Maria is a South American married and living here in Jeddah with her Saudi husband. A graduate of English literature in her home country and with time on her hands, she chose to make the best use of her talents and teach at a local international school here.
The school where she is at attracts hundreds of kids of all nationalities, a selling point being the multinational teaching staff on their payroll. There are also extra-curricular activities touted in their introductory brochures to prospective parents. Items such as art, music appreciation, drama lessons, and a variety of sports. All in all, the brochure promises to deliver a fresh and healthy environment for the young aspiring minds.
But all is not fresh and healthy in Maria’s mind. She has not been paid for her teaching services for the past three months. By means of a variety of excuses, the school owner manages to avoid giving her and other expatriate teachers their dues.
Blaming the current economic conditions, his pleas to defer their demands for some more time are beginning to fall on deaf ears, as Maria and the other teachers are not unaware of the healthy income being generated with the sign-up of each new pupil or of his frequent excursions to various sight spots around the world. There’s also the spectacle of the new Mercedes 600 proudly driven by the owner himself!
But what is her recourse? She has a contract all duly signed by the owner himself, but where could she really go to demand her due? This particular school operates outside the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Education as many other such schools sprouting out and about every year.
There is always that underlying threat that women like her are not really legally authorized to work, and thus get taken advantage of more frequently than not. Or the subtle warning that were the teachers to band together and approach any official body outside of the school, they would all be effectively terminated. Employee strikes or labor unions of any sort are banned, they are constantly told. And they risk deportation!
Some teachers at her school have begun to take it out on the kids, she says. Despondent over their financial woes, they have lost the desire and initiative to teach effectively, letting their classes run wild in most cases. And while Maria has still not lost the will to teach, she admits that her heart is not in it anymore.
The few expatriate parents that Maria has spoken to of this predicament simply shrug their shoulders in hollow sympathy and walk away. So long as the school doors are open and their kids are in attendance, they refuse to get involved in anything controversial.
Maria’s case is not at all unusual. There are countless such women teachers here being taken advantage of year after year, and yet nobody seems to be regulating or enforcing fair play in such matters. The law governing the right of women to work, and especially expatriate women married to Saudis is gray at best.
Owners of such schools realize the precarious predicament of such expat teachers, and have fully used it to their own advantage. With false promises and worthless contracts, they are too busy collecting the money to wonder about the harm and damage to the personal esteem of their teachers. They freely promote their schools on the credentials of their foreign staff, yet it is this very foreignness that ends up biting the poor teachers where it counts; their wallets!
Today Maria hangs on, torn but determined, in the hope that the owner will make good on his word to pay the staff their arrears after the Haj holidays. That is, when he returns to the Kingdom from his restful trip to Cyprus! — Tariq A. Al-Maeena, [email protected]