, good jobs are at a premium.

The Okanagan probably fits the bill with regard to warmth in the Summer and not the ridiculously freezing Winters, ours finished a month ago. Job availability is however another matter- I'm not sure about teachers, it is a tricky profession to maintain a steady job in, even for Canadians, you may well struggle to get work in a lot of places.
If you like warmth why are you considering Canada??? Would Southern Europe, or even Oz not be more appealing to you?

Thanks for your replies. We are just in the very early stages of even considering if it's an option for us at the moment, we're used to English weather so could deal with the cold (ableit it may take us some getting used to to Canada's winters!) but like most people prefer the summer months.
We'll have to think carefully about jobs, thank you to those that have commented about this.
There are some places in Europe we would consider, Australia not though - I've been there and just didn't love it and couldn't see myself living there. We are trying to think of somewhere that would suit us but mainly give our son the very best start in life, and we imagine that Canada, the USA etc may well be somewhere that would suit him just as much as it would suit us.

Thanks again everyone.

I do have some friends in Vancouver who have said how amazing it is, but they also mentioned the high cost of living there. It seems jobs are very hard to come by in Canada!

The trouble is, that as per your other thread in the US forum, and the Wiki article about teaching in Canada, both the US and Canada are a non-starter if you both want to be working straight away. So unless you have the funds to sustain yourself in either of those countries on one salary, I'd look at Europe personally. It would also be a heck of a lot easier with no visa required and lower costs etc.

Not all jobs in general - just teaching jobs! Your partner would probably find it relatively easy to get a job, although he'd have some hoops to jump through first in terms of getting licensed to work as a plumber.

Good luck with whatever you decide.

You could spend the money that immigration would cost (think 10,000 +) to give your child a good start in the UK. You have a good job in the UK which you won't easily be able to replicate in Canada, so you're already minus one wage instead of the two good ones by staying put and maybe moving areas if that's a problem. We have been living in Ontario for more than a year now and I can't honestly say hand on heart that we did the best thing by our son by moving..

OP why do you think your child can't have a good start in Britain? Are you not just trying to justify your own desire for adventure?

Britain has gone to the dogs.

Cheryl Prudham on £39k a year benefits seen shopping for designer handbags | Daily Mail Online

Birmingham man arrested suspected of going to Syria to join ISIS | Daily Mail Online

Best to move for the children.

Canada is very provincial with a sparse population spread across the huge boarder with the US.

Most significant companies do not require a presence here as any need can be filled by an office over the boarder.

That makes the availability of well paid jobs less than in other "modern" economies.

Because i would like to send him to private school and realistically that's not something we could afford in England. I've seen the difference it makes and want to give him that opportunity, hence my idea of moving which of course is to fulfil our sense of adventure and our dreams, but try and get myself a job in a private school which would most likely get him a free or heavily discounted place there. This would be more achievable for me in the USA it seems but my partner would struggle to get a working visa there, and it seems in Canada we'd have the opposite problem. I know there are some good state schools around, but there's no question in my mind after working in state and private education that private gives those children better opportunities in life, and just like any parent would argue, I want to give him the best start that we can. But as I mentioned before, we're just trying to think of all options that would suit all 3 of us at the moment before making any big decisions.

Maybe I'm missing something, but why can't you get a job at a private school in the UK if a discounted place is the reason you're moving? Do bear in mind that those in private schools can be brutal to kids that aren't as wealthy as them. So you might find he'd be happier in a state school anyway where he's not judged on the fact that he doesn't have a large house or skiing holiday twice a year!

And FWIW, both of my children are in state school in the UK and I can't fault it - their class sizes are 14 and 18 and it's an amazing school. And it's our third primary school, all of which had small classes and great teachers, so not an anomaly.

I wish you the best of luck whatever you decide, I'm sure that Europe would have some great opportunities for a teacher at a British school maybe?