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charlesmarlow
Joined: 17 May 2013
Posts: 68
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 Posted: Mon May 20, 2013 5:29 am Post subject: |
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Hey TRH
You must be a real teacher or teacher trainer 
Would you mind giving Mr Kurtz a few pointers so he and his friends can move in the right direction and make more than 1,200 USD per month  |
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kurtz
Joined: 12 Mar 2008
Posts: 518
Location: Phaic Tan
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| Posted: Mon May 20, 2013 6:09 am Post subject: |
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| charlesmarlow wrote: |
Hey TRH
You must be a real teacher or teacher trainer
Would you mind giving Mr Kurtz a few pointers so he and his friends can move in the right direction and make more than 1,200 USD per month |
Way to go Charles. I take it you and your friends are swigging Duval by the gallon with your fellow backpackers? Or are we still on the bia hoi? How's your investment portfolio going along? Putting a little bit away for retirement are we? Going to retire at 45? You make yourself sound like a group of Oxford old boys sipping high end whisky after playing a round of golf, but wait you're actually........
Considering the best gigs in town only require a BA and 2 years' post CELTA, it's not really much to hang your hat on to say you work there. Furthermore, one can fairly easily obtain an AC position in any of the mills with only 1-2 years' experience. Welcome to Vietnam, a place where anything is possible.
Folks, this is what I mean by saying EFL in Vietnam is a joke. The bar is set so very low that a basic newbie can be in the top echelon after only two-whole-years if they have a BA and CELTA.
Personally, I'm over the 2 grand mark but I haven't let the heat and humidity alter my brain into thinking I'm on a good thing. |
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ExpatLuke
Joined: 11 Feb 2012
Posts: 744
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| Posted: Mon May 20, 2013 6:28 am Post subject: |
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| kurtz wrote: |
Considering the best gigs in town only require a BA and 2 years' post CELTA, it's not really much to hang your hat on to say you work there. Furthermore, one can fairly easily obtain an AC position in any of the mills with only 1-2 years' experience. Welcome to Vietnam, a place where anything is possible.
Folks, this is what I mean by saying EFL in Vietnam is a joke. The bar is set so very low that a basic newbie can be in the top echelon after only two-whole-years if they have a BA and CELTA.
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This simply isn't true, and it makes you sound either presumptuous or misinformed when you keep saying it over an over again. The BEST gigs in town require just as much as they would require anywhere else in the world. Which is a Masters or CELTA, 3-5 years experience post-degree with the desired age group, training to teach for specialized tests, etc.
If you think teaching EFL in Vietnam is a joke, then I'd encourage you to try teaching elsewhere and see how different it is. Anywhere in Asia is going to be the same. You'll still have the lower-tier language mills hiring the under qualified white faces. And you'll still have the upper-tier schools hiring only the best and most dedicated. Japan, Korea, China, Taiwan, Indonesia, Thailand, you name it it's all the same. Maybe then you can head over to South America and tell me if you think its any better there. Next, check out Africa, Europe, and the Middle East. I hear there's only super serious jobs there....
I honestly don't know what some of you are looking for. Kurtz you sound like you've been here long enough that it should be easy for you to get one of the best jobs around. Yet you're always talking about how teaching here is nothing but a joke. Why don't you sign on at one of the posh international schools or a Western-run language center? There's plenty of those all over the country. But they won't hire you unless you have the right qualifications. |
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kurtz
Joined: 12 Mar 2008
Posts: 518
Location: Phaic Tan
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| Posted: Mon May 20, 2013 6:56 am Post subject: |
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Hi Luke,
Well, I'm speaking from experience, first hand. You need to check your facts. It IS possible to get a job at RMIT/British Council with only two years' experience. It IS possible to get an AC job at a well-known mill with 1-2 years' experience. I have seen it with my own eyes. It does help to get hired from within though.
I'm looking through the eyes of someone who in the past had a real life good job in the West. My expectations of a workplace perhaps are higher than most peoples'; I will endeavor to reduce those expectations when dealing with EFL in Vietnam in the future.
Luke, I believe you have proper qualifications and experience so best of luck to you.
However, from first hand experience, I'm convinced that Vietnam offers unbelievable opportunities to people with little or no experience. This goes to some peoples' heads, others not. I think you're right in saying it's the same all over apart from proper uni jobs requiring a lot of experience and an MA TESOL. It's about connections and having mates in the right places in Vietnam.
