Wp Without Degree?

[podge]

hi, hope i have posted this in the right section, im a 31 yr old male and have been living in chiang mai for a month now, on a 1 year non imm o visa.

Previously i have worked in manufacturing, quality control for 12 years. I have been interested in teaching for a while and have a genuine interest in this, and would like to do a job that would be helping people. i have been reading through the posts for quite a while now and have a couple of questions i hope someone will answer for me, i have no degree but im seriously thinking about taking a text and talk 6 week TEFL course here in changers soon.

My questions are if i take a job here, i assume i will not be offered a WP, what are the chances of me being caught without one, and what could happen to me?

also is it possible that i could get a WP, if i have no degree, it would be nice to hear from anyone in this position, or is this impossible!

please go easy on me.

[PeaceBlondie]

Hi,

You can take Text and Talk or another course or two, right in Chiang Mai.

Do not expect to get a work permit until you've been working at a school for a while. Technically, that means that you and the school are both breaking Thai law, but they don't care. I did it for two years.

You can get a job in or around CMai for about 20 to 25K, probably.

[JustAnotherFarang]

Hi,

You can take Text and Talk or another course or two, right in Chiang Mai.

Do not expect to get a work permit until you've been working at a school for a while. Technically, that means that you and the school are both breaking Thai law, but they don't care. I did it for two years.

You can get a job in or around CMai for about 20 to 25K, probably.

I neve knew you could get a work permit without a degree. I have a friend who works in a school for nearly 2 years and he has been led to believe that he cannot get a wp and must tell people he is working voluntarily

How does he go about getting a wp Peace Blondie

JAF

[PeaceBlondie]

Hi,

You can take Text and Talk or another course or two, right in Chiang Mai.

Do not expect to get a work permit until you've been working at a school for a while. Technically, that means that you and the school are both breaking Thai law, but they don't care. I did it for two years.

You can get a job in or around CMai for about 20 to 25K, probably.

I never knew you could get a work permit without a degree. I have a friend who works in a school for nearly 2 years and he has been led to believe that he cannot get a wp and must tell people he is working voluntarily

How does he go about getting a wp Peace Blondie?

JAF

How should I know? I couldn't get a work permit for two years, even though I had a real degree and was working at real govt. schools in a province where the boss at the ministry of labour said they had never, ever issued a work permit to a teacher.

Yes, there are more than a few teachers in Thailand, without a bachelor's degree, who have work permits. You have to be loved by knowledgable teachers and administrators in Thailand who actually know how to administer and teach, and are willing to go through the Thai bureaucracy with you. You can't do it alone.

Volunteer work requires a work permit.

Thais are lovely people, even when they don't have a clue as to how to do something Thai in Thailand with other Thais for a farang to teach Thai students.

[The Dan Sai Kid]

I have a friend who works in a school for nearly 2 years and he has been led to believe that he cannot get a wp and must tell people he is working voluntarily

You still need a WP for voluntary work.

[Loaded]

Hi Podge

I know at least 5 teachers working in CM without a degree but with a wp.

I also know teachers who've worked at language schools in CM for over 8 years without a wp - they do a MaeSai visa run every month. Unless you're lippy to immigration you won't have a problem working in CM on a tourist. There are 10s of teachers here in that situation.

[podge]

thankyou for your reply peace blondie, you have helped me in my decision. i think im going to have a chat at the place wo does the tefl. i think il give it a go. if anyone on here has a wp without a batchelors degree it would be good to hear from you.

thanks again!

[DrFisher]

Well, if you truly want to help people and be a part of the solution rather than the problem here I suggest getting a degree. How would you feel if someone in your native country did not have an education and decided they wanted to be a teacher, would it even be legal? You will not likely get a work permit without an education because the schools that offer them are looking for permanent workers with an education but your chances of getting caught are slim to none because the school gets fined not you. As far as Text and Talk goes it is a good school and 1 of the 2 in Thailand accepted by the Thai board of education the other being CMU. Sorry, I don’t mean to sound hard about the topic (I’m not an English teacher by the way) but I get pissed when I see tourists that want to extend their vacation decide to be an educator, I spent a lot of money and 12 years of my life to get an education and if I felt I was committing a disservice to my students in anyway I would resign my position. Again sorry, I don't mean to hurt feelings it's just that I feel very strongly about this topic, mostly because I have children that I don't want in schools with uneducated teachers.

