How does one find a university teaching position in Taiwan?

Work Teaching English in Taiwan
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[quote=“tomthorne”]
I would get out of the mindset that you are going to be teaching English literature to enthralled and enthralling students who can’t wait to devour the literary greats. This could lead to immense disappointment on your part. Approach the lessons as much bigger buxiban classes with slightly older kids, and you’ll be more satisfied. Most of the unis will run reading classes, but not with the level of student engagement you seem to be looking for :wink: .[/quote]

Check. I dunno how typical this is but I can perhaps give you an idea of how it works here.

A few years ago the school decreed that Freshman English class external reading, which is as close as we get to “literature” should be worth 25% of the assessment. This was a response to the complaint that, at 15%, they didn’t bother to read it.

I pointed out that, at 25%, they STILL wouldn’t bother to read it, so we’d have a choice between failing over half of them, or faking it. The response was the usual smoke-and-mirrors reality-defying bullshit.

Taiwanese teachers would NEVER fake it, and we could and should fail over half of them, “if they deserved it”.

I dunno what Taiwanese teachers do, but I understand they don’t fail very many. I fake it, and I still fail about 20-25%, nearly all on the external reading component.

Faking it, for me, involves 3 piss-easy open-book tests a semester backed up by a movie-of-the-book, and I drop the lowest score. They don’t bring the book to the open-book tests, and they sleep through the movie.

EDIT: That’s as accomodating as I’m prepared to be at the moment, but, judging by the teeth-sucking when I hand in my grades (24% failure rate this year) if the slide continues I’ll have to start “adjusting” the pass-rate in future, if there is a future. This is widely practiced, and I’ve been given a few vague-to-incomprehensible descriptions of “statistical techniques” in use by Taiwanese teachers.

Once you start that, of course, if you set multiple choice questions they can/will actually answer, any amount of monkeys can pass, and I’ll bet they do.

Simian Success is a Sure Sign of Silliness

ENDEDIT

I gather that another Taiwanese teacher solution is to assess ER as a homework “essay”. I tried that and I got a very limited selection of cloned/cut and pasted answers, endlessly repeated, warts and all, but if you ignored that, it might work, especially as the assessment will be subjective.

For the last couple of years I’ve (“illegally”) used the Penguin Graded Reader version of The Godfather, with the film. I used to use About a Boy which worked quite well, but it went out of print, and would be stretched rather thinly over two semesters at 25%. Penguin Readers have been dropped off the approved list by the school for reasons unknown, and I’m supposed to change to an Oxford Bookworm Classic, which I don’t like and will ignore for as long as possible.

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[quote=“Quentin”]Well, I sent out emails last night and have already gotten a nibble. But of course they don’t hire over the internet (what reputable uni would?). This would be a lot easier if I were physically in Taiwan, without the hassle of having to fly in and wait several months until I can start a job. Maybe I’ll just have to fly in, work for a dodgy buxiban for a few months, and spend the spare time doing interviews.

I’ve just been surfing the websites of private/technical/science universities and emailing the directors of the Applied English programs. It’s a bit of a search because nearly all of them have horribly sub-standard English language websites (poorly written with skimpy info), and my Chinese reading skills are pretty rusty. But I’ve figured out the characters for “Faculty” and “Applied Foreign Languages” by now.

Now there’s a job opportunity for an enterprising native English speaker with good writing skills – it seems that all of these universities want to attract international students, judging from their websites.[/quote]

They don’t care/see the point.

I told my previous department on a number of occasions that I would clean up the English so that it would make sense for potential students/instructors (quoting them a very reasonable rate), and never once heard back. It wasn’t about the money, as the university paid me obscene amounts to do editing on numerous other yearly projects. Also, someone “qualified” has done the current job for nothing.

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DP

But, as I’m here anyway, I’ll just say that [quote=“Ducked”] “statistical techniques” in use by Taiwanese teachers. [/quote] is a bit hard to believe.

I once spent a couple of hours with a blackboard and a calculator explaining to my Head of Department that, since I was working out a % score, the total number of scorable points in my exam didn’t have to add up to 100, so a maximum total of 90 or 118 was not “impossible”, as she’d insisted.

I had to repeat it at a departmental meeting later. Don’t think anyone got it.

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[quote=“Quentin”]

Now there’s a job opportunity for an enterprising native English speaker with good writing skills – it seems that all of these universities want to attract international students, judging from their websites.[/quote]

Ah, now you’re entering into the realm of face. I’ve had this concept explained to me many times but still don’t understand it. Basically, making the entire university look like arrogant fools is LESS embarrassing than admitting that one of the senior chaps (or relative of) can’t actually write better English than a native speaker.

This occurs on a national level, too.

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[quote=“tomthorne”][quote=“Quentin”]

Now there’s a job opportunity for an enterprising native English speaker with good writing skills – it seems that all of these universities want to attract international students, judging from their websites.[/quote]

Ah, now you’re entering into the realm of face. I’ve had this concept explained to me many times but still don’t understand it. Basically, making the entire university look like arrogant fools is LESS embarrassing than admitting that one of the senior chaps (or relative of) can’t actually write better English than a native speaker.

This occurs on a national level, too.[/quote]
And if they do let you do it, they’ll just edit it to the “correct” version anyway, because everyone KNOWS Taiwanese have a better grasp of English grammar than native speakers. Silly of you to think otherwise. :no-no:

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Insisting on Phds is silly, because no one with a reputable Phd would want to work in Taiwan, and trying to fill the gap with Taiwanese Phds is even sillier, because a Phd from a Taiwanese university isn’t worth the paper it’s printed on.

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Whether they gained their PhD from a highly ranked foreign university or not, there are quite a few foreign academics who choose to work here long-term. Taiwanese university positions offer a secure job with a (relatively) easy teaching workload (9 hrs per week, 16 weeks per semester), which leaves enough time to get on with your own reading and writing. That’s all you want, really.

Then there’s the many affordable attractions of the Taiwanese lifestyle. :slight_smile:

A PhD is like a driver’s license. Just as a driver’s license shows that you can basically drive a car from A to B, a PhD merely proves that you have the basic capacity to undertake extended research. What you do with that ability is far more important than where you got your PhD or whether you did it under the British or American system.

AFAIK, like universities the world over, Taiwanese universities will be more interested in hiring someone with a PhD from a modestly ranked university, but a strong publication record, than someone from a highly ranked university but without much in the way of publications. (Issues of guanxi aside, of course.)

While your post obviously contains a fair amount of hyperbole, I suspect you may have to adjust your attitude a little if you’re serious about working in the Taiwanese higher education system. As you will have read in