Quote: (03-08-2012 02:02 AM)AlphaTravel Wrote:
It was something I considered for a while but never went through with it, the generally low pay and what the job entails puts me off. Plus working with kids is not my idea of fun.
A friend of mines is flying out to Thailand next month to do a 3 week course down in Phuket, costs about $1,100 USD but he gets put up in a nice resort during the course, then a guaranteed job for at least 4 months somewhere in Thailand (a village in the sticks with little to keep you entertained), free apartment and $1000USD a month in pay. The only stipulation is that if he doesn't complete that 4 months placement he doesn't get the TEFL certificate and has to pay around $500USD for non completion. Anyone interested the name of the company is American TESOL institute Thailand.
Actually, if you’re looking to stay somewhere longer than 3 or 4 months, teaching can pay pretty well after you get some experience. A coworker from my school just got hired by an oil contractor to teach Physics in Equatorial Guinea. He’s going to be making $20,000 a month, working your typical 28 on, 28 off shift. That’s $120,000 a year, tax free for 6 months of work. He has no teacher’s license btw, just a Bachelor’s in Computer Science and about 4 years of teaching physics and math in a Thai public school. Obviously you’re not going to land this type of job with a TEFL paper and no experience. Like most things, you have to put in some work and do some networking.
Right now I’m teaching in Thailand (I’ve also taught in Korea) so this is something that I can lend my “expert opinion” on. If I were to advise your friend, I’d say just skip the TEFL. If you’re just starting out then the only thing it’s good for is to make connections. That 3 week course is not going to prepare you for the chaos and culture shock of a Thai classroom. If you want to stay in teaching a bit longer and head to a country that requires one for visa purposes like Vietnam or Indonesia, then do it after you have some experience. It’s unnecessary in Thailand, Japan, China, and Korea.
I don’t have a TEFL and I work at one of the better public schools in Thailand teaching English grammar and PE (yeah, it’s fucking easy). I have a pretty sweet deal here; salary that allows me to save a fair amount, excellent administrative support, 8 weeks paid vacation, health and dental insurance, accident insurance, housing allowance, and on top of that I only teach 14 periods a week. We also take 4 all expense paid school trips a year. At the end of this month we’ll be spending 4 days at a five star resort in Hua Hin. Basically, I just have to show up around noon everyday and do an hour of activities with the students, then I’m free to do whatever I please with the rest of the afternoon and night. After those four days, I have 5 weeks of paid holiday that I’m going to use to hit up some of the islands in the south and Burma.
If anyone is thinking about starting out teaching, then Korea is definitely more lucrative. I was there 15 months and saved $21,000. I worked my ass off though-- doing private lessons, not blowing money in casinos like many of my friends, cooking for myself, finding the cheapest grocery stores, taking the bus instead of taxis. At one point, I had a private lesson paying 80,000 won an hour ($75) where I’d just go in and talk about getting drunk and chasing women with Korean businessmen—no joke. Our conversations never really got past sex, money, cars, gambling, drinking, hookers, billiards, and travel. It was the easiest money I’ve ever made.
Generally speaking, I was frugal but not cheap. I do spend money but not on stupid, useless crap. Everything adds up. I just looked at it as a year to make money and have fun chasing women but I know some foreigners in Korea that can’t save a dime. They just have no idea how to manage their money.
Korea was a good year and I used the coin that I earned there along with about 35k in other savings that I had to go cash in with my brother on a duplex in a college town in Minnesota. Right now it’s looking like a wise investment as each unit nets us about $720 a month after insurance, prop mgmt, water, taxes, etc.
Anyway, I realize I’m rambling. If there’s any interest I can break down how to find a quality job in Korea and Thailand and what to expect in terms of working conditions, pay, benefits, how to find housing, women, culture, regions, etc.
Oh, one more thing I wanted to throw in: if you’re going to start out teaching you might as well just swing for the fences and try to get into an international school. You’ve gotta be licensed to do it however and one way you can do that is through taking the MTEL by the Massachusetts DOE. Look it up. It’s easy. I’m considering doing it myself when I finish here in September.