[Ijustwannateach]

I know several persons teaching at some of the "best" schools who do indeed have work permits without even a Bachelor's degree. This dead horse has been flogged so many times I'm hardly moved to flog it again, even if we have been joined by one of the "properer" crowd. So I'll tell a story instead.

When I was about 9 years old, there was a boy in my elementary class named Johnny Villalobos. His mother was a first generation Spanish immigrant. She made an arrangement with our teacher to come in once a week and teach us simple conversational Spanish. We learned the alphabet, numbers, greetings, and other simple expressions. Once or twice during the year we had a kind of Spanish party, where she would cook various things for us to try. It was great fun and we learned a lot.

TEFLers in Thailand are a lot like this. Most students in Thai public schools who encounter them see them *maybe* once a week, if they're lucky, and learn very basic skills- like numbers, basic greetings, short conversations, etc. If there's a primary English instructor, it will be a Thai teacher who's far from fluent who spends a lot of time teaching about boring mechanics and spelling and stuff.

If schools out there have the money to pay people to come in and do this professionally, more power to them. Many kids will otherwise never meet a native speaker. And I don't think they need a college degree or a teaching degree any more than Mrs. Villalobos did visiting us for short Spanish lessons. It's not the TEFLer's typical job to teach grammar and mechanics in detail.

All-English programs are a different kettle of fish, and do require personnel with higher academic training. Unfortunately, many Thai administrators don't see the difference between TEFLers and subject teachers, and many TEFLers have been trying to jump the gap- with very mixed success. The poster above is entirely within his rights to check the credentials of teachers at his kids' schools. And no doubt he knows that at the kind of big international schools where "proper" teachers are consistently employed, he will be spending the kind of big bucks that such teachers must really be paid. Or is his complaint that properly qualified teachers just don't work for slave wages anymore?

Otherwise, it's hard to imagine why he has a problem with the opening poster, because OP clearly says he's interested in TEFL, and will most likely wind up at a poor government school somewhere in the suburbs. And if that's the kind of school where the last poster plans to send his children, there's no danger they'll learn English at all either from qualified or unqualified teachers- so he really shouldn't worry, now, should he?

[PeaceBlondie]

Thanks, as usual, Ijustwannakeeponteachingwithaworkpermit.

After I'd taught for two years at govt. schools in a province adjacent to Chiang Mai, I was offerred a job like Mrs. Villalobos had (which means, "village of wolves"). It was in the village of Saraphi, for 200 baht per hour. I no longer consider myself to be a Mrs. Villalobos, and I declined, and got another job in town for 300 baht per hour. Trust me, a Romanian backpacker who dropped out of school in Translyvania at age 16 could have taught those wolves.

Let's change our forum names to like "PeaceVillageWolvesBlondie" or "I just wanna teach to a village of wolves."

My apologies to Dr. Fisher. If you can get your kids into Oxbridge or HarvYale, be sure all the professors have doctorates in their teaching fields. If you want to spend a million baht per year in Bangkok for the best secondary education in Thailand, I think all the teachers will be properly certified, even though they earn about 60% of what they'd earn in New York or Texas.

The opening poster would do fine in Saraphi or MaeJo or SanKampaeng, after he's taken a TEFL course of 100 hours and enough supervised practice teaching. But he may never get to teach at the better schools in Chiang Mai.

