Do you want to be a teacher in Canada? If so, then you need to know how much you can earn working there, and assess if it is worth it. Fortunately, there are many resources online, including videos and articles from reliable websites, that provide this crucial information. In fact, this article showcases the information shared by an OFW Daycare Teacher working in Saskatchewan, Canada. He mainly talks about his experiences before becoming a teacher and the salary of teachers working in their province based on different levels of experience and expertise.
Salary aside, however, working as a teacher in Canada is a rewarding experience. Canada is, after all, one of the richest and most progressive nations in the world. It is also the most open to foreigners, including Filipinos, who wish to migrate there. This is truly an opportunity you shouldn’t if you are looking to start a career abroad.
Disclaimer: The information posted here is based on the personal experiences shared by the OFW in the video below. Please let this post serve as a guide only. If you have specific questions, you may ask the OFW by commenting on their video on their accounts.
Salary of a Day Care Teacher in Saskatchewan, Canada
The information provided in this article is from a YouTube video from Rhod’s channel. In this video, the Vlogger answers the question of how much the salary is of a daycare teacher in Canada. He also talks about his life as a former teacher in the Philippines, and how he managed to be a licensed teacher in Saskatchewan, and also what the perks are of having a license while teaching in Canada. You can watch the full video below:
Early Work Experience
The vlogger mentioned that he used to work at a restaurant in Canada. He was then blessed to find an opportunity in Canada to teach, something that he has been doing for 10 years back in the Philippines. Aside from being able to teach, he says he is also fortunate enough to increase his knowledge in teaching by studying in Canada.
He was also given the opportunity to be a part of the YMCA. His application got accepted, and they found out from the papers he sent that he got 10 years of working experience in the Philippines, teaching high school and children with special needs. They also saw that he had a master’s degree from the Philippines which they accepted.
It wasn’t easy for him at the beginning. He had trouble adjusting to the new teaching environment due to the difference in culture. However, he eventually learned to adapt to the culture as well as the attitude of his students. As time goes by, he became better at getting along with the students in Canada.
Getting a License to Teach in Canada
In the video, he narrates the following steps to getting a license to teach in Canada:
- Get papers and documents relevant to your teaching career and send them to World Education Services (WES)
- WES will then evaluate your papers, and send them to the Ministry of Education in Canada.
- If approved, the ministry will grant a license.
According to the WES website, a bachelor in special education graduate will just need to submit your Academic transcript. In order to do that, here are some steps you need to take:
- Ask your school to send the academic transcript directly to WES through a sealed and signed envelope
- If your school sends the transcript to you, you can send the documents yourself, sealed as well, to WES.
- A formal letter can be downloaded from the WES website which you can send to your institution.
The application process was simple, but the actual basis of teaching the kids in daycare was difficult for him. At first, he was handling children with special needs. Having said that, his initial salary is not that high because they still waited for him to get a license.
The YMCA institution gave him a form which states that if he wanted to get a license and use his papers in the Philippines, then he should get those papers and have them assessed through WES.
These papers and the WES assessment was then given to the Ministry of Education. After which, based on the equivalency of Canada and the Philippines, the ministry will then give him a license.
After several months of processing of papers and waiting, the license finally arrived. Because of this license, he was then upgraded from Level 1 to Level 2 as a teacher.
Level 2 states that he is already licensed to teach kids in Canada using Certificate level 1. It also gave him the right to receive an equivalent rate based off of the minimum wage of Saskatchewan. This is also known as the salary or rate equivalency of Saskatchewan.
After receiving his certificate level 1, at a certain date which was given by the Ministry of Education, Department of Early years, they immediately gave him the rate of Level 2 which he deserved for having a license.
Currently, he is working on his papers to have Level 3. This is what both he and the YMCA wants. The YMCA wants all of his teachers and staff to have licenses. This is also in accordance with the laws set by the province of Saskatchewan, Canada.
Salary of a Day Care Teacher in Canada
According to the vlogger, there are 4 levels for daycare teachers. Each level represents a number of things, such as the experience of the teacher and the salary they get.
- Level 0 – 11 CAD / hour
- Level 1 – 13 CAD / hour
- Level 2 – 16 CAD / hour
- Level 3 – 20 CAD / hour
This is based off the Provincial Minimum Wage Act. In the video, he converted the salary into Philippine pesos based on the average exchange rate between Canadian dollars and Philippine pesos during the time this video was recorded.
For Level 0
Your salary is 11 CAD per hour. The first paycheck is for 80 hours work or two weeks, that means you earn 880 CAD per two weeks.
For each month, you will receive two paychecks, so you will earn around 1,760 CAD per month.
