Coming to America for a better life and to educate Houston children

"So far it's been the best experience of my life"

By JANICE WILLIAMSON
11 News - Houston
April. 24, 2002

HOUSTON (KHOU) -- School is not even out yet and already Houston area districts are scrambling to find enough teachers for next year.

A Houston company is making it it's business to provide a foreign fix by recruiting teachers from overseas.

It's been four years since Maria Moliner came to Houston to teach. "So far it's been the best experience of my life," Moliner says."

In Spain, teaching was more prestigious. Here, it's more of a challenge. "I need to make a difference with these kids," she says.

Three hundred teachers in India want the same opportunity. And a Houston company is working to make their dream to work in America a reality.

Like most teachers recruited by U.S.A. Employment, Sandy Lawrence is well qualified. She has a bachelor's degree, two masters and twelve years of experience.

"We have a classroom of 60 students, so classes of 25 seem a heavenly class to me," Lawrence says.

She will spend three weeks in Texas interviewing.

"My initial impression is these are teachers who can teach in America," says Dr. Mike Ford of the Texas City Independent School District.

Even with a teacher shortage, the idea of an agency recruiting teachers is not without criticism.

"If their intent is not to seek citizenship and stay, they're a band aid," says Gayle Fallon of the Houston Federation of Teachers. "We prefer long-term solutions to band aids."

Sandy Lawrence is willing to move her family to America permanently. She makes $200 a month in India, and spent $2,000 to come here in the hope of finding a job.

"That's my first and last gamble. It's going to pay off, I know," she says.

U.S.A Employment recruits foreign teachers at no cost to area school districts.