PhD and Master’s Unpack the Reality Check Facing Teachers Returning From Abroad

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For South African teachers, working abroad is often linked to better salary, wider social experiences and new career opportunities.

However, recent research shows that returning home is rarely straightforward, and is instead shaped by shifting professional conditions, personal responsibilities and changing ideas of belonging.

This is reflected in two related studies which examined international teacher migration as a cycle that includes trajectories of departure and return. Both studies were completed under the supervision of Professor Sadhana Manik who has been extending scholarship for decades on international teacher migration in the context of South Africa.

In doctoral research, ‘I Love South Africa But… The Case of South African Return-Migrant Teachers’ Experiences’, Dr Dianne Soobbadoo explores the experiences of South African teachers who return after working abroad. A Durban-born educator now based in Johannesburg, she balances full-time teaching with raising a two-year-old child while continuing her academic work.

Her research interest comes from her own early career experience. “After qualifying, I struggled to secure a teaching post locally, which led me to seriously consider working abroad. This raised important questions about belonging, adaptation and what returning home might look like.”

Across her findings, she highlights a consistent tension between attachment to home and difficult working conditions. Teachers in her study described feeling overworked, underpaid, and, at times unsafe in South Africa, particularly when compared with their experiences abroad. Broader constraints such as rising living costs and job security also shaped their decisions.

Her study showed that return is not only professional but also emotional. One participant described the adjustment as complex, explaining the challenge of managing multiple family responsibilities alongside work and personal expectations. Another highlighted difficulties linked to uncertainty in securing stable employment after returning.

Soobbadoo notes that returning home is not a simple or automatic transition. While many participants adjusted within months, others continued to face financial pressure, employment instability and difficulties re-establishing themselves in the public education system.

Supporting these findings, master’s research by Mr Malibongwe Mnyandu, also supervised by Manik, focuses on teachers returning from the Far East. His dissertation, ‘Reasons for the return of South African migrant teachers from the Far East,’ examined why teachers leave and what brings them back.

Mnyandu, from Pietermaritzburg, says his interest began after observing peers pursuing teaching opportunities abroad. “What struck me most was that while much attention is often given to why teachers leave, very little is said about their return.”

His findings show that teachers often left with expectations of better salaries, improved working conditions and international teaching experience. However, these expectations were frequently shaped by workplace realities abroad. Participants in his study described employment conditions that were often unstable and dependent on external evaluation processes rather than secure professional structures.

His study found that, over time, return was shaped by a combination of professional instability, emotional distance from family and difficulty adjusting to working environments abroad.

 In most cases, the decision to return was not sudden but developed gradually through accumulated experience.

Both studies show that reintegration into South African schools is uneven. Some teachers are able to adjust relatively quickly, while others face challenges such as limited recognition of international teaching experiences, delays in securing employment and readjustment to local cultural systems.

Together, Soobbadoo and Mnyandu’s research presents international teacher migration not as a one-way journey but as a continuous cycle of movement, comparison and reassessment, where return forms part of an ongoing negotiation between opportunity, stability and belonging.

Words: Rakshika Sibran

Photographs: Sethu Dlamini