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Begemot
Joined: 17 Jul 2009
Posts: 9
Location: Connecticut
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 Posted: Sun Jun 12, 2011 6:36 am Post subject: CELTA interview and possibilities |
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Hello all,
I have applied for the CELTA program in Manhattan through Teaching House-NY and have a phone interview coming up on Tuesday.
From what I've read, I get the sense that the application/interview process for the CELTA is something of a formality and I don't have to stress too much, the way one would for a job interview. However, if someone here has been through this process, could you tell me what to expect and how beast to be prepared?
I'm also wondering if, in anyone's experience, only having a BA in English and a CELTA (with no actual teaching experience) is enough to land a full time ESL job in the United States. At the moment, I'm kind of ambivalent about whether I want to do a year overseas or move to a major city (with lots of immigrants) and teach ESL there. |
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naturegirl321
Joined: 04 May 2003
Posts: 9041
Location: home sweet home
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| Posted: Sun Jun 12, 2011 7:47 am Post subject: |
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| For the US, you want to teach at a language school or in a public school setting? The NY CELTA should help you with finding a job. There are entry level jobs, everyone has to start somewhere. But to teach at a public school, you'll need to be a licensed teacher. You could teach in institutes though. |
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spiral78
Joined: 05 Apr 2004
Posts: 11534
Location: On a Short Leash
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| Posted: Sun Jun 12, 2011 12:29 pm Post subject: |
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| Quote: |
| only having a BA in English and a CELTA (with no actual teaching experience) is enough to land a full time ESL job in the United States |
The general word is that full-time contracts at private language schools (entry level jobs) in North America are quite rare. There's a lot of competition for work. No, with just BA and CELTA, you wouldn't be able to compete for the better jobs in public/college/university situations.
Depending where you actually want to go, you may be able to cobble together a full-time situation, probably including private students, but keep in mind that pay is relatively low at this level.
There is a North American forum below where you could ask more specific questions. |
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Begemot
Joined: 17 Jul 2009
Posts: 9
Location: Connecticut
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| Posted: Sun Jun 12, 2011 4:21 pm Post subject: |
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| spiral78 wrote: |
| Quote: |
| only having a BA in English and a CELTA (with no actual teaching experience) is enough to land a full time ESL job in the United States |
The general word is that full-time contracts at private language schools (entry level jobs) in North America are quite rare. There's a lot of competition for work. No, with just BA and CELTA, you wouldn't be able to compete for the better jobs in public/college/university situations.
Depending where you actually want to go, you may be able to cobble together a full-time situation, probably including private students, but keep in mind that pay is relatively low at this level.
There is a North American forum below where you could ask more specific questions. |
I've worked the past two years as a newspaper reporter. I'm getting pretty used to shitty pay.  Thanks for the help, Ill browse some older posts in that forum. |
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fladude
Joined: 02 Feb 2009
Posts: 432
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| Posted: Sun Jun 12, 2011 7:02 pm Post subject: |
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| naturegirl321 wrote: |
| For the US, you want to teach at a language school or in a public school setting? The NY CELTA should help you with finding a job. There are entry level jobs, everyone has to start somewhere. But to teach at a public school, you'll need to be a licensed teacher. You could teach in institutes though. |
To be honest, I don't think that a CELTA would be of much, if any use, in getting a job at US public school. Most school administrators won't know what it is. Being a certified English teacher would be your entry point. Once you had that, an MA in English, an ME with a TESOL component, or an MA in TESOL would help you to get the job. Actually even experience would help you get the job. You could say, for example, that you taught English in Mexico for two years. I think a lot of schools would look well on that (especially since they won't have to pay you for 2 years of experience if you weren't teaching under contract at a school and weren't certified). But the CELTA would be meaningless to most of them. Repeat a CELTA does not help you to get a job at US public school (99.9 percent of the time). So if you want to teach at one, don't bother with it. About the only way I could imagine it being useful is if the administrator who does hiring there also had gotten a CELTA back in the day. That is, however, highly unlikely. |
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Begemot
Joined: 17 Jul 2009
Posts: 9
Location: Connecticut
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| Posted: Sun Jun 12, 2011 7:40 pm Post subject: |
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| fladude wrote: |
| naturegirl321 wrote: |
| For the US, you want to teach at a language school or in a public school setting? The NY CELTA should help you with finding a job. There are entry level jobs, everyone has to start somewhere. But to teach at a public school, you'll need to be a licensed teacher. You could teach in institutes though. |
