Georgia school districts plan changes on foreign teachers

ATLANTA (AP) Two large Georgia school districts are making changes in how they hire foreign teachers from contract recruiters.

DeKalb Schools Superintendent Michael Thurmond told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution the district will put out for public bid its annual contract for international teachers. He said new language in the bid will bring greater accountability to recruiters, while the district also moves to use less of their services.

Officials at Atlanta Public Schools said they will discontinue use of the recruiting firms entirely.

Neither district will offer any job guarantees for the approximately three dozen teachers currently in its classrooms. As a result, foreign teachers hired by recruiting firms now in those districts could find themselves out of work if a district uses a different recruiter going forward. If they cannot find work, the foreign teachers could be required to leave the United States.

The newspaper previously found Georgia schools have spent more than $50 million 2010 paying recruiting firms to import foreign teachers to staff hard-to-fill positions in math, science and special education. DeKalb County schools spent the most of any district on those contracts.

Some of the teachers recruited to the United States have said a recruiter asked them to pay some or all of their immigration expenses, while others said they went weeks or months without pay while waiting for a job with a school district.