As of the current exchange rate, which is 37 Php = 1 CAD, then you can earn PhP 65,120 per month as a Level 0 or minimum wage teacher in Saskatchewan.
This is quite high, but if you compare these two how others are earning in Alberta, Ontario, British Columbia or Manitoba, news say that Saskatchewan has one of the lowest minimum wage salaries.
The vlogger hopes that the minimum wage for Saskatchewans will increase, and daycare institution leaders are fighting for this salary increase, with the justification that their work entails lives and it is difficult to deal with children.
For Level 1
Your salary is 13 CAD per hour. The first paycheck is for 80 hours work or two weeks, that means you earn 1040 CAD per two weeks.
For each month, you will receive two paychecks, so you will earn around 2,080 CAD per month.
As of the current exchange rate, which is 37 Php = 1 CAD, then you can earn PhP 76,960 per month as a Level 1 teacher in Saskatchewan.
For Level 2
Your salary is 16 CAD per hour. The first paycheck is for 80 hours work or two weeks, that means you earn 1280 CAD per two weeks.
For each month, you will receive two paychecks, so you will earn around 2,560 CAD per month.
As of the current exchange rate, which is 37 Php = 1 CAD, then you can earn PhP 94,720 per month as a Level 2 teacher in Saskatchewan.
As you can see from the trend, from Level 0, 1, 2, the salary rate actually increases for an employee that works in day care institutions. As the vlogger said, the salary depends on which province you are working in.
While the minimum rate in Saskatchewan is high, he says that he is content with the salary, since he says it is enough to get by with the cost of living in the province in general.
For Level 3
Your salary is 20 CAD per hour. The first paycheck is for 80 hours work or two weeks, that means you earn 1280 CAD per two weeks.
For each month, you will receive two paychecks, so you will earn around 3,200 CAD per month.
As of the current exchange rate, which is 37 Php = 1 CAD, then you can earn PhP 118,400 per month as a Level 3 teacher in Saskatchewan.
The rates he shared are from the minimum wage at Level 0, and getting higher for each level, for the province of Saskatchewan. However, the salary still depends on the day care. Some day cares give more, while others give less.
Moreover, based on what he heard from reports of previous months, Saskatchewan has the lowest rate. The government of Saskatchewan is trying to increase the minimum wage based on the needs of the people living there.
This means that the government is not sleeping, and is taking notice of common employees like the Vlogger.
Other Requirements for Teaching in Canada
Aside from the ones mentioned above, you will need to comply with the following other requirements to be able to teach in Canada:
- Practice teaching – in the teacher education program that you graduated from, you need to have completed at least 80 days of practice teaching. If this is not the case for you, then the Ministry of Education will accept an alternative evidence: having at least one year of teaching experience as a licensed teacher.
- Language proficiency – since you are from the Philippines, you need to provide proof of the English language proficiency. You can take the IELTS for this, and make sure you have excellent scores on all parts of the test.
Being a daycare teacher in Canada, don’t expect to have a high paying job. That’s because you can’t compare this profession to the likes of doctors, nurses, those that work in huge metal industries, those that work in factories.
The rate for these professions are different from that of day care teachers. However, there are groups that are advocating the increase, even for just a little bit, of the salaries of employees working at the child care system.
The vlogger said that he is blessed as a teacher working in Canada. That’s because he never had to deal with more than one child with special need; a task that is a lot more difficult than dealing with kids that are healthy and normal.
Ever since he started working at the YMCA, he was only given one child with special need to take care of and teach. In contrast, some teachers have more than one; some even have more ten.
Because of this, he says he typically helps those teachers that have many children with special needs assigned to them. That spirit of collaboration and cooperation is one of the reasons why he finds his job to be fulfilling, and allows him to feel a sense of belongingness to a community.
Overall, it’s fun to be a day care teacher for the following reasons:
- You learn how to deal with colleagues.
- You learn how to deal with the children with special needs.
- You learn to increase your patience.
As such, the Vlogger thinks that his career is worth it. He’s done several jobs as mentioned above, but he can’t help but want to go back to what he is used to doing; a profession that has a classroom setup.
Here are some of the things he is grateful for being a teacher:
- He teaches kids.
- He shares some basic knowledge to kids.
- He gets to work in a job that isn’t too physically strenuous.
He mentioned that as an asthmatic, he can’t do jobs that involve too much physical labor, so even when he was still in the Philippines, he decided to be a teacher.
There you have it. Teachers in Canada, particularly in a province that supposedly gets the lowest minimum wage, actually earn a lot more compared to what most teachers earn in the Philippines. This makes, among other reasons, pursuing a teaching career in Canada something one must seriously consider, especially if you have the skills and experience.