To be honest, I don't think that a CELTA would be of much, if any use, in getting a job at US public school. Most school administrators won't know what it is. Being a certified English teacher would be your entry point. Once you had that, an MA in English, an ME with a TESOL component, or an MA in TESOL would help you to get the job. Actually even experience would help you get the job. You could say, for example, that you taught English in Mexico for two years. I think a lot of schools would look well on that (especially since they won't have to pay you for 2 years of experience if you weren't teaching under contract at a school and weren't certified). But the CELTA would be meaningless to most of them. Repeat a CELTA does not help you to get a job at US public school (99.9 percent of the time). So if you want to teach at one, don't bother with it. About the only way I could imagine it being useful is if the administrator who does hiring there also had gotten a CELTA back in the day. That is, however, highly unlikely. |
I was not really considering public schools as I don't really have the interest or funds for graduate school. I'm thinking more along the lines of private language institutes, of which (if Teaching House is to be believed) there are many in metro areas like NYC with large immigrant populations, and whether they would hire CELTA holders. |
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coledavis
Joined: 21 Jun 2003
Posts: 1838
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| Posted: Sun Jun 12, 2011 7:52 pm Post subject: |
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| Not all CELTA courses treat their interview as a formality. If they have given you preparatory reading, e.g. on grammar, I would do it. |
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newdayrising
Joined: 17 Dec 2010
Posts: 32
Location: Boston
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| Posted: Mon Jun 13, 2011 12:27 am Post subject: |
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Perhaps this discussion is more relevant to the North America forum, but I just wanted to say that it's not necessarily impossible to find jobs in the US if your only qualification is a CELTA. You're definitely at a disadvantage though with your inexperience. I recently came back to Boston (rent-free living with my parents) after getting a CELTA and teaching for five months in Peru. I interviewed at about 7-8 private language schools. The only offer I got was for an irregular subbing position (ugh I work all next week and it's a 2 hour commute each way), which is alright for me since I'm about to leave for Taiwan anyway. But a couple interviewers outright told me I was too inexperienced almost as soon as I met them. I wonder if they had even reviewed my resume before inviting me for an interview. Based on those experiences and my experience subbing I think there's definitely a strong age bias in the US against younger people, which may or may not be relevant to you...
But Boston is probably a totally different ESL market than NY. In Boston the students come here to get educated, and I assume in NY they mostly come to work. |
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naturegirl321
Joined: 04 May 2003
Posts: 9041
Location: home sweet home
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| Posted: Mon Jun 13, 2011 2:47 am Post subject: |
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| fladude wrote: |
| To be honest, I don't think that a CELTA would be of much, if any use, in getting a job at US public school. Most school administrators won't know what it is. Being a certified English teacher would be your entry point. Once you had that, an MA in English, an ME with a TESOL component, or an MA in TESOL would help you to get the job. Actually even experience would help you get the job. You could say, for example, that you taught English in Mexico for two years. I think a lot of schools would look well on that (especially since they won't have to pay you for 2 years of experience if you weren't teaching under contract at a school and weren't certified). But the CELTA would be meaningless to most of them. Repeat a CELTA does not help you to get a job at US public school (99.9 percent of the time). So if you want to teach at one, don't bother with it. About the only way I could imagine it being useful is if the administrator who does hiring there also had gotten a CELTA back in the day. That is, however, highly unlikely. |
Right, it'll help you with a language school job. I said that "But" to get a job in a PS, you will need to be a licensed teacher. |
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PierogiMonster
Joined: 17 Jun 2010
Posts: 148
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| Posted: Tue Jun 21, 2011 12:34 pm Post subject: Re: CELTA interview and possibilities |
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| Begemot wrote: |
From what I've read, I get the sense that the application/interview process for the CELTA is something of a formality and I don't have to stress too much, the way one would for a job interview. However, if someone here has been through this process, could you tell me what to expect and how beast to be prepared?
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I just got accepted on my chosen CELTA course today, at the end of my phone interview.
I won't say whether the interview was easy or hard as that all depends on your experience in and knowledge of TEFL. But as to the content ...
1. I was given three short sentences using the present perfect and asked to explain the reason the present perfect is used there.
2. I was given a short list of nouns and asked to categorise them as countable, uncountable or 'tricky' (which I took to mean as 'both' e.g. the noun 'coffee').
3. I was asked to comment upon the advantages of pair- and group-work for both the students and the teacher (this was merely a recap of the same task which is on the written pre-interview task, so was no shock).
4. There may be a 4 or 5 but - due to my existing experience - the interviewer cut things short at this stage.
Good luck! |
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DJC
Joined: 03 Jul 2011
Posts: 2
Location: USA
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| Posted: Tue Jul 05, 2011 12:31 am Post subject: |
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@Begemot:
So . . . how'd the phone interview go?
@PierogiMonster:
Was your CELTA interview with NYC's Teaching House--or with someone else entirely? |
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