Job Discussion Forums

[Gregor]

Would you INTELLIGENT, EDUCATED, SUPERIOR PEOPLE PLEASE pay attention? My post was perfectly clear. I made two points. Was that the problem? Y'all couldn't count to flippin' TWO with all your education??

#1 The OP should get a degree, and I regret not having got one earlier.

#2 Degrees, in my humble but meaningless opinion, are not necessarily a sign of intelligence or teaching ability.

You people are proving the lack of intelligence thing by your inability to read beyond the first paragraph.
I dunno why I feel like I should defend myself among people who are so blatantly - intentionally?? - misrepresentling what I write.

I TOLD the guy to get a bloody degree! AND!! I asked you people to back me up on that.
Just, by the way, I, personally, think that it's a sucky requirement, but even with THAT I said that a degree is important.

JESUS CHRIST!

To Doglover - I hope - but do not pray - that I can work things out when I get back home. I'm not a flippin' retard. And you do not wish me the best in my endevours - you wish me the worst. That much is abundantly clear. I do not need your hopes or prayers. I will work out what I can work out. I have asked for opinions on this site in the past, but at the moment, I do not. I have teaching jobs lined up already, thanks so much, and even if they fall through, I can cope.

[denise]

[Doglover]

[Doglover]

[Gregor]

Doglover said,

[Cdaniels]

[sojourner]

Gregor,

I'm feeling a bit perplexed regarding your purported non-degree status !

As I was reading your postings to this thread, I vaguely recalled that you had previously mentioned that fact that you don't possess a degree, as well as to your casting of doubts as to the value of a humanities degree to ESL teaching. A lot of what you say has considerable substance - however, my personal opinion is that such a qualification is 'highly desirable' for people in our line of work.Whilst a TESL qualification, such as your Trinity TESOL Diploma ,is most relevant, for the technical skills that it inculcates, we should realise that our students often expect us to be 'educated' people, not just 'ESL technicians'. Apart from wanting to pick up the nuances of our mother tongue, they also want to learn as much as possible about Western culture. And a good way for a teacher to learn about our culture is to have undergone a degree programme in the humanities. Any humanities major will enhance one's appreciation of our cultural heritage. Of course, one should not rely simply on the knowledge picked up at uni. Rather, a person should always be a' life-long learner', not merely by enrolling in additional degree programmes but, more importantly, through private study. Having completed, say, a BA programme, will provide one with the critical and conceptual skills essential if he/she is to make the best use of his/her private study.

Anyway, as I was reading your posts to this thread I felt that something did not 'quite gel'. So, a few minutes ago , I did a search of some of your previous postings, and found what was making me feel a bit uneasy. Back in September, in a thread entitled 'How can you trade a career for a career in TEFL', you submitted a posting in which you stated that, apart from your Trinity diploma, you also hold a 'BA Music'
http://www.eslcafe.com/forums/job/search.php?search_id=97383704&start=30

If you hold such a degree, then why do you keep referring to yourself as a non-graduate ? Majoring in music is quite an accomplishment - certainly, at least equal to majoring in history, philosophy or English ! Or, are you embarrassed by being associated with the institution that conferred your degree ?

If your degree was conferred by a recognised and reputable university , don't hide the fact that you are a graduate (like the rest of us).You, yourself, have mentioned that you regard a degree as useful in getting certain types of jobs, here in China, eg at universities. Well, don't be put off from applying merely because you didn't major in English or history, like most of us ! For most of the run-of-the-mill universities, the FAOs don't really care what subject you majored in.

If you are an American, you may be reluctant to mention to employers if your degree was obtained in three years - in Nth America, recognised BA programmes involve four years of f/t study, don't they ? Well, if that is the case, couldn't you articulate your three-year qualification to a four-year degree ? Shop around - surely, there would be recognised universities that could help you out. You would probably only be required to do a few more units (or courses). Even if you doubt the intrinsic value of a humanities degree, at least see it as a passport to a better job. Nowadays, credentialism is the name of the game.

Peter

[Gregor]

Yeah, well,
While what I post here and my real life are related, they are not exactly the same thing.

My degree is a little dodgy. It was mostly transfered credits from the U.S. but the degree itself is from an Indonesian universitas.

My feelings about the baccalaureate level degree for a teaching job is more about the principle of the thing than anything. It's just my opinion that it is FAR more education than this job requires, certainly at the entry level. In my opinion, it's like requiring a degree to work at Wal Mart. I can take an intelligent, thoughtful native speaker and train him or her in a very short time to be an effective teacher and learn how to improve him or her self on the job.
If you don't agree with me, that's fine. The rest of the world doesn't agree with me, either. If you think I'm a dangerous force in the world of ESL, well, you are projecting your delusions of grandur onto me - I seem to be alone in my opinion, so don't worry about it.
And ask anyone else with whom I've had this argument - I am not going to shift my opinion no matter what you say, so let's just not get into it.

At any rate, it doesn't seem to be a huge issue in the U.S. Not as huge as I thought. No, I'm not going to be working in a public school system, but who would want to in that country? You get greeted with armed guards and metal detectors when you walk into those places, anyway.
I have been offered three ESL jobs (one of them test prep for the Kaplan people - TOEFL and TOEIC mostly) in Oregon. That's based on my licentiate diploma.
The diploma also counts as a degree in China. The government translates it as a master's degree. That's because of the word, "Licentiate." If the DELTA has that on it, it would count as well.
I personally find it somewhat amusing that someone would come to me with nothing more than a degree in engineering and expect me to hire him for a job teaching English. And yet that happens A LOT.

[Justin Trullinger]

While I had forsworn this thread, when it was getting ugly and a bit abusive, I'll let myself be tempted to come back now that it looks like calming down a little.

I believe that a degree is a good investment in your future. I believe that, in teaching, the access it can help you get to further, graduate level training, is also not to be scoffed at. But I want to be clear about what a degree is and isn't. There has been far too much nonsense on this thread about the skills aquired from a degree.

[Gregor]

/clapclapclapclapclap/
Well bloody said, mate, well bloody said.
Much better than I've been able to put it. I really wish I could be so calm and levelheaded in my posts. That's pretty much exactly what I have been trying to say for this entire thread. You managed to say it in a reasonable way. I can't imagine who would disagree with you, and it would be impossible to take offense without the offesnse taker proving conclusively that he or she is one of those non-intelligent degree holders (of which I know a few as well - we all do, if we have worked for any length of time in ESL).

[MarkStevens]

Just a quick two cents from a newbie.

I went to a respected redbrick university in Kent, England and came out with a good degree. I also met some very smart people there. However, lots of the students were dumb as road gravel. Why were they there? Because Mummy and Daddy were subsidising their little darling.

Getting to university is often to do with social class as much (maybe more) than brains. I'm pretty middle-class and my parents always expected me to get a degree - cool with me. However, I have met some brilliant minds who are holding down lousy minimum-wage McJobs just because they came from poor families, were expected to start working at 16 etc etc, and so have few or no qualifications.

This is a major bugbear of mine. I understand the situation is even worse in the USA - and it's getting worse in the UK all the time with the rising cost of fees etc (shamefully introduced under a so-called Labour government).

[Hector_Lector]

Luckily, Scotland has always recognised the benefits of education. Thus, the fees issue is not a problem. Hence, the preponderance of brilliant Scots minds in all fields.