Commonwealth Teacher Recruitment Protocol

Address:

c/o Health and Education Unit Commonwealth Secretariat Marlborough House
Pall Mall London SW1Y 5HX UK

Telephone: (44) 20 7747 6289

Fax: (44) 20 7004 3645

Email:

education@commonwealth.int

Aims and objectives:

Adopted by ministers of education at Stoke Rochford, United Kingdom on 1 September 2004, the Protocol aims to balance the rights of teachers to migrate internationally against the need to protect the integrity of national education systems, and to prevent the exploitation of the scarce human resources of poor countries.

The Protocol also seeks to safeguard the rights of recruited teachers and the conditions relating to their service in the recruiting country. The Protocol promotes the positive benefits that international teacher migration can bring and facilitates the sharing of the common wealth of human resources that reside within the Commonwealth.

Main activities:

Until recently, implementation of the Protocol was guided by an Advisory Council that met annually. This was informed by a series of Symposia on Teacher Mobility, Recruitment and Migration where research on a range of issues pertinent to the protocol have been presented.

In order to facilitate the implementation of the Protocol, the Commonwealth Secretariat has prepared a Model Memorandum of Understanding for the Recruitment of Migrant Teachers. This document provides a framework for negotiation between two countries that wish to enter into an agreement to manage the migration of teachers from one country to the other.

Recent publications:

Recent publications, in addition to the Protocol itself, include:

• Next steps in managing teacher migration. Proceedings report of the Sixth Commonwealth Research Symposium on Teacher Mobility, Recruitment and Migration