[shieclulaweew]

Quote[/b] ]Seeker and Sally, I know from reading your blogs that both of you have taught english in thailand. Did you guys have a degree in secondary Education or did you have a degree in a whole other field?

Whoopsie... Sorry for the rather late reply, Frightened_Farang; this thread somehow escaped my attention.
I got my degree not in Secondary Education, but in Biology, specializing in Microbiology. As you could see, this did not hinder me at all in getting teaching jobs in Thailand. I have to mention though that I had teaching experience prior to accepting the Thai job. I taught at an American university until I came here.

Like Sally, I didn't do the TEFL either. I agree with her that it would have helped us to understand how people learn English, but I already got this knowledge first-hand. The fact that I learned English from scratch just like my students helped me tremendously. It bridged the gap between us; I was not a remote observer, but one of them, someone who already reached the goal that they strived for.

What was my advantage in teaching English became my disadvantage when it came down to business decisions. There is no need for non-native English teachers when hundreds of unqualified backpackers roam Thailand, eager to earn a few quick bucks by yapping in the classroom for a few days.

For advice, just read Sally's. I couldn't say it any better. I guess I could just paraphrase what she wrote, but why waste your time?

Good luck, and let us know how things turned out!

[Ingeborga]

Hi Frightend_Farang

I am a qualified teacher in England and so yes I do have a degree. I have not done TEFL. although I do feel that it might have helped me understand more on how people learn English as a second language.

I think you will find it easier to get a job if you do have a degree. I don't think the subject of the degree is necessarily important. Having a degree means that you are a well educated person. If you haven't teaching experience or qualification, I would recommend you also do one of the courses, TEFL or TESOL.

You can get a job with none of the above, if you are a native English speaker. However, your pay will reflect your experience and so without qualification you can only be expected to be paid as little as 10,000 baht a month.

The more qualified you are the better the job prospects.

Are you really sure that English teaching is for you? The best way to find out is to do some voluntary teaching first. The schools will often give you free accomodation and some pocket money whilst you do this. The school, who owns this website, is a good place to start. That is how I got a job teaching in Thailand and made my contacts with other schools

Once you are in a school and they like you, you can often stay or move to other schools on their recommendation. Making yourself know is important.

You could also start off on a low income and then move up the pay scale as you gain more experience.

To me, the money was not the incentive. (A days teaching in England is a Thai's monthly teaching salary. ) I enjoy teaching and love Thailand and so mixing the two is heaven for me.

I taught in Thailand for a whole year and gained experience in two schools. Both were totaly different. One was a rural school with little resources and the other an inner city school.

Have a look at the following website to see the kind of qualifications schools are asking for.
http://www.ajarn.com/Jobs/

Good luck with your venture

[valensds]

Dear Frightend_Farang, I am going to an info session tonight that purports to offer "1000's of jobs teaching English in over 80 countries without the need for a UNI degree or teaching experience....including Thailand. My own research on the net seemed to indicate that a Uni degree in any discipline was the minimum prerequisite to getting a 'paid' job - plus being a native English speaker of course. The info session I am going to tonight contradicts that so I will let you know whether this is marketing hype or otherwise. Although this offer has been made for the Australasian market I would imagine if we (downunder) can do it so would you Stateside. The Web address for the company making this offer is : www.teachinternational.com

There is a 3.5 mb pdf for download that has a lot of background info on it.

Also I may be able to offer some other points of contact as my landlady has recently returned from a UNESCO conference in Korea where she made contact with teachers from all around the world - including Thailand.

Good luck with your endeavours.

[ErnestTU]

eyyy...teaching certificate is ok too. then depends on you weather you will pass the test & interview or not.

[Muramoursuard]

Thanks Richard. Do you think it would not be wise for me to go the route I mentioned above?

[amelveEnromma]

Note Doug.... While communicaions major may be what your company will pay for there are many classes that will be required for both major's. Public speaking, Sociology, Psychology, English.

After you get a degree in Communications, it may only require 20 credit hours of other classes to get a degree in education. So depending on the school you are considering you could take those clases for very little out of pocket. Many great Universities offer online courses.

Stanford, Harvard, Texas State, Florida State etc. all have classes that you can take over the internet and they will award you your degree in that field. You can transfer your credits to their schools headquarters and study online. It is very very legitimate and many times very hard work but much lower cost than attending the actual block and stone buildings.

[duribass]

To apply for a work permit, you need a bachlor degree in any field. However, if you want to work in one of the international schools (where the pay is a lot more as it will be equal to your home country) you will need a degree in secondary education.

[ErnestTU]

teaching degree is the key to the field

[Muramoursuard]

Sorry guys. I know I post a similar topic about this every couple of months. I hope all of you can put up with my repetiton.

As you may or may not know, I want to become an english teacher in Thailand. My question is for those of you who teach or have taught in Thailand. Is there a specific bachlor degree required? For examaple a bachlor's in secondary education? Will a bachlors in any field along with TEFL certificate suffice? Such as a Bachlor's in communications with a TEFL certificate? The reason for my question is because I don't want to go indebt paying for school. The Company I work for has a tuition reinbursment program. I can get my company to pay for my classes as long as the degree I'm studying for is authorized by my company. Unfortunatly a degree in secondary education is not an authorized program, but a degree in communications is covered.

Seeker and Sally, I know from reading your blogs that both of you have taught english in thailand. Did you guys have a degree in secondary Education or did you have a degree in a whole other field?

[Muramoursuard]

Thanks Steve. Let me know what you get out of the seminar you are going to. Although I would love to just take some 1 month intensive study course and be done with it so I could go on and make the move to thailand. I think I'm going to just go ahead and get the Bachlors in Communications. That way I will always have a back up if I need to come back to the States.

[valensds]

Well the info session was very upbeat ( as they typically are) and reading between the lines their claim of not needing a degree sounds plausible depending where it is you want to teach. Some Asian countries, Korea for example you do need a degree in any discipline to teach but others it seems there are ways around it. China is less rigourous in this regard particularly because of their massive population base and the upcoming Olympic Games - they need as many English speakers as possible prior to the Games start.

I specifically quizzed the presenter about Thailand and according to her, their company's information as at about 3 months ago was that a degree was not essential. Whether they have alliances or contacts with schools and international business schools etc is something I need to do further research on.

Perhaps some local (Thai) can shed further light on this.

In terms of your own situation it makes sense to plan for your future needs and as any degree will get you a start you are probably doing the right thing to go with the Comms degree.

I didn't get a chance to ask whether the Tesol Certificate that they are offering was available to those outside Australasia but perhaps there is more info on their Web site.

The course over here is NZD$1595.00 and comprises one week workshop and an online course with exams at the end.

The company offers lots of resources and help to secure a job upon completion and seems fairly legitimate on the face of what I have seen so far.

In the end I think it is the old addage of 'who you know and not what you know' that can sometimes make the difference.

Anyway I am thinking seriously about doing it so I will let the forum know how it all goes.

Best of luck with your studies.

[duribass]

Yes, your plan sounds great. Good luck.