Job Discussion Forums

[WannaTeach]

Hi,

My b/f and I really want to teach in Asia. We've been researching for months now, but our situation is a little unique so we need some advice as to what is truly viable and in our best interests. Rather than do a long essay I'm just going to put everything in point form for easy reading.

1. We both have BA degrees. His is a double major in History & Philosophy with a minor in Biology; mine is in Sociology.

2. We're both completing our MA degrees in 3 months time. His focus is History; mine Sociology.

3. We're both looking into TESOL certification.

4. We both have Diploma in University Teaching Certification, (lesson plans, teaching strategies, learning styles, etc you name it).

5. He has 1 year teaching experience, while I have 4. We've taught age groups 5-40 years with classroom sizes ranging from 15-35 students.

6. Both our degrees are from Canadian schools.

Sounds good? What's the problem you say.

7. He's Canadian (white) and I'm Jamaican (black) with a pending Canadian PR status).

What do we do? We've looked and looked. We know the problem is not him. He'll be easy to hire. The problem is me. No one wants me, irrespective of how qualified I may be. We even went to our school's employment office and we alluded to the burning question of how employable I am in this type of job market - and the employment counselor ignored the question.

So tell me, what am I missing? What are our options? We have a phenomenal amount of student debt and we'd like to have this experience but now I'm not so sure if its even possible.

Some people mentioned on another forum that we should forget Asia because of the racism etc and focus our energies on Europe.

We initially we interested in Singapore, Hong Kong and south Korea. We still want Singapore or Hong Kong, but now Malaysia and Macao are looking great!

I'm sorry this so long, but if you made it this far I'm grateful. I'm just feeling really down trodden and devastated by this. Any advice, suggestions, experiences that you could share would be great. Give me some hope, because right now, I'm feeling like making him go alone.

Thanks!


P.S The jobs we're looking at are:

1. ESL
2. Pre-university
3. University
4. College

Ideally if a pre-university/college or university were to hire us to teach ESL and 1st & 2nd year courses (A'levels, IB or college) we'd be over the moon.

[englishmaster]

I have enough time under my belt in northeast Asia to know that you can forget about Korea and Taiwan. There _might_ be some small places in China that would take you.

I have not been to Malaysia, but may be going there soon, and, based on what I have read about the place, I would say you should look into it. Look on the links of www.saintinmalaysia.blogspot.com for teaching and expat info.

You might look into eastern Europe, too. The University of South East Europe, in Macedonia, is hiring.

Good luck.

[saint57]

There are two Canadian pre-university programmes using Ontario curriculum in Kuala Lumpur. However, to be employed at either of these schools (including ESL) you must be certified by the Ontario College of Teachers.

My school also offers A-Levels, but the staff are 100% local.

[roamingteacher]

WannaTeach - where did you end up?