I have only been doing it for two years and just like a vast majority of the people who are teaching English (or some other subject, in English) over here in South East Asia, I am not qualified to be a teacher back in my home country of USA. The only requirement is that you have a college degree in just about anything, don't have a criminal background, and be from a native-English speaking country.
This might seem like they are selling their student's short but if they had the same stringent requirements that they have in the USA and most of Europe, no one would come to do it because the salary, while more than enough to live comfortably here, is a joke.
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The truly qualified teachers such as those with a Master's degree in education can make seriously big bucks at private international schools but these job are few and far between and are therefore extremely competitive. If you land one of those, you are going to be living it up. One of the people I know has such a job and her housing allowance per month is double my entire salary. It's a different world and this is NOT the kind of people I am referring to.
I am referring to people like me that never trained to be a teacher and honestly, never thought they would be one.
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Overall I think that ESL teaching is something that people who don't know what to do with their lives should get involved in for a few years, and then stop
I mean no offense to people that have done it longer than this and if you enjoy that I applaud you. The world would be a very boring place if we all thought alike but here are my reasons and real-life experience as to why I feel this way.
ESL, at least in all the countries that I have been witness to, is not a career. You have no savings plan, you have no job security, and generally speaking your salary is very bad - for me, I manage to live off of the $1000 a month or so that I get, but I am putting nothing away in savings
The classrooms are crowded in most schools and you receive very little in the way of support. In our school our time is probably spent 70% doing crowd control / punishments and 30% actual education. The students see the ESL portion of their day as playtime and since they speak a different language than you they can talk trash right to your face and you wouldn't even know the difference (not that this happens a lot, but it does happen.)
Whether or not you are aware of it in your early 20's, this is the best time to be making some sort of long-term investments in stocks or crypto since there is a very good chance that the bigger players in the game such as Fortune 500 Index Funds or BTC are going to grow exponentially throughout your lifetime
The experience on your resume / CV when you eventually go back to your home country might impress a person here or there, but other than showing you have a sense of adventure, it really isn't applicable to any career field
That's just a few of the downsides but I'll finish up by saying this: I do not know a single person (in the school circles that I run in here in Chiang Mai) that has been doing this for 5 years or more that are happy they decided to stick around that long. Not one. I do on the other hand know people that have been doing it for 10 years or more that feel trapped and that they have burned the best years of their lives and now will have to do the very humbling and embarrassing boomerang move back with their parents in whatever country they came from. Then, the ones that have done that take years to get back into any sort of normal independent life because as it turns out, our home countries are very expensive and unforgiving.
My advice to anyone that is considering doing ESL teaching overseas is to go ahead and do it, but to keep your feet on the ground and your delusions in check. There are a ton of fantastic experiences that I have had doing this for around 18 months now but I am quite certain that after this next contract is finished that I will be done with it for good.
I'm happy I decided to do it, but also feel as though I am making the correct decision when I say that I am going to go back to USA when the school term finishes in early 2021. I, just like the people i described before will have no choice but to move back in with my parents while I figure out what to do next.
Do I regret ever doing this? Not really, but I am happy that I have had the sense to ponder this and decide to get away from it before I get locked in like so many others around me have done.
I once again want to say that I am not trying to say that any long-term ESL teacher has made a bad life decision, I just think that for most people, it can and should be a short-term job
I shared this post on Twitter to try and get your work in front of more people.
You can find your post and me on Twitter if you like? https://twitter.com/dick_turpin
I've also upvoted you and shared your content on Hive.
I read your post. No Bots were used this was all done manually. Hope That Helps.
Don't forget, you can upvote peoples comments too!
I had thought about giving this a go in the past but think the opportunity (whilst I was carefree) has passed me by. And based on this account, not so sure I have missed too much. Thanks for sharing :)
well i'm still glad I did it but many of the young men and women get involved in relationships and this holds them here for a lot longer than they probably should. Then kids become part of the equation, then they stay even longer. Next thing they know they can not actually financially support this situation and either become a burden on their families back in their home countries until they eventually give up and relocated back home.
If you treat it as what it is, an adventure, then things will be fine. Just have the good sense to know when it is time to bail out.
Not really been my forte, and I think this route would have been a bumpy one!
!ENGAGE 25
ENGAGEtokens.How beautiful your experience!
inspiring, transformative, vocational and meaningful
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