Getting a job as a teacher
Fake Degree/No Degree/Ageism Let's get this out of the way immediately. Fake degrees from Khao Sarn Road are no longer viable. You will need a sealed letter from the university or your embassy to authenticate it. You'll be found out. Unqualified teachers (no degree) can rarely get jobs in Thailand now. It is not impossible but you will not get the better jobs and the pay will not be great. If people like you then strings can be pulled. Visiting the local schools and asking for a job can and does happen. Take a Thai speaker with you. The retirement age for Thai and foreign teachers is 60. Once you have reached that age you will find it almost impossible to get a job. How do I know? Because I am 66 years old and I have submitted countless job applications without success. Increasingly adverts for teachers stipulate much younger than 60 with 45 and 50 not uncommon. Basic paperwork needed (NOTE: The rules are being more strictly applied now) Your employer should process all the paperwork required. If the advert says they will help with the paperwork, it normally means you need to pay for it. Better employers will meet the cost. Some employers will start the process promptly. Some employers will delay the process because they want to see if you can really teach first. I found the whole process to be stressful. My problems with Thai employers always have stemmed from unduly lengthy processing. This was because the visa in my passport was about to run out, but the Thai administration couldn't or wouldn't do things in a timely manner. Bloody minded brinkmanship! Try to stay calm. I couldn't stay calm but you might succeed!
The best free website in Thailand is http://ajarn.com/recruitment/browse_jobs/index.html I have found nearly all my jobs through their jobs section. Put your CV on the resume section and when you see a job advertised that you like, just send the school your resume. The alternative is to get your paperwork (CV, copy of degree) together and go round all the government schools, colleges, universities and private language schools, leaving them a copy of your paperwork. Try to speak to someone while you are at their premises, and periodically return in person to remind them that you are still seeking a job. There is a lot of information about all the things you need to know when teaching in Thailand on the ajarn.com site. Visit the forum for advice. You can get the real opinions of fellow teachers and they will help you with the job interview stage onwards. The paperwork (work permits, visas) requirements are many but the website members will guide you through the minefield. It is a wonderful website. It achieves much more than I can here, because it is up to date. Normal workload and expectations at Government schools Normally - You will be expected to prepare detailed lesson plans for the full term. You will probably teach several different classes. Textbooks are normally selected by the Thai teachers, so talk to the Thai teachers who deal with your classes. Try to work together. Ask what chapters, and which aspects of each chapter, will be covered by them and which aspects by you. Usually you will be required to teach the conversational parts. You will need to get a list of the students' names, which will probably be in Thai. At the first lesson ask them to write their English nicknames beside their name. Some kids will not have one yet, so give them an appropriate nickname. Use this list to record their grades. Test them regularly and as soon as possible to get the students, and you, used to the process. Otherwise – Some Thai teachers may prefer that you sail alone. You will need to prepare everything yourself. You may choose a textbook or prepare handouts to be handed to each student at the beginning of the lesson. A lecture to the students about keeping the handouts in a file or remembering to bring the textbook for the next lesson is a good idea but whatever you do or say students will still lose them or forget to bring them. I used to prepare a folder for each child and hand them out and get them back at the end of the lesson! Their test answers and grades were also included in the folder. International Schools International schools offer the best salaries and working conditions but also demand the best people. If you are well qualified, they are your best bet. Government Schools Good schools are easily identifiable from their advert. It should cover all the information about salary, benefits, work permit, visa, health insurance, working hours, contract term and so on. They are reliable employers because you can be certain that you will be paid, and it will be on time. Private Schools and Language Schools Private schools and language schools can be fine, but they can be less reliable than the other options. The reliability aspects normally relate to visa processing and sometimes payment. You will need to negotiate the best deal you can. Be careful. Ask around before you commit. Universities The Rajabhat universities tend to process your paperwork very quickly. When I worked there I had my visa and work permit within a fortnight. Amazingly quick. The workload and expectations are higher than government schools. You will be assigned a Thai counterpart to help you. Liaise carefully with your counterpart to ensure that you are fully aware of the tasks you are responsible for and the strict deadlines. You will be expected to teach several different courses and are required to prepare everything for each complete course. This covers tasks such as the complete