TORONTO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Amid an ongoing staffing crunch that is affecting schools throughout the U.S., Off2Class today announced that it is hosting a Virtual ESL Career Week from March 28 – April 1. As the provider of the leading software toolkit for English as a Second Language (ESL) teachers, Off2Class has a community of thousands of independent ESL teachers that rely on its ESL lesson plans to teach ESL online to English Language Learners (ELLs). Through its first-ever Virtual ESL Career Week, Off2Class aims to connect ESL teachers from within its community with U.S. K-12 districts that are looking to fill ESL teaching jobs.
Many school districts are struggling to hire and retain teachers on staff due to the COVID-19 pandemic, teacher burnout, and educators leaving the profession. To address this nationwide teacher shortage, many districts have eased their teaching requirements to give schools greater flexibility in bringing in support staff, parents, custodians, and others who are not qualified teachers to keep classrooms running amid the pandemic. However, as ELLs are already vulnerable to learning loss, the nationwide teacher shortage disproportionately affects this particular segment of learners. Off2Class recognizes that teachers play a critical role in successful language acquisition. And while some districts are rolling out programs to recruit language teachers from foreign countries, Off2Class believes it can play a small role in helping to solve this teacher shortage by connecting great teachers from within its community to schools and districts.
“As we have a vast network of ESL teachers that use our toolkit, Off2Class is in a unique position to help U.S. school districts address the staffing shortages that continue to be of significant concern,” said Kris Jagasia, co-founder and CEO of Off2Class. “Through our Virtual ESL Career Week, we will bring together ESL teachers from within our community and school districts that are hiring. Our goal is to help combat these staffing shortages by highlighting current job vacancies to our network of teachers, many of which may be interested in applying for full-time or part-time ELL teaching roles.”
Virtual ESL Career Week in Partnership with Leading US Districts
Working in partnership with several leading U.S. districts – including Tulsa Public Schools (OK), Harmony Public Schools (TX), and Springfield City School District (OH) – Off2Class will showcase the many career opportunities for teachers who want to work with ELLs, are open to relocating to join local school districts, and would like to work full-time as an ESL teacher. As teachers in the Off2Class community are well versed in using the Off2Class toolkit for online ESL instruction, there will also be opportunities for teachers who are not interested in a full-time teaching role to explore additional part-time, online ESL teaching roles with schools and districts.
The event will feature ESL job listings from K-12 school districts across the country, webinars highlighting districts and ESL career opportunities, along with concierge support and relationship brokering.
U.S. K-12 districts looking to hire ESL teachers and interested in participating in the Virtual ESL Career Week can get additional information online.
About Off2Class
Off2Class was founded in 2014 by former English as a Second Language (ESL) teachers who saw the need to adapt traditional classroom materials and software for the 21st-century classroom. The edtech company’s Off2Class ESL teacher toolkit provides a complete e-learning curriculum, along with assessment and professional development tools, that improves the language-learning experience for teachers and students, saves time, and drives equitable English Language Learner (ELL) outcomes. Off2Class is used by ESL teachers in more than 100 U.S. K-12 districts – including Tulsa Public Schools (OK), Harmony Public Schools (TX), Springfield City School District (OH); and over 6,000 online ESL tutors in more than 120 countries. There are more than 72,000 active students on the Off2Class platform and, to date, it has been used to deliver more than one million ESL lessons across K-12, higher education, NGOs, and private language institutions around the world. To learn more, visit www.off2class.com.