[podge]

thanks all for replying, i have friends who have an "education" degrees, i went in a different direction, and got a job in engineering straight after school, and ended up learning a lot in my job which i stayed in for 12 years. whos to say that they are brighter than me because they have a degree? in my opinion i would say not. infact they are quite dumb sometimes

anyway i have enrolled today for the talk and text course so i shall see how it goes, i will give it my best shot!

thanks again

[DrFisher]

My grandfather doesn’t have a high school diploma and he is a multi millionaire that’s not the point, try pulling that off today. My point is the tourists that come here and decide to extend their vacation so, they decide to become an English teacher and go to class or not, drunk, hung over, whatever it doesn’t matter to them. Now, personally if I made my living in the noble field of English teaching I would not want to have to compete with these people because they are willing to work for a lower wage which brings your wage down as well as all of the other legitimate English teachers trying to make a living. I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings but seriously I spent a lot of time and money in school and I can’t imagine how I would feel if tomorrow someone told me my education didn’t mean anything anyone could take a 4 to 6 week course and replace me for a very low wage. Some of us are true expats that live here and have to make a living to pay car payments, house payments, etc. when vacationers come along and decide to work as illegal aliens and drive our wages down…… well I hope I don’t have to say any more and as I said I’m not trying to hurt anyone’s feelings I just care about the people here and I am a legal educated worker here that pays taxes. If you live here and work here you should feel the same way I do and you should be looking to improve your financial position by weeding the bad ones out.

[Ijustwannateach]

I think we're off-topic here. The subject is not whether or not persons with or without degrees should have work permits, but whether or not they can. Incidentally, when they do hold work permits, they are not illegal aliens, and they do pay taxes- it's part of the point of the work permit- as I'm sure Dr. Fisher knows. I'm starting to smell rumbling from under the bridge.

[DrFisher]

There is no point in saying anything you missed the point and for some reason that only seems to happen when I post something in an English teaching form; I wonder why?

[Ijustwannateach]

Well, it seems to me that most of us responded to most of your points, on this and other threads- which one exactly was it that we missed?- and you've failed to respond to some of ours, which as you must know (as a doctor) is not exactly a strong way to make your case, whatever it is, based on the available evidence.

As to teaching-in-Thailand forums- I think I've read all your posts here. Were you here under another handle before?

[mijan24]

Well, it seems to me that most of us responded to most of your points, on this and other threads- which one exactly was it that we missed?- and you've failed to respond to some of ours, which as you must know (as a doctor) is not exactly a strong way to make your case, whatever it is, based on the available evidence.

As to teaching-in-Thailand forums- I think I've read all your posts here. Were you here under another handle before?

Steven I know we have had our differences in the past but your first post on this topic was in my humble opinion right on the button.

Dr Fisher not wanting to drag this out to much - I think you may well be the one who is missing the point - The OP did not say he did not have an "Education" just he did not have a Degree. To save argument I refer to an extract from your post (Dr F) - How would you feel if someone in your native country did not have an education[/b

Edited July 18, 2006 by mijan24

[PeaceBlondie]

I don't think Dr. Fisher's point about qualifications was completely off topic. The OP was pointing out that he wants to teach English in Chiang Mai, without a degree. And Dr. Fisher's right that there are a lot of factors pushing down wages in Chiang Mai, for many years now. Expats like me, who don't need 30K to survive. Sexpats, drunks, etc. - although I honestly think the competition is tough enough in CMai to weed those guys out real fast. They might survive in Lampang or Saraphi, Hang Dong, Mae Sot, Mae Sai, Mae Hong Son, etc., but not in Chiang Mai, where good teachers are in large supply.

But in a lot of places, a Romanian from Translylvania (like my old friend Richard W., BA, MA, paralegal, etc.) might do passably well out in the hinterlands, speaking English far better than most of the hard-working nice ladies who teach English to prathom students. Richard spoke as good English as I do, but with that accent from Dracula's hometown (really).