course lesson plans (which also serve as the course outlines to be presented to the students at the first lesson), selecting and printing of the textbooks (including getting them printed at the print shops at the university) so that each student has a text book at the beginning of the course. The difference between the good and poor students is huge! You may need (and I certainly did!) to prepare additional material in order to cope with this problem. It arises because the textbook is too difficult for the poorer students so your choice of textbook is an important issue. Please ask the expatriate and Thai teachers for assistance in gauging the standard of English you will be confronting. Gauging the standard of the students comes with experience, but the first time you do it you don't have any, so don't be afraid to ask for help. Grading is an important issue. You will need to test them at the middle and end of each term. You need to choose a sensible grading structure. If you are too generous you might be required to reduce the number of A's you have given! Agencies – The good, the bad and the ugly Good luck! I don't mean to be controversial. I have never been shafted by an agency, but I have needed to be nimble and I have been lucky. My best job was with a British agency in Hat Yai. There are horror stories though, so you need to be cautious. New agencies spring up and bale out regularly though, so you take the plunge or not as you wish. I always asked to be paid daily or weekly at the beginning, but most are reluctant to do that, because they fear that you will not turn up regularly, so it works both ways. Find an expatriate bar frequented by teachers and ask around. Irritations Thais will rarely pay your travelling or other costs so job hunting can be an expensive and time consuming exercise. Mostly you will not be hired unless you turn up, so get suited and booted and go for it! I have had mostly positive experiences so chin up and best foot forward. I once arrived for the interview at the stated time only to find that there were 19 others who had been told to come at the same time and on the same day! I left immediately, and sent the school an email condemning them concerning their disgusting behaviour and their contempt for foreign teachers. It made me feel better, but I did not get a reply. Shit happens but please do not let the bastards grind you down. Mostly you will be properly treated. Salary The salary for a government school and university is about ฿30K to ฿40K. International schools pay much more and will be in the range of ฿50K to ฿100K, depending on your qualifications and experience. Health Insurance It is a legal requirement for government schools to provide health insurance once you have the work permit–at the time of writing the cost is ฿750 monthly from you and ฿750 monthly from the school. Working as a teacher I have been working as a teacher in Thailand for 11 years. In my experience many Thai teachers dislike foreigners and firmly believe that most of us are inferior. They think we are unprofessional, overpaid and over here just to extend our stay, to screw their women and get drunk. There are many glorious exceptions but the majority fit this description. Expatriate teachers are a rum lot too. Most are self centred and will think nothing of denigrating you and telling lies about you just to curry favour with the Thais. They think teaching is a popularity contest! Fortunately though, it is not absolutely vital to rub shoulders with your fellow teachers. You will be teaching at different times, you will be getting on with your own workload, you will be working alone, so you will follow your own agendas and rarely meet up normally. Thais and expatriates away from the working environment are better and I have had many positive experiences. I am even happily married to a Thai lady so it must be true. There is obviously a cultural divide in dealings with Thais in Thailand but only in the workplace does this cause a problem. Thais generally think foreigners are blunt and too rude and I have some sympathy with their viewpoint. Thai teachers and administration staff do not like being asked to take care of foreign teachers for this reason. The unfortunate Thai who is assigned to help with the visas and work permits for the foreigners absolutely hates having to do it. Consequently they put off doing things until the very last minute. This causes stress and frustration for the foreigner. The foreigner complains, the Thai person is upset and then the problems begin. Thais will then talk about the foreigner maliciously, often telling lies in order to put the boot firmly in. They group together and stop acknowledging your very existence. Your contract will not be renewed and you will get a bad reference. My very personal golden rules when working in a Thai school are:
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September 2014 – Phuketwan newspaper report:
The beaches of the far southern portion of Phuket are looking great. Here's a rundown on what the Phuketwan team encountered on a swing through Phuket's south. Palai Beach This east coast beach, mostly used by local fishermen, has plenty of atmosphere and a large restaurant right on the water's edge. Great spot for a walk and a seafood meal with a view out across Chalong Bay. Unchanged. Rawai Beach Not so much a swimming beach as a parking space for speedboats and longtails, the shorefront stretch at Rawai now seems to be more orderly with parking clearly defined. Yet the use of the shorefront pavement remains odd, with restaurants on the opposite side of Rawai Beach Road still using tables and chairs or low picnic-style cushions for customers. There is even a taxi sala with a driver watching television as we stroll by. Laem Ka Beach This small beach remains a favorite place for speedboats to collect and deposit Korean tourists for snorkelling day-trips to nearby islands. One after another or in twos or threes, the speedboats will deposit their cargoes of Korean tourists through the afternoon, hundreds of them. The tourists all walk across the beach and up the steps, where they board seong taew buses and are ferried to their resorts. Apparently picking up and dropping off hundreds of passengers every day is not commercial use of this Phuket beach. Nai Harn Beach Largest of the southern beaches, Nai Harn has always been a favorite of local expats, especially those with a pet dog to walk in the early morning. The beach looks great without the sunbeds and umbrellas. The day we passed by, one or two adventurous swimmers brought their own brollies. The area under the shady grove of trees looks worn but clear of the illegal restaurants that were destroying it. With time, the grass could recover. Ya Nui Beach A small cove with a rocky outcrop as an added attraction, Ya Nui still has a pile or two of rubble but that's a huge improvement on wall to wall sunbeds and commerce. Interlopers have always been a problem here. An illegal house stood on the spot where the parking lot now lies until the 2004 tsunami washed it away. Wonderful to sweep eyes from side to side across this little gem again. Ao Sane Beach Always the quirkiest of Phuket's beaches, Ao Sane is reached by driving through and under the Phuket Yacht Club Resort building. The restaurant alongside the rocky beach remains. Whether Ao Sane has been overlooked or whether the restaurant is legal we can't say. But if readers are looking for a place to eat by the sea, without the disturbing sound of inappropriate music, this is one place to try. Unfortunately the prices have gone up. Rent in Thailand - Buy in Malaysia
Foreigners cannot own land in Thailand. Only Thais can. Many foreigners take the risk of buying land and putting it in the wife’s name. Then they build a dream home on it. Personally, I would never take that risk, because you could end up homeless and penniless or dead. Why buy land or property? I live in a rented home with my Thai lady. It costs just ฿2,000 monthly. It is in a rural area surrounded by coconut, mango and other trees and wildlife such as birds, animals and snakes. The normal monthly rent is about 3 to 4 thousand baht for a nice house in the provinces outside Bangkok. I like to have a base I can return to. My Thai wife stays there looking after the home. When I am working in another province and need some loving care, I call her and she comes quickly and stays a week. The house is cared for by Thai neighbours. There are many stories being told of the dreams of buying property in Thailand. Property purchases in Thailand are risky. You can't own the property. Some say condominiums are exempt from this but it's not entirely true. At the end of the day it's the land that counts, and the fact is foreigners cannot own the land. The following extract is from the Bangkok Post report dated 4 September 2010 entitled "Owning a piece of Thailand": According to current mortgage law, the lease-holder only has rights of possession, not ownership rights. As a result, the holder cannot use it to apply for a mortgage loan. "The leasehold contract terms are not favourable with foreigners because they are too short. They are not confident whether their leases can be extended when the contract expires. The leases are also unable to be financed and inherited." The words in quotes are those of Mr Wittaya, a partner in the international law firm Baker and McKenzie. So whatever an unscrupulous property agent will tell you, you don't have rights to the land in Thailand. If you are thinking of setting up a company to do a property deal, that just complicates matters even further. The general consensus is that Thailand is geared up for foreigners to fall flat on their face when it comes to investments, either through bureaucratic and outdated legislation or by the unknown. The unknown could be a lot of things. Corruption is rife in Thailand. A corrupt Thai lawyer is not unusual. Corrupt property developers are common place and the Thai legal system does not protect foreigners who invest in Thailand. Property scams operated by crime syndicates exploit the system in Thailand. Buy in Malaysia The Malaysians have a MM2H program (Malaysia My 2nd Home) http://www.mm2h.gov.my/index.php/en/ which gives easy entry and hassle free residence in Malaysia via a renewable Social Visit Pass, with a multiple-entry visa that is valid for 10 years. You do not need to make the dreaded Thai visa runs in Malaysia. The Malaysian–Thai border is free. Because the Malaysian visa is multiple-entry you can cross into Thailand at will and enjoy the carefree Thai entertainment (ladies!). You could even rent a holiday home in Thailand if you wanted a haven there. Foreigners are allowed to own freehold properties in Malaysia, and property ownership is well regulated and systematic so you can pass the property on to your kids. The country has a low cost of living and there is a widespread use of English. In addition, the country's political stability and ample financial liquidity are strong plus points that attract foreign buyers. |
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