Job Discussion Forums

[sgrzyb]

Hi everyone,

This is my first post; I am so glad to find this community!

My questions may have been asked before, sorry.

I am American & my husband is Polish & a naturalized American citizen. We want to move to Poland, and I would like to teach English there. I am looking into language schools to get my TEFL Cert. Here are my questions:

Are all TEFL Certs equally respected, ie when I am looking for work will a TEFL cert from one school be better than a TEFL from a lesser school?

My idea is to get my TEFL at a school that I think I would also like to teach at, and try to get a job there after I have my TEFL. Does this seem feasible? If not, can I get my TEFL in the States?

Once I've found a job, how much support can I expect from my employer re moving, finding an apartment, residency card & work permit papers, etc. ?

Any recommendations as to which schools that offer TEFL cert are the best? We have friends & family in the Malopolska region (Krakow, Plesna, Rzeszow, Przemysl, etc) & want to stay in that area, preferably Krakow.

Also, if I understand correctly, teachers get a contract for a certain period of time. What is the customary time frame, ie a calendar year, an academic year, etc?

I love languages & think I would make a great teacher, and I've always wanted to live abroad.

Any information or thoughts would be greatly appreciated.
Dzięki!!

Susan

[Richfilth]

Good to see some enthusiasm for Poland! However, take your time and use the search function, and you'll see that it's really not that easy for non-EU citizens to get themselves working legalling in Poland. Do not expect anything in the way of support from your employer either.

As for the TEFL cert; a a cert is a cert, and people can find work without one if they try. A CELTA or a Trinity or a university-accredited cert are all the same in an employer's eyes.

Really, use the search function. All of this stuff has been asked more than once in the last few months.

[sgrzyb]

Hi and thank you for your reply! I was surprised that you say that it is not easy for non-EU folks to work legally. I thought that because my husband is a Polish citizen that it is relatively easy for me to get residency & work permits. This, at any rate, is what the Polish consulate in New York City told me. Have others had a different experience?

I will use the search function, thanks for the reminder!

Best wishes,

Susan

[hrvatski]

I would recommend a cert with at least 100 hours course time, including real hands on lessons with learners. Better employers will be looking for this.

I think with a Polish husband you shouldn't have too many problems, just make sure you start the process as soon as you get to Poland because it takes time and you don't want your tourist stay to run out!

[Tracer]

Hi sgrzyb,

I'm an American, too. I'm currently working for Lingua Nova and they are helping me to obtain a work permit. They're one of the few schools in Warsaw where you can find a large percentage of non EU-teachers (Americans, Canadians, Kiwis, Aussies etc. ). I haven't worked for them for very long, but they seem very organized; at least much more organized and on the ball than the other two schools that I've worked for.

As for the TEFL vs. Celta cert or whatever, I think people make way too big a deal out of it. Just get one. If the school needs someone they'll hire you fast, regardless of your certification. If they don't need anyone then you could have a Phd in EFL and they won't hire you.

One important thing to remember about being an American in Poland is that you need to begin making arrangements for a work permit right away. If you submit a complete application after 45 days in Poland, they won't accept it and you'll be forced to go back to the States to apply for a work permit and residence permit there.

The other thing to remember is how your Schengen visa works. A lot of people are totally retarded about this for some reason? (Especially Americans who got into Poland before Poland became part of the Schengen territories.)

Here's how it works:

You can legally be in the Schengen zone for 90 days out of a 180 day period. The 180 days begins when you first enter the Schengen territories. For example, you can enter the Schengen territories for 30 days, leave and go back to the USA for 45 and then come back and you've got 60 days out of 105 that you can legally be in the Schengen zone before you get a fresh 90 days. That means you can only stay for 60 days out of the 105 days remaining in your 180 period.

Sound complicated? It's not. Just remember, every 180 days, you can legally be in Europe for 90 days as an American. The meter starts running when you first enter the Schengen territories and runs out and starts again 180 days later. So forget about being in Poland for 89 days and making a border run to you Ukraine for a couple of days and then coming back. You'll have overstayed your visa by doing this! This was something you could do before Poland became Schengen, but not anymore.

There is some good and useful info for US citizens at the link below on the Schengen visa, how it applies to you and how to get a residence permit here:

http://poland.usembassy.gov/poland/general_information_acs/poland-to-schengen-area/

All this being said, if you're still in the states and will be there for awhile, you might want to try one of the Polish consulates in your area. If you're in the Chicago area, then you're in luck because their reputation is excellent. If you're on the west coast, you're not so lucky because the closest Polish consulate is in LA and they're morons.

Good luck!

[spiral78]

The fact that you're married to a Polish citizen will definitely make the path to legality much easier. I don't know the current law in Poland (my spouse is Czech) but it was extremely simple here to get permanent residency/work status, and I know in the past it was the same in Poland. I agree that you should get on the process immediately, but it shouldn't be onerous.