[kenkannif]

I don't think Dr. Fisher's point about qualifications was completely off topic. The OP was pointing out that he wants to teach English in Chiang Mai, without a degree. And Dr. Fisher's right that there are a lot of factors pushing down wages in Chiang Mai, for many years now. Expats like me, who don't need 30K to survive. Sexpats, drunks, etc. - although I honestly think the competition is tough enough in CMai to weed those guys out real fast. They might survive in Lampang or Saraphi, Hang Dong, Mae Sot, Mae Sai, Mae Hong Son, etc., but not in Chiang Mai, where good teachers are in large supply.

Still nothing really to do with quals mate...unless being a bit 'thick' means you're more likely to enjoy sex and alcohol....which obviously isn't the case

[Ijustwannateach]

Agree with Mijan (all forgiven, mate! ) and Ken. PB, the good "Dr." did make that point about depressed wages, but as I previously responded, he's not in the same market as serious subject teachers who should get better money (him included, of course, unless he's a closet TEFLer and not telling us) and if he's willing to pay market rates for "real" teachers he'll get 'em for his kids. So my question stands: which point did we not "get?"

"Steven"

[DrFisher]

To answerer your question no I wasn't here under another handle, it just goes to show I'm not the only one that feels this way, as a matter of fact I use my real name so I consider what I am saying. If I didn't answer you response immediately I'm sorry I don't sit here all day sending responses but I do try to keep up on them. And third I'm very happy my teachers had an education including my foreign teachers in Thailand.

[DrFisher]

To answerer your question no I wasn't here under another handle, it just goes to show I'm not the only one that feels this way, as a matter of fact I use my real name so I consider what I am saying. If I didn't answer you response immediately I'm sorry I don't sit here all day sending responses but I do try to keep up on them. And third I'm very happy my teachers had an education including my foreign teachers in Thailand.

[erikr_]

To answerer your question no I wasn't here under another handle, it just goes to show I'm not the only one that feels this way, as a matter of fact I use my real name so I consider what I am saying. If I didn't answer you response immediately I'm sorry I don't sit here all day sending responses but I do try to keep up on them. And third I'm very happy my teachers had an education including my foreign teachers in Thailand.

Interesting Thread. I have no degree, willing to do a TEFL and work as a teacher in Thailand. You would say that I deprive kids of a good education with that:

-1: I have done 3,25 years of teachers education, just did not finish as I got a job as a private tutor and later managing the facilities.

-2: Have studied 2 years of psychology as part of personal development

-3: have done 10 years of private and individual tutoring up to first year of university level in Maths and physics and am currently working in the UK in an all english environment.

Who is more suitable to educate your kids? Me or someone with a business degree and a TEFL?

Hard to tell as I am capable of helping students pass there final exams in 20 hours 1 to 1 education in math.

Edited August 24, 2006 by erikr_

[PeaceBlondie]

erikr, maybe you're an exception which tests the general rule. Your academic transcript would show lots of courses in education (pedagogy, psych & development, learning theory, etc.). You should include that in your resume, of course.

In my opinion, there's a difference between your transcripts and mine. You're 3/4ths of the way to full certification, and I'm nowhere.

[papertiger]

As usual, people who invested in degree education defend their position with very ignorant attitudes. I'm currently teaching 5 to 6 year old Thai students for 45k, with 25k extra from private students. My boss is English, with 20 years experience, and Masters of Language Arts and two of my collegues have Masters degrees. Despite my lack of degree or TEFL, they recognise me as a talented and very capable teacher capable of planning and writing course materials and examinations. The owner of the school is interested in education... But not institution. My English is above average, and I'm very capable of teaching people to spee kinglish. If you think I spelled that badly, ask a Thai to read it.

Try to support good people, and good teachers, and forgive people who are offended because they invested 12 years and lots of money. It should be obvious that drunks and backpackers should be driven out, but remember that they are often well qualified. Have faith that talented teachers can survive and drive out bad ones, and stop believing that university produces good, creative, or well educated people.

