Job Discussion Forums

[mark_in_saigon]

I hate to feel this way, as I love this country and its people, but it is pretty hard to find much here to feel good about. The few pluses are of such huge significance that they make life here worthwhile, and give opportunities that we cannot have in the west. My recent surgery was a great example of life here, almost died due to the incompetence of some of the key players (and the progression of the organ failure), yet the surgery was excellent (they brought in their star surgeon who had trained in the states). The recovery room was a vision from hell, yet I was alive. Cost was a pittance. Maybe these programs are like that (but not the cost part). TEFL I had some folks that cared and tried to do a good job, but the overall organization was a failure. I think any organization likely is, and it is not because these people are evil or lazy, they are forced to operate the way they do because of their systems, which cannot be changed by well meaning individuals.

With ILA, I am sure they have some well meaning people there somewhere, most of these places seem to. What I try to do is just look for signs. The first point of contact made it clear how rude they were, so it was an easy decision. The organization is not going to be courteous to the customer overall and yet hire a jerk as the gatekeeper. So it was a sign, and I respected it. TEFL I gave me early signs of their incompetence, so it was no surprise when they showed it during the program. Apollo HCMC did not show any danger signs, but I missed the timing on theirs, I think they do not do one every month, and I had some free time when they were not doing one.

Guys, this whole thing is pot luck. It may actually be of value to get abused or to see how stupid it really can be. Even if you work for a better organization down the road, most everything you do will include the battle against the chaos that is a central feature of life here. It can get very tiring. But, move out to the boonies for a while, you may find that you miss the big city.


Seen pictures on the TV
Where they stay up all nite long
Around here its early to bed and you rise before the dawn
They say the old ways are still the best
And I cannot deny it
But I can't get no rest
Cause it's just too quiet.

Sweethearts of the Rodeo, Midnight Girl in a Sunset Town

[haller_79]

Nicely articulated post Mark. Reminds me of how I felt before I booked a one way ticket out of Saigon. I know what you mean about the 'few plusses', - for me, apart from living in an exotically different country and culture, they were my Vietnamese girlfriend, my Vietnamese friends and being able to go wherever I wanted on a motorbike, even when not sober.
The real deal breaker for me though was the crummy school I worked in and forever feeling like a clueless white monkey pulling off circus tricks at the front of the classroom - not a recipe for sanity! Since getting back home life has been predictably quiet, oscillating between pleasant to somewhat boring, I no longer get called 'handsome' by interested women and I'm generally back to being a pimple on the butt, YET I feel better. I have nearly completed a post-grad B.Ed and now actually understand what teaching is. It IS a hard job, no matter where in the world you do it, but I now realise it needn't be as difficult as what it was for me in Vietnam after my meagre TESOL training. Would the CELTA have made things different? It's possible but somewhow I doubt it.

[I'm With Stupid]

[I'm With Stupid]

[mark_in_saigon]

Was looking for some fill in work from my regular deal (which does not require a cert at all) and found the hiring managers pretty clueless about the TESOL thing, they just see it as a pass/fail requirement. The TOEIC thing really blew their dresses up though.

Actually, it was the CELTA people who could not accept the criticism. You can go back and read the thread on it if you like. I never got past the point where they proved they could dish it out but not take it. I should not say CELTA people, Apollo was quite gracious in their correspondence, and did not get all bowed up when confronted with the same kind of issues I was raising.

Crap schools? Vietnam? Are you serious? This is such a first rate, professional environment, who would have to work at a crap school?


Anyway, the TOEIC thing is just a suggestion, if you do not find it of value to you, don't take it. It was of a lot of value to me, not just when I fill in with teaching, but in my regular deal too. It has a lot more value than the 40 bucks and 2 hours it took to get it, and relative to the cost in time and money on the TESOL, it gives me a lot more bang for the buck in the training thing I do. You mileage may, of course, vary.

[I'm With Stupid]

[haller_79]

[I'm With Stupid]

Sure. Language Link and ILA have been fine. And based on the experience of friends, Apollo have been too, although a little more likely to give you stupid shifts.

[mark_in_saigon]

How many times must we slay this dragon? Look, as you all should know, over 80% of the VN teachers of English are not able to reach the level on the TOEFL test required by the govt, maybe closer to 90%. Just considering this one fact (as reported by the VN govt, not made up by me), how anyone can say that ESL teaching is generally a well managed industry is beyond me. Yeah, there may be one or two first class organizations, and maybe 3 or 4 second class organizations as well. Maybe some of us are living in some kind of a parallel universe here, or maybe I have gone insane this is all just a crazy dream, yet it seems so real.

The way those numbers look gives a pretty good indication of the overall state of the industry, at least the way I judge a business or industry. I spent most of my life in corporations, not education, so I will defer to your superior knowledge on teaching techniques, but I know a mess when I see one.

[generalgiap]

There are two issues here, one is the Vietnamese education system and the other is English language centres run by foreigners and Vietnamese. It is completely illogical to say this is the same industry. In addition, the same can be true comparing the TOEIC with a TEFL certificate.

The biggest problem with Vietnamese English language teachers teaching in Vietnamese primary and secondary schools is the salary. How can one be motivated to develop their own skills if one is only paid 1.6 million Dong a month to teach in a primary school? Furthermore, if there is a lack of training and no resources to develop yourself, it is almost impossible. And finally, do you need a really high TOEFL score to teach young children English in a Vietnamese primary school? Of course, it would help but it is still possible to teach elementary level English to children without having an advanced level of English. Yes, there are many other important issues, but will leave that for another time.