And the fact that you're married to a Polish national and obviously have already a bit of the language yourself should also make you an attractive candidate for jobs.

[hrvatski]

[Tracer]

I stand corrected. - I got a TEFL and I work for a great school now. (It was a one month intensive course in Costa Rica.)

[celtdancer]

Hi Susan,
I just saw your posting about Poland. There's a wonderful website for discussing anything having to do with moving to Poland, being married to a Polish man, what that means for your work - ability, etc...

It's the Easy ExPat website, and it has Forums - just like this one, in fact! You'll want to register (free of course), login, and search for "Polish Citizenship". There you will find the posts divided into "PartI" and "PartII" because it's such a big topic I guess, esp since Poland joined the EU back in 2004. I suggest you make a big pot of tea, and prepare to read through all the posts in these 2 Parts, or do a search for keywords that apply to you, within this forum. (There are many many pages in each Part, and it continues being a hot topic to this day). There are also Forums on many other countries around the world.

I've been using this Forum website myself, because I'm American but applying for my Polish citizenship right now. I'm sitting in Poland at my aunt's house, and have learned a *ton* about the rules in Poland. I don't know anything about your situation, mind you, because I'm not married (to a Pole nor anybody else), but I bet this website can help you.

www.easyexpat.com

And if you ever need help doing your own application for Polish citizenship (I'm not sure if that applies to you), I can recommend an excellent little firm "down under" that specializes in helping people with this. (They're currently helping me with my paperwork process, by email, and are fantastic!). You can PM me if you want that firm's name. The woman president of the company is from Poland and understands Polish bureacracy very well (if that's possible), speaks the language fluently, and has researchers and other colleagues working with her in Poland.

Good luck! And by the way, when you are surrounded by people speaking Polish, and only Polish, it's a lot faster of a learning curve than what some of these posts describe in a class-taking scenario. (I'm just trying to give Susan a little hope, folks). I've only been here (in Poland) for 3 weeks, but I could hold my own over dinner last night with 5 people who only speak Polish (except for the word "Okay!").

And that is with no classes, and nobody actually teaching me any Polish per se, as nobody in this house / in this branch of our family speaks English (except a few younger cousins, but they all live in Germany and England). I'm surrounded by (mostly elderly) family members that only know the word "Okay!" in English. Yes, we use a lot of mime, some acting and tons of hand gestures to communicate, but I still feel that I could learn faster if I just had "big, wide-open" receptive listening (and pay attention to the context and body language), (i.e. listen with your whole body), and noticing words in conversation that come up often, writing down any word that interests me or seems important (and later calling a cousin on the phone to ask what it means, and writing that down, too), and one little Polish-English dictionary that is old and therefore missing many necessary words! I have already 5 little notebooks full of words, or phrases, or drawings of what I want for dinner (and then Polish words for each item, added later)...

And, I got myself an internet connection, found Poltran.com for some basic translations on the fly (although this computer program makes many errors in translation) and then added a Skype (online) telephone calling plan that covers, well, just about the whole world for about 8$USD a month. So I can stay in touch with English-speaking friends. I try to read signs when I walk down the street into the village, read magazines sitting around my aunt's house, and just let the words soak in...

Anyway, Good luck to you! It's snowing here tonight.

PS -- I've heard that Cambridge and Trinity are biggest names in TEFL, but look into it yourself as you are already doing. And one of them offers a class (to become certified) in Krakow. I think that was you, asking about Krakow certifications, no?

Dziekuje!
* Celtdancer

[Harry from NWE]

[dynow]

[hrvatski]

Sure after 120 hours a teacher is pretty green as well, but not on quite the same scale as the 60 hour teachers.

The best thing about CELTA and select other courses is that they allow real contact with real students, and reflection after the lessons. These lessons pick up and hopefully correct mistakes which no language school would want, especially in the first weeks of a semester in which students are evaluating their investment. Mistakes like fast / overly colloquial speech, chaotic instructions, timid monitoring, dry introductions - the list goes on.

I've found that candidates after Oxford Seminars and some other such certificates don't even know simple principles of Communicative Language Teaching.

In every instance so far I've found that a B on a CELTA translates to a person with a stable approachable personality, strong motivation, genuine TEFL understanding and will to expand that and generally a reliable personality.

Good results from other certificates don't seem to consistently correspond to these qualities at all, so although an extra 60 hours doesn't seem like much, in the grand scheme of things the CELTA is a higher quality qualification.

There are many natives coming to Poland these days to teach, notably a lot more women have started venturing over and applying since 2008. If you can do anything to help you gain an edge it's worth it, IMO