[erikr_]

As usual, people who invested in degree education defend their position with very ignorant attitudes. I'm currently teaching 5 to 6 year old Thai students for 45k, with 25k extra from private students. My boss is English, with 20 years experience, and Masters of Language Arts and two of my collegues have Masters degrees. Despite my lack of degree or TEFL, they recognise me as a talented and very capable teacher capable of planning and writing course materials and examinations. The owner of the school is interested in education... But not institution. My English is above average, and I'm very capable of teaching people to spee kinglish. If you think I spelled that badly, ask a Thai to read it.

Try to support good people, and good teachers, and forgive people who are offended because they invested 12 years and lots of money. It should be obvious that drunks and backpackers should be driven out, but remember that they are often well qualified. Have faith that talented teachers can survive and drive out bad ones, and stop believing that university produces good, creative, or well educated people.

I cant agree more. I feel that especially when it comes to teaching english in Thailand a local exam to get a teachers licencewould be more beneficial then a degree requirement.

[farangsay]

Well, if you truly want to help people and be a part of the solution rather than the problem here I suggest getting a degree. How would you feel if someone in your native country did not have an education and decided they wanted to be a teacher, would it even be legal? You will not likely get a work permit without an education because the schools that offer them are looking for permanent workers with an education but your chances of getting caught are slim to none because the school gets fined not you. As far as Text and Talk goes it is a good school and 1 of the 2 in Thailand accepted by the Thai board of education the other being CMU. Sorry, I don’t mean to sound hard about the topic (I’m not an English teacher by the way) but I get pissed when I see tourists that want to extend their vacation decide to be an educator, I spent a lot of money and 12 years of my life to get an education and if I felt I was committing a disservice to my students in anyway I would resign my position. Again sorry, I don't mean to hurt feelings it's just that I feel very strongly about this topic, mostly because I have children that I don't want in schools with uneducated teachers.

Very interesting but...

I don't have a degree. I wouldn't dream of offering my services as a "teacher" of any subject

other than , possibly , English.

My qualifications ?

Spotting that your last phrase does not express what you wanted to say.

Stay cool.

[podge]

I agree, not all people who teach english are back packers, or go out and get drunk / whoring everynight during the week, if you have a genuine interest in teaching, and can offer a good service, then why not teach? im in the middle of my tefl right now, and if i dont do very well at it, i wont be teaching at all. As it turns out im really enjoying it, and i think il do ok. I dont have a degree and if i do get a teaching job, i will give it my all. im not the type of person who would go to school pissed, and if im sure i could do a better job than someone who did.

[mbkudu]

As far as the students are concerned, I don't think they care if a teacher has a degree as long as they feel he or she is a good teacher and they are learning something. I do think that a teacher teaching in a university should have a degree at the same level or higher than the students being taught; higher preferably. On the other hand a teacher without a degree here has no solid future. What I mean is it's a crap shoot. Without a degree you could fall into just the right pockets and make a good living and retire peacefully and financially stable. You could also struggle with low paying jobs and eventually be pushed out of the market by increasing visa regulations and stricter screening procedures. A teacher with a degree, whether a good teacher or a poor teacher, has much better prospects for the future in Thailand and Asia as a whole. If your future plans are short-term, you are of retirement age and have enough savings or you are independently wealthy and just want to teach in Thaialnd to stay busy, then a degree is irrelevant. If your situation applies to none of the above, then you might rethink things a bit. I know I did.

[DrFisher]

Due to recent events that I was told would never happen…Well, they happened, as I was saying, get an education and then welcome, stay as long as you like, with out an education welcome as a tourist not a teacher. How long did you think it could go on? Denial? They have medication for that? Peace and blessings wherever you go I honestly wish you the best of luck. Who said they would teach my child and I would be happy? I would like to hear your answer now.

[Ijustwannateach]

Um, there are still plenty of teachers teaching legally with work permit and visa, even without degrees. I know some of them myself. They are legal, they pay taxes, and they will not be ejected from the country under any version of the new "crackdown." I'm afraid you're celebrating too soon.

"S"