Shanghai Normal University will offer bonuses totaling 600,000 yuan (US$75,000) next year to encourage its graduates to teach at suburban elementary schools in the city, university officials said yesterday.

 

School officials did not disclose how much each teacher would receive.

 

The university's graduates, no matter whether they are education majors or not, will be eligible for the reward immediately after they sign a work contract with an elementary school in the city's suburban districts.

 

Graduates who sign up to teach in the suburbs will also be entitled to free on-the-job training or further degree education programs one year after they start work, according to university officials.

 

"It's just an incentive," said Li Jin, the university's president. "We need to guide our students to respect education in the suburbs so we can curb the gap in education quality between downtown and rural areas."

 

Owing to poor transport links and relatively poor facilities, rural recruiters are frequently left out in the cold at job fairs. The 10 suburban districts are estimated to have a shortage of nearly 5,000 teachers.

 

The Shanghai Education Commission announced last year that university graduates would be granted a reward of 30,000 yuan if they teach in the suburbs for at least five years.

 

Li said the extra university-level payment with no work duration requirement was the first step toward encouraging students to work there.

 

More than 450 employers were invited to attend the city's largest job fair for university graduates this year yesterday. About 250 were elementary schools in the city's suburban areas. 

 

(Shanghai Daily November 30, 2006)