Job Discussion Forums

Tiger Beer · Joined: 08 Feb 2003 Posts: 778 Location: Hong Kong

What does this take? I'm American.. and teaching at a university in Korea with an unrelated MA degree in another subject.

I really enjoy teaching TESOL/ESL/TEFL (whatever acronym you want to call it).. and would love to get some further education in the TESOL field to do this back in the U.S.

Are online MA degrees acceptable for working in the U.S. Are universities predominately PhD-attainted teachers? Or can MA in TESOL students get in there? How about community colleges, etc.?

How much do they usually pay? How many hours a week in general? Etc.

Curious about all of this..

chinagirl · Joined: 27 May 2003 Posts: 235 Location: United States

A full time position at a university Intensive English Program often calls for a master's degree in TESOL or closely language/linguistics/education related degree. Part-time positions usually call for this as well, however, related experience is often taken in lieu of the MATESOL.

It is difficult to make a career teaching ESOL to adults in the US. In many areas, most jobs available seem to be part-time/hourly (25-50 dollars an hours, no benefits) positions in community colleges and the like. Full-time university IEP positions are often very competitive and call for advanced training in TESOL. The pay there, too, is often low (I have seen starting salaries in the mid twenties) considering the educational requirements. The PhD is usually not necessary to teach ESOL, but if you want to be a professor and train other teachers, it would be a requirement.

As far as online/distance/independent coursework degrees, I think that there are many people doing their master's degrees in person, and they probably have the edge in the market. Look for an accredited American degree, in any case. I personally would avoid a distance degree, although taking a few courses via distance is probably OK. If you have no other choice, there are a few reputable options - SIT in Vermont has a very good, reputable summer option, and Shenandoah University in Virginia has a distance master's that is also available on-campus.

Most full-time jobs in teaching ESOL are found in K-12 education where there are many more full-time, career track positions. This is one area where decent salaries can be found with medical benefits. If you really like teaching ESOL, you might want to look into the need in your home state.

If you do some searches on the internet of various IEP and community college programs you should be able to get a good idea what is out there.

Here are some job listings in New York-
http://www.nystesol.org/jobs/jobs.php

Tiger Beer · Joined: 08 Feb 2003 Posts: 778 Location: Hong Kong

Very thorough response! Thank you for that.

Parttime at US$25-50 without benefits.. that's still quite good in my opinion. Granted the other mid-$20,000 for full-time university positions aren't so good!

Good to know about the PhD.. sounds like something I wouldn't be interested in then. I'm most interested in ESOL at the university/college/community college levels. So I can rule that out.

Interesting about the K-12 being most of the jobs. That is another place I just don't have the interest in, but curious to know thats where most exist however.

Great info here. Thank you for the assistance and such. Very thorough, and I appreciate that.

chinagirl · Joined: 27 May 2003 Posts: 235 Location: United States

The part time positions only are good if you can get enough hours. Sometimes teachers are not paid for prep time, either, which makes the hourly rate seem a lot lower. Many adjuncts are moonlighting, or in graduate school, or have another source of income (spouse) to support them.

Imdramayu · Joined: 09 Feb 2007 Posts: 394 Location: South Korea

To teach ESL K-12, would a MA-TESOL be sufficient or would a B-Ed be necessary?

movinaround · Joined: 08 Jun 2006 Posts: 202

Jizzo T. Clown · Posted: Sat Feb 17, 2007 6:32 pm Post subject:

rusmeister · Joined: 15 Jun 2006 Posts: 867 Location: Russia

A big disappointment might be that getting the K-12 certificate will require (typically) a 2-year program, and your degrees and experience will not help you in this. (A Bachelor's is generally a minimum requirement to get in, but otherwise doesn't do you much good.)

In inner cities, you can often get hired on an 'emergency certificate' because they need warm bodies, as long as you register in a program and are working towards the teaching cert.

I had the same question and returned to the states (NY) after several years overseas with the assumption that all that experience and my Master's degree would make me a shoo-in. I went through a major disillusionment and wound up moving to CA, where I found the same requirements. I eventually got hired and got my cert as described.

It's important to understand that some institutions have a vested interest in an artificial teacher shortage (like the NEA and state teacher union associations). They squawk about a shortage and holler doom, and then add, "Oh, we need higher teacher salaries and more funding!", which is then thrown at them. Then the cycle repeats. Plus, the colleges and universities benefit from your being required to take their courses and state ed can grow on the continued spiral of funding (with occasional drops) and increase in bureaucracy, so none of these guys are interested in making things easy for you.

Caveat emptor!

Chancellor

harmonious · Joined: 20 Sep 2006 Posts: 8 Location: Oman

Hi:

I must agree with rusmeister about the credentials aspect of K-12 jobs. I thought I'd try high school and even though I had an MA TESOL, and a BA in ESL/Japanese, none of my language teaching or lingustics courses were counted. In effect, they wanted me to get another 4 year degree. There was an alternative certification program that I joined which allowed you to get through it all much faster, but was about $5000.

A further dissapointment that may await newcomers to K-12, however, is the terrible attitude that many faculty have towards "ESL" kids, the lack of support that ESL related programs get, and the overall terrible circumstances faced by many students and teachers in these programs. I was in an "Exemplary School" (Texas rating system) and was quite dismayed. It obviously wasn't for me. Apart from the above challenges, you have to be able to be a diciplinarian. Forcing other people who don't want to do something to do it is not my strength. Even my students would tell me "you have to get mad sir!" Perhaps if I actually believed that all of what they were supposed to do was doing them good, I could find the will power to enforce it, but in many cases, I thought it was crap myself. Laughing

Anyway, in my experience in the US, the best paying jobs with the best benefits outside of K-12 are in the community colleges. They're better than most University IEPs. Typically you have to work part time first, get known by full timers, do well, and then wait for a full time opening. One Community College in the North Houston area was starting at over $40,000.

But good luck to all in their chosen paths!

comenius · Posted: Tue Apr 10, 2007 9:21 pm Post subject:

I worked in New York City for a number of years at the university level, teaching at New York University, The New School, and Laguardia Community College.

I can verify that the salary was in the neighborhood of $50 per contact hour, without benefits.

I have a MA TESOL and my understanding was that it (or a closely related degree like Applied Linguistics) was essential and pretty much non-negotiable.

They also looked for a fair amount of classroom teaching experience, and evaluated you at the end of every semester and only invited you back if your ratings were solid with the students.