A fifth of Hong Kong’s international schools are struggling to hire teachers just days before the start of the new academic year, as analysts and staff warn that the city’s strict Covid-19 quarantine regime is making recruitment “extremely difficult”. 

就在新学年开始前几天，香港五分之一的国际学校正努力招聘教师，分析人士和工作人员警告称，香港严格的新冠肺炎隔离制度使招聘“极其困难”。

Not even the offer of higher wages has been enough to attract teachers to the Chinese territory, which has had to follow a version of Beijing’s contentious zero-Covid policy. 

即使提供更高的工资也不足以吸引教师来到中国领土，中国领土必须遵循北京有争议的零新冠政策。

“The salaries are already at the top end,” said Ruth Benny, a Hong Kong education specialist at consultancy Top Schools. “There is not much more most schools can do. They need to be a bit more creative about incentives. It is tricky.” 

“工资已经达到了最高水平，”顶尖学校咨询公司香港教育专家鲁思·本尼（RuthBenny）表示。“大多数学校所能做的不多。他们需要在激励方面更具创造性。这很棘手。”

There are about 50 international schools in the city but at least 10 institutions were still hiring teachers as of this week, a Financial Times analysis of job advertisements found. 

英国《金融时报》对招聘广告的分析发现，该市约有50所国际学校，但截至本周，至少有10所院校仍在招聘教师。

Some schools are looking for headteachers and associate heads. International schools, which are typically attended by expatriate children, charge up to HK$274,000 (US$35,000) at secondary level per year. As with other businesses in the city, international schools have been buffeted by severe Covid restrictions and lengthy quarantine for incoming travellers.

一些学校正在寻找校长和副校长。国际学校通常由外籍儿童就读，中学每年收费敢达274000港元（35000美元）。与该市其他企业一样，国际学校也受到了新冠疫情严格限制和入境旅客长时间隔离的冲击。

Schools have also had to cope with the introduction of a sweeping national security law that affects the school curriculum. This has led to an exodus of staff with many companies struggling to attract talent. Benny said the difficulties of hiring new teachers were “unprecedented”, while Belinda Greer, chief executive of Hong Kong’s largest international school group, the English Schools Foundation, told the FT turnover was 14 per cent in the last academic year. This was “significantly higher” than the previous year, she said. 

学校还必须应对影响学校课程的全面国家安全法的出台。这导致员工大量流失，许多公司都在努力吸引人才。本尼（Benny）表示，招聘新教师的困难是“前所未有的”，而香港最大的国际学校集团英国学校基金会（English Schools Foundation）首席执行官贝琳达·格里尔（Belinda Greer）告诉英国《金融时报》，上个学年的营业额为14%。她说，这比前一年“明显更高”。

A senior member of staff at an international school that has lost many teachers added that a large number of pupils had also left, and that fewer students were arriving from overseas. “Hong Kong needs to drop the quarantine measures and demonstrate its interest in being an international business centre,” he said.

一所失去了许多教师的国际学校的一名高级职员补充说，大量学生也离开了学校，来自海外的学生更少。他说：“香港需要放弃检疫措施，展示其成为国际商业中心的兴趣。”

This week, the city eased quarantine at designated hotels from seven days to three, followed by four days of home quarantine. But a teacher from another international school that was still hiring this month said: “If the quarantine does not go to zero, I suspect that a lot more teachers will leave [by the end] of this year as well. Many schools are already hiring less experienced teachers.” And it is not just international schools that are struggling. Teachers from local schools have been asked to poach students from rival institutions, wooing them with perks such as free iPads. More than 25,000 pupils withdrew from local and international schools over the past year, many of them from higher-income districts, official data showed. 

本周，该市将指定酒店的检疫时间从7天放宽到3天，随后是4天的家庭检疫。但本月仍在招聘的另一所国际学校的一名教师说：“如果隔离不降到零，我怀疑今年年底还会有更多的教师离职。许多学校已经在招聘经验不足的教师。”而且，陷入困境的不仅仅是国际学校。当地学校的教师被要求从竞争院校挖走学生，用免费iPad等额外福利吸引他们。官方数据显示，在过去一年中，超过25000名学生从当地和国际学校退学，其中许多来自高收入地区。

More than 4,000 teachers resigned in the last academic year, up 70 per cent from the year before. At least six local schools were expected to close over the next five years, education officials said. 

上一学年有4000多名教师辞职，比一年前增加了70%。教育官员说，预计未来五年至少有六所当地学校将关闭。

While conceding that the sheer number of students and teachers leaving Hong Kong posed challenges, education minister Christine Choi insisted that it “does not necessarily mean they are unhappy with the [city’s] education system”. 

尽管承认离开香港的学生和教师数量之多构成了挑战，但教育部长蔡若莲坚称，“这并不一定意味着他们对香港的教育体系不满意”。

Tang Fei, a pro-Beijing lawmaker and a secondary school head, suggested Hong Kong should consider bringing in more pupils from mainland China and south-east Asia to stabilise the student population. As companies shifted staff from Hong Kong to other places in the region such as Singapore, the Asian financial hub recorded a 1.4 per cent contraction in its gross domestic product in the second quarter of this year. That followed a 3.9 per cent decline in the first three months of 2022.

支持北京的立法委员、中学校长唐飞建议，香港应该考虑从中国大陆和东南亚引进更多学生，以稳定学生数量。随着企业将员工从香港转移到该地区其他地方（如新加坡），这座亚洲金融中心今年第二季度的国内生产总值（gdp）下降了1.4%。此前，2022年前三个月下降了3.9%。