Certification for Teaching English?

December 26, 2004 9:34 PM

Ok, I apologize in advance for this being a not-entirely-original question, but my girlfriend and I are looking to teach English somewhere in Europe starting this fall (we're thinking mostly of Spain and Italy, but we're open to suggestions), and I was wondering how important certification is, and how to obtain the correct sort of certification from a reputable authority. Thanks, AskMeFi!
posted by clockzero to Education (12 answers total)

If you are not from an EU country, you may find it a little difficult. Possibly to the point of impossibility, if you have no experience or certification (although a cert can be cheap and easy to get, if you just want the piece of paper). North Americans I've known who have gotten work in the places you mention were generally a) on the ground and in the right place at the right time b) lucky and c) certified.

Even Poland, where the ESL industry has been booming, might well be going that way since their EU accession -- I haven't checked in a long time.

Asia, of course, is still wide open. I've been in Korea for about 6 of the last 9 years, working my way up the ESL ladder (when I wasn't being an IT guy in Australia).

Good luck, regardless!

(If you're not already aware of it, you can check Dave's ESL Cafe (eslcafe.com) for current job postings and sometimes useful discussion in the forums.)
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 10:52 PM on December 26, 2004

Well, my brother (Bolivian) and most of his friends who are US expats teach English in Barcelona. To my knowledge, none of them are certified, and I doubt any had teaching experience (I know he didn't). Also, none of them are legal residents either. Well, his girlfriend is Austrian. But despite having a Hungarian passport (via our grandparents) he's in no rush to correct his status.

This particular school is not entirely on the up-and-up as you can imagine. But he gets paid and makes pretty good money.
posted by O9scar at 11:02 PM on December 26, 2004

Interesting, O9scar. I wonder if they found those jobs before going, or as I suggested might be more common, when they were already there. I assume too that bilinguality (is that a word) might have helped, as well.

*starts planning extended vacation in Spain*
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 12:59 AM on December 27, 2004

09scar is right about Spain, you don't necessarily need certification to teach here, but you DO need to get lucky as stavrostwc said. Even if you do get lucky expect the job to be highly unstable and not so well paid (here O9scar's brother got really lucky!), cities like Madrid and Barcelona are extremely expensive to live in, to the point of being nearly prohibitive, especially if you are renting initially with dollars (the Euro hitting new highs against the dollar this last week). The combination of a huge increase in immigrant population over the last decade with 8 years of real estate speculation fomented by Aznar's Partido Popular in Spain has caused real estate to skyrocket and the renter's market to become very very difficult to negotiate in Madrid and Barcelona.

So maybe O9scar's brother seems to be making alot of money but I'll wager that he is spending quite a bit as well. Real wages in those cities are quite low, actually.
posted by sic at 4:21 AM on December 27, 2004

Also, I just saw on the news that Italy is going through something of an economic crisis, which I wasn't aware of. Apparently consumer spending is way off so I'm not sure it is a particulary good time to be looking for work there either.

Sorry to be such a Cassandra, but I'm sure you asked the question to be well informed about the pros and cons of the situation.
posted by sic at 4:25 AM on December 27, 2004

TEFL is the most useful international qualification for teaching english as a foreign language, and the TEFL site is a very useful resource for jobs and questions of this ilk. HTH!
posted by kitschbitch at 6:58 AM on December 27, 2004

Dude, just ask John.
posted by kenko at 7:20 AM on December 27, 2004

A little more info: My brother was living in Spain for a few years before finding that job. He told me he made about 13 euros/hr. He does not work full time, and is definitely not living a life of luxury.
posted by O9scar at 10:33 AM on December 27, 2004

Response by poster: Kenko: he doesn't know about teaching english. He does computer stuff.
posted by clockzero at 2:12 PM on December 27, 2004

I think lots of the people he knew in Sofia did that? You're right though.
posted by kenko at 2:27 PM on December 27, 2004

The people i know who have done ESL teaching in Europe (one in Italy, 2 in Ukraine, 1 in Poland) all needed a working knowledge of the local language before they were even considered for the jobs. I understand that it's not always a requirement to be able to speak both languages, but it certainly made a difference for those people i know who actually got the jobs.

As an aside, a friend who teaches English in Japan recently commented that: "In Japan, socially, Gaijin English teachers rank somewhere below freelance prostitutes."

Good luck to you.
posted by reflecked at 5:39 AM on December 28, 2004

I was in Italy right before the euro came in, and the situation was more or less starting to suck for English post-grads who had just gone over on a lark to make some money and travel. The EU was making finding illegal/gray-area jobs much harder, especially for Americans. (Prior to that, it had been pretty easy.)

Have you considered, though, tour guiding? Either local city tours or going with a group on buses. You would still need to speak the local language, but that way you could get a job through an American company and avoid some of the red-tape hassle.
posted by occhiblu at 11:43 AM on December 28, 2004