The offer in Xinyang represented a considerable improvement.
Better pay.
A fixed schedule.
Clearly defined teaching hours.
And an established curriculum.
No more having to pull a magic trick out of thin air every time an uncooperative child decided that learning English wasn’t on the day’s agenda!
🤣
Leaving Tianjin wasn’t easy.
I’d made friends, built relationships with my students, and begun establishing a life there.
But my contract was due to expire in September 2020, and I’d decided not to renew it.
I wanted to move forward.
Despite the travel restrictions still affecting China, I was able to take the high-speed train to Xinyang.
I arrived in September.
The marketing director and other staff welcomed me, showed me my accommodation, and treated me to dinner in the wonderfully hospitable manner I’d come to associate with China.
The food was plentiful.
The drinks kept arriving.
And the welcome was genuinely warm.
Several of those colleagues would eventually become good friends.
For a while, everything went remarkably well.
Then education venues in Henan faced closures and inspections following a school fire.
Our centre temporarily closed while the necessary checks were carried out.
Shortly afterwards, another COVID-19 outbreak caused further disruption.
And then came something else.
The beginnings of what would become China’s Double Reduction Policy.
Discussions about the policy were appearing increasingly frequently in expatriate news outlets.
By the summer of 2021, the implications for the private tutoring industry were becoming clearer.
My old data-analysis instincts started tingling again.
Uh-oh.
I began to suspect that the future of for-profit tutoring centres, particularly those delivering core academic subjects, was far from secure.
And I had no intention of ignoring the warning signs.
I decided it was time to move into mainstream education.
A regular school.
An established curriculum.
A more predictable academic calendar.
And, hopefully, greater stability.
I tried warning friends who were still working at my former training centre in Tianjin.
They weren’t convinced.
Management had assured them that the changes wouldn’t affect their branch.
“That’s not going to happen here,” they told me.
Famous last words, I thought.
The pandemic had already forced the company to close several branches, including the one where I’d worked in Guangzhou.
Not long afterwards, the Tianjin branch also closed.
From what I later learned, the consequences for several teachers were severe, including difficulties involving their employment and immigration status.
I was relieved to have left when I did.
Unfortunately, my position in Xinyang was becoming increasingly uncertain too.
Our centre had been unable to resume normal operations.
With no classes to teach, my income had effectively disappeared.
But once again, I’d already begun preparing for another move.
I’d secured two interviews.
One with a primary school in Beijing.
The other with a primary school in Tianjin.
To my surprise, both schools were interested.
Despite my experience being almost entirely confined to training centres, I was being considered for mainstream primary education.
I deliberated.
The offers were broadly similar.
Beijing was tempting.
But Tianjin felt familiar.
I already had friends there, knew the city, and had an employment and residence history that could prove helpful during a period when COVID restrictions were becoming increasingly unpredictable.
So I chose Tianjin.
Once again.
I narrowly avoided another lockdown in Xinyang and returned safely to begin a new chapter.
I was finally going to become a primary school teacher.
At the time of writing, I’m in my sixth academic year at the school.
And what a journey it has been.