I think I've got one of the better gigs in town, I'm pretty content but so many things I've seen like management decisions in terms of hiring, implementing courses that a 2-year old could see wouldn't work, aged 30+ adults enjoying board races, edutainers getting the best feedback, receiving feedback on lessons from someone with 2 years' experience and the like really leaves me scratching my head. |
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deadlift
Joined: 08 Jun 2010
Posts: 267
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| Posted: Mon May 20, 2013 8:26 am Post subject: |
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| I think I've got one of the better gigs in town, I'm pretty content but so many things I've seen like management decisions in terms of hiring, implementing courses that a 2-year old could see wouldn't work, aged 30+ adults enjoying board races, edutainers getting the best feedback, receiving feedback on lessons from someone with 2 years' experience and the like really leaves me scratching my head. |
But the point several us often try to make is that there are a lot of big employers where this is not the case. I doubt I need to name them but I will, at risk of being called a shill again: ACET, BC, RMIT. These schools together are not a small segment of the market, and to head off the inevitable strawman, I am not implying that they are perfect. I don't know enough about ILA, but I would wonder if they're straying into the territory of what you described. But based on what people I know have told me, they're not too bad. Apollo, Cleverlearn, VUS et al? I have no idea but I have my suspicions.
I agree that there are unbelievable opportunities in Vietnam (though not so much with the "little or no experience" part). In my opinion, it's one of the good things about teaching here, because if you have a reasonable (not necessarily amazing) resume, handle yourself well in an interview, and are serious about yourself and your work, it doesn't take long for you to stand out in stark contrast to the muppet majority.
Sorry for my sarcasm earlier in the thread Kurtz. But now I'm sincerely curious... why are you content at the place you described? Why not work toward a gig at one of the more reliable schools? |
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kurtz
Joined: 12 Mar 2008
Posts: 518
Location: Phaic Tan
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| Posted: Tue May 21, 2013 7:02 am Post subject: |
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| deadlift wrote: |
| Quote: |
| I think I've got one of the better gigs in town, I'm pretty content but so many things I've seen like management decisions in terms of hiring, implementing courses that a 2-year old could see wouldn't work, aged 30+ adults enjoying board races, edutainers getting the best feedback, receiving feedback on lessons from someone with 2 years' experience and the like really leaves me scratching my head. |
But the point several us often try to make is that there are a lot of big employers where this is not the case. I doubt I need to name them but I will, at risk of being called a shill again: ACET, BC, RMIT. These schools together are not a small segment of the market, and to head off the inevitable strawman, I am not implying that they are perfect. I don't know enough about ILA, but I would wonder if they're straying into the territory of what you described. But based on what people I know have told me, they're not too bad. Apollo, Cleverlearn, VUS et al? I have no idea but I have my suspicions.
I agree that there are unbelievable opportunities in Vietnam (though not so much with the "little or no experience" part). In my opinion, it's one of the good things about teaching here, because if you have a reasonable (not necessarily amazing) resume, handle yourself well in an interview, and are serious about yourself and your work, it doesn't take long for you to stand out in stark contrast to the muppet majority.
Sorry for my sarcasm earlier in the thread Kurtz. But now I'm sincerely curious... why are you content at the place you described? Why not work toward a gig at one of the more reliable schools? |
Hi Deadlift,
No problems, you seem like quite a level headed person and usually give great advice.
I'm going down the IELTS path, get pretty well paid and aren't too interested in RMIT and the gang. Given an EFL context in Vietnam, RMIT, ACET and the British Council are good schools who don't just take anyone with a pulse. The fact is though you only need a couple of years of post CELTA experience to get a job there. I hence don't see these schools as particularly exclusive and I get a but bewildered at SOME of the people who work there as they really seem to think they're someone special. This is not against you. Another poster in this thread is so arrogant to think that anyone who points these basic facts out is on some crappy entry level wage, thus bolstering their own ego. My question to those people are; are you using your degree? what did you do before working in EFL in Vietnam? Would you be able to gain employment in your home country? I really think some people lose touch with reality a bit and the relative status they have goes to their head.
In relation to the mills, again, they will take just about anyone and given you play the game correctly; AC jobs are within reach after only one year of experience. This provides people new in the industry with unbelievable opportunities. This is something I see at least as very unprofessional. AC jobs should be for those with a related Masters, BA TESOL and the like, not butt kissing newbies but that's only my opinion.
I'm all for increasing the requirements for working in EFL and making it less of an amateur show. Weed out the uneducated, make a CELTA mandatory, push for a BA TESOL but so many of the better schools in Vietnam will look past a few of those things as they're so desperate for staff. |
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skarper
Joined: 12 Oct 2006
Posts: 477
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| Posted: Tue May 21, 2013 8:52 am Post subject: |
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There are many ways the powers that be could make TEFL/EFL in Vietnam a much better deal for students, parents and teachers. It's not rocket science.
