Thirty recently retrenched staff from the Singapore Airlines (SIA) Group have applied for jobs at EtonHouse International Education Group.

If successful, they will take up about a third of the more than 100 positions on offer at the international school group. That is the number of jobs the school committed to offer last Friday to former SIA staff who have been retrenched.

EtonHouse is offering two tracks to Singaporean applicants - teaching and administrative - and those hired will receive a monthly salary of between $2,000 and $3,000.

The school's efforts were cited yesterday by Minister for Trade and Industry Chan Chun Sing during a visit to semiconductor firm AEM.

Mr Chan had said companies in the Scale-up SG programme, which includes EtonHouse, have helped to create good job outcomes and opportunities for Singaporeans amid the bleak economic climate.

He said: "This is how we intend to help one another through these very difficult times, with the Government partnering our companies, and our companies partnering the unions, to see how we can place the displaced workers from one company or one sector to adjacent ones, so that they can continue to preserve the hard-won capabilities that we have built up over the years."

Mrs Ng Gim Choo, founder and managing director of the EtonHouse Group, said: "I am a frequent traveller on Singapore Airlines and I have always admired the professionalism of SIA staff and the high standards of customer service and relationship building that they represent.

"They also have a wealth of international experience and cultural understanding that they bring to their roles."

Mrs Ng said she started the programme to "reach out to the wonderful SIA staff who may have lost their jobs and are looking for a meaningful career path".

She said: "As a part of this programme and profession, they can shape the lives of future generations. We also wish to play a part in supporting our society as we fight this difficult period caused by the pandemic."

Under the two-year teaching track, candidates will work part-time in the schools as teaching assistants, while pursuing an early childhood qualification.

After starting off as teaching assistants, they can move up to become assistant teachers, and later take on more senior leadership positions, like executive principal.

Those on the administrative track can work in roles involving parent liaison, school management or roles in the head office, such as business development, communications or marketing.

Opportunities for overseas postings in senior positions are also available. EtonHouse has more than 120 schools in 12 countries.

The group has in the past also hired former SIA staff who are now principals, teachers, parent liaison executives, or working in business development.

One of them is former leading air stewardess Josephyne Ho, 50, who in 2003 made the switch to teaching at EtonHouse after a decade with SIA. She is now a senior principal at EtonHouse Pre-School Mountbatten 223.

She said: "As a flight attendant, I have interacted with many people, and those that are polite and well-mannered always stand out. It motivated me to nurture and model positive behaviour in young children, so that they can make a difference in their lives and that of others.

"For everything that I lacked in terms of teaching, I made it up with determination, knowledge and more knowledge."