Job Discussion Forums

[yamnitsky]

Hi,

I'm a 30 year-old who lives in Chicago with native fluency in English, Russian, and Hebrew, fluency in French, and working knowledge of Spanish. I have always wanted to have a career in a language-related field (teaching, for example), but due to a number of factors went to school in Engineering and have a Master's Degree in Applied Statistics. Now, after 4 years of less than successful career in that, and after being laid off from my last job, I realized it's time to finally do a career change to something where I feel "at home". While I lack formal education in the field of Linguistics and Language Teaching, I have been reading a lot of linguistics, applied linguistics, and general language-related literature.

What I am trying to find out is as follows: what opportunities (if any) are out there for teaching ESL in the US and what are the degree(s) needed to do that. Related to that is the following question -- what is the average workload and pay for these positions. Furthermore, how likely would I be to find a Russian and/or Hebrew teaching position in the US, and would I also need some specialized degree/certificate/training. Likewise, if anyone knows what the pay scale for these types of positions is, I'd appreciate if you share it with me.

Finally, I see that a lot of people are interested in teaching abroad. While I am not opposed to teaching abroad for a year or two, I was wondering what are the advantages to teaching English in foreign countries. In particular, do people who have taught outside US have better chances at securing jobs back home when they return (possibility of a transfer, perhaps?), or is it just a "life experience" type of thing. In that regard (although I should probably post this question to the South America forum), anyone knows of the likelihood of finding an EFL job in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and if the pay is decent enough to live normally? I've visited down there for business and for leisure several times, so I'm interested if the pay scale in Argentina is on par with their cost of living.

Sorry for a barrage of questions in one posting, it's just that I'm completely confident that I want to go through a career change, but don't know quite where to start. Any advice, comment, or criticism is greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Mike

[khmerhit]

Try Cambodia!

[naturegirl321]