Global Classroom

After years of teacher shortages, New York City has been able to fill nearly all its classroom posts this year. Enhanced incentives have lured many new instructors. So has extraordinary recruiting.

Seven of the new teachers will be coming all the way from Spain, thanks to a renewed teacher-exchange program. All that was needed was a welcoming city and a spirit of adventure on the teachers' part. New York also has two dozen Austrians teaching math in another exchange, plus a handful of Germans and Swiss instructors who came on their own.

There should be some intriguing stories at the end of the year: international teachers meet New York's wildly diverse student body. Teacher-short districts in places like California and Texas may be cocking their ears. Enter the globalized classroom.