I was also intrigued to hear a native English speaking EFL teacher recommending other native speakers to sit the TOEIC test to improve their employment opportunities in Vietnam. Why the TOEIC, why not TOEFL or IELTS, all of them are English language assessment exams for non-native English speakers. In fact, should one do that and put it on their CV, it is a guarantee that one will never get an interview with any of the reputable EFL schools or with any cowboy outfit managed by someone with a brain bigger than a pea.

[deadlift]

[Jbhughes]

I think that the Vietnamese education system very much includes its private aspect and that when looking at the situation as a whole, we shouldn't ignore any of its parts.

Surely those of us who work in language centres where the teaching staff includes Vietnamese teachers can all state that those teachers also have 2nd - or 3rd - jobs working in the public education system? In my centre there's primary school teachers, high school teachers and uni professors.

In the town that I work in, of the students who haven't studied with private tutors or language centres ,all but those studying in the elite high school (school for the gifted or something like that) come to the school barely able to say a comprehensible wrod. I'm sure if the education they were receiving was better, then our centre would be less successful.


While I agree that teaching children through most lower levels doesn't require an advanced ability in English - god after a morning of kids and a couple of beers, I seem totally incapable of constructing a few coherent paragrahs this afternoon (tenuous link I know) - I do believe that the powers that be really need to invest more in the education system and that if that did, the private sector would be required less and less.

I'm not trying to put down Vietnamese teachers as the situation doesn't seem to be their own making whatsoever. Salary, class sizes, training etc that Generalgiap has mentioned are probably just the start part of what they have to deal with (what about corruption - do you take the needed money and give the sts the grades, or stick to your principles and probably get punished for it?) In fact, I feel a lot of sympathy for Vietnamese teachers, if I was in their situation, I really don't think I'd keep at it - perhaps it's not as simple as just sliding off into another career for them.
I mean, imagine some f'ing foreigner bumbling in saying goodbye to their hot young girlfriend (one of your country's women), wiffing of beer, cigarettes and not enough coffees, flicking through the student book for 5 minutes befor siddling upstairs to waffle on for a couple of hours - oh and they get paid 4 times more than you?

Ok, before this post gets deluged with others defending good ol' tay - I'm not saying that we're necessarily how I've just depicted - but I'm sure something similar to this caricature must exist in some Vietnamese staff members minds (occasionally justly?)

There's a thread on here somewhere discussing problems with the system and potential solutions - including training VN teachers abroad - I definitely advocate something along these lines.

[Jbhughes]

Ah, and as for the TOEIC cert. Honestly, it does seem quite weird to me, but if it was profitable overall, then why not?

I would imagine that a lot of employers would look on it less than favourably - so with these employers one can simply omit it from one's CV. If for some reason it comes up later, it can simply be explained that it was useful for getting a particular job and you wanted to experience a new teaching context.

I don't think it's wise to have a one-size-fits-all CV even for similar jobs, the least one could do is to have 2 CVs - one with TOEIC qual, one without.

[generalgiap]

The TOEIC test is not a teaching qualification, as I stated before, it is an English language assessment test for non native English speakers. The main test consists of two components, reading and listening, and it's multiple choice questions. Therefore, if you do not know how to use a pencil to fill in the answer sheet than it may help you. Otherwise, it's nothing but complete rubbish to discuss why a native English speaking teacher should take it to put on their CV.

I have years of experience teaching TOEIC in Vietnam and yes I have taken TOEIC practice tests in the students book to help me understand the details of the test. And it's the same for teaching IELTS/TOEFL, one should take a practice test before teaching exam preparation courses.

Finally, I have been an IELTS examiner for many years and have never heard of a native English speaker taking the test and the same is for the TOEFL/TOEIC. I suspect that the only native speaker in the world who has taken one of these tests is the one on this thread.

Finally, it would not help in your job search, it would be a disadvantage for many reasons.

In conclusion, what was his TOEIC score-990-100%, that's what one would expect from a native speaker.

Lets be honest, it was bad advice, now lets move on.

[Jbhughes]

I think it would be mildly alarming if anyone participating in threads on this forum wasn't aware that TOEIC is what it is. I may have used the words like qual or cert without particularly thinking my usage of words, but to imply that people posting in this thread aren't aware that TOEIC is a test to measure the ability of non-native speakers is well, just a little bit condescending, in my opinion.

I'm not disagreeing with your points regarding how useful a TOEIC certificate could be for a native speaker. Personally I wouldn't take the test and perhaps it isn't the best advice.

However, my point remains - the poster got value from doing the test and there is nothing wrong with a bit of innovation in securing work. Again, personally, I wouldn't recommend it, but the suggestion that seems to be being bounded around on this thread is that a TOEIC cert would somehow taint one's TEFL career permanently, meaning one would only be able to apply for poor jobs is patently false. As it appears to me, the poster was only trying to offer up an alternative that has worked for them. The poster explained how it worked also- in quite a lot of detail. Pretty altruistic in my opinion, posters and in general teachers can sometimes play their cards a little closer to their chests.

Actually, recently a very experienced teacher in my centre took the TOEFL test - 2 foreign teachers did in fact. The experienced teacher (having taught classes for all 3 main tests for years) honestly neither has any idea why they were doing the test but did it anyway. The experienced teacher got the highest score. At the moment that teacher is getting good hours at the moment. Kh�ng? yes. Perhaps there is another reason (the teacher in question should always have been getting good hours anyway, we're lucky to have such an experienced teacher), but the fact is that teacher is getting the hours.

It seems that one problem in VN is the additional distinction between language ability and teaching ability isn't made enough (alls well that ends well though - this teacher has both).