They actually have the basics in the WP requirement. [I don't think a degree is actually necessary if you have passed a 'proper' CELTA or equiv but a CELTA certainly is necessary.]
Basically, everyone teaching should have a CELTA or equiv and everyone in a management role should have a DELTA. All school owners should have education qualifications or have hired a manager who does.
The market wants what it wants and a lot of that is edutainment. It doesn't have to lack learning if you put some thought into it - though there will be much less progress than if the students are motivated to put some serious work in. Most are just not bothered.
The problems really arise when a school tells the students [or teachers] one thing and then delivers another. I think we've all seen classes that should really be in 6-7 different levels/courses but are all lumped together and labelled 'upper intermediate'...
THE SOLUTION is to put in place a clear simple WP process that suitably quailified teachers can follow through themselves even if not employed. But I think we all know why they won't ever do that.... |
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manalive
Joined: 02 Apr 2013
Posts: 12
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| Posted: Wed May 22, 2013 12:20 pm Post subject: |
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| 1st Sgt Welsh wrote: |
Hi kutz,
I spent countless hours using this forum before I made the move here and it seems to me common sense that if you are serious about moving to a foreign country then you would research it properly. If you are too lazy to do that, then, at the risk of sounding insensitive, that's on your own head. |
I don't think the statement is insensitive at all. |
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TRH
Joined: 27 Oct 2011
Posts: 340
Location: Hawaii
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| Posted: Wed May 22, 2013 2:36 pm Post subject: |
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| kurtz wrote: |
| AC jobs are within reach after only one year of experience. This provides people new in the industry with unbelievable opportunities. This is something I see at least as very unprofessional. AC jobs should be for those with a related Masters, BA TESOL and the like, not butt kissing newbies but that's only my opinion. |
Sorry to be so ignorant of the jargon, but what are "AC jobs?" |
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BenE
Joined: 11 Oct 2008
Posts: 321
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| Posted: Wed May 22, 2013 3:41 pm Post subject: |
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| I assumed "Academic Coordinator" though I might be wrong and it might just mean a teaching job with a working air conditioning unit in their classroom. |
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TRH
Joined: 27 Oct 2011
Posts: 340
Location: Hawaii
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| Posted: Fri May 24, 2013 1:43 am Post subject: |
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| BenE wrote: |
| I assumed "Academic Coordinator" though I might be wrong and it might just mean a teaching job with a working air conditioning unit in their classroom. |
Thanks for keeping it light. |
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pid
Joined: 23 Dec 2012
Posts: 2
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| Posted: Fri May 24, 2013 3:59 pm Post subject: |
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| kurtz wrote: |
| pid wrote: |
Hi Dublingirl. I take it you're Irish? I'm from Leitrim/Dublin and I'm arriving in Hanoi on the 1st September and starting a CELTA course on the 9th.
What are your plans in general? Have you taught ESL before?
I'm interested in seeing how you get on. Quite a few people on here have a negative opinion on the ESL situation in Vietnam, though anyone I've spoken to in real life seems to love it.
Patrick |
Hi Patrick,
May I get you to elaborate on these people who you've spoken to that said they "love it" ? What context are they teaching in Vietnam? Do they think $1200-$1500 is good money? Do they have a career path to follow?
Newbies who've just got their sparkling new CELTA and have signed up for one of the mills for a year might have slightly lower expectations than someone who has been here a number of years. That is what I see the main problem with these forums is; you have the newbies and the mid and long-termers (and a few lifers) all talking about ESL from completely different perspectives. |
Hi Kurtz,
Sorry for taking so long to reply.
Some of the people I spoke to earn ~$2000 mark. They have online TEFL certs, and others have CELTA. One person had no qualifications when he began, but that was in 2008.
Nearly all of these people have other careers and are university graduates. They chose to teach ESL as a way to experience a completely different culture for a year. I don't think any of them are pursuing a career in ESL, nor did they chose Vietnam for financial gain.
I would be happy to break even after a year teaching in Vietnam, but would hope to make a small profit. |
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kurtz
Joined: 12 Mar 2008
Posts: 518
Location: Phaic Tan
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| Posted: Sat May 25, 2013 9:36 am Post subject: |
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Hi Patrick,
Thanks for that.
With your realistic expectations, I'm sure you'll have a great year.
Enjoy. |
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