Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2020 February 22

= February 22 =

TEFL job?
Hello, I'm thinking about doing ESL teaching abroad in Asia or Europe. How far in advance do you think I should start planning to teach abroad? I talked to some placement organizations and one guy wants me to be in Asia at the end of May. Do you think this is achievable for me? Is it realistic for me to get TEFL certified, get a background check and other nessecary paperwork, and relocate to Asia within that timeframe? Keep in mind that I have not done my TEFL certification yet, and will likely need to complete it first. Many of the people I have known have started to prepare 6 months in advance. I just heard about these opportunities.

The opportunity in Spain would likely have me starting in August.

Can a TEFL certification be completed in two weeks?

I am also weighing some other job options outside of ESL teaching that I expect to hear back from soon in the beginning of March or end of February. If I don't hear back from them or get a rejection notice, I will likely be committing to the ESL teaching route. In that case, I would be starting the 120 hour TEFL course in March.

FYI: I live in the Western United States. Thought this information would make it easier for you to provide me with an informed answer as far as realistic start dates. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 184.167.226.152 (talk) 03:03, 22 February 2020 (UTC)


 * For those not familiar with the jargon, TEFL means Teaching English as a Foreign Language and ESL means English as a Second Language. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 03:07, 22 February 2020 (UTC)


 * I'm not a TEFL teacher, although I have taught (maths) in one and I know some TEFL people.
 * You can get 'certified' for TEFL in no time at all, or at least to a standard that the school requires. This is not necessarily a good thing. Standards across the industry vary considerably. If I were dealing with a school who were 'optimistic' as to the time needed to do such things, to the extent that you were questioning the possibility of this, then I'd be looking hard at whether I wanted to work for them. YMMV. Andy Dingley (talk) 18:17, 22 February 2020 (UTC)

Who are these TEFL people you know? It might be helpful for me to talk to them.

If I was to go the TEFL teacher route, I would feel more comfortable starting later like during the summer or early fall rather than sooner. It seems like a rather daunting task to get all the paperwork done, pass the TEFL course, and handle the logistics of relocating abroad in a short amount of time. Perhaps I'm overestimating the difficulty of it, but I'm not really sure. I want to wait untill March to commit to the ESL options because I will likely be hearing back about my non-ESL job options in March. I generally prefer these other options over the ESL teacher opportunities so I want to hear back from them first before spending the money on online TEFL and starting the process of relocating abroad legally. If I did not have these other options I would hit the ground running right now with the TEFL stuff.

The Asia program I've talked to wants me to start in May or April. The programs I've looked at in Europe (Spain (kind of hesitant to go there now - you often a need student visa to teach legally as an American 😩), Hungary and Romania (promising), Russia and Poland (promising), and Czech Republic (also seems promising) ) have late summer start dates. I feel more comfortable having a later start date. I prefer Asia over Europe (Korea, China, Thailand, or Taiwan) though because salaries are higher (Particularly Korea and China where it is possible to save significant amounts of money - flights are even reimbursed in Korea) and there are usually no upfront payments to recruiting agencies.

I don't want to name any specific companies or organizations here. I want to stay anonymous so I don't compromise any of my options. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 184.167.226.152 (talk) 18:05, 23 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Good luck. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 19:10, 23 February 2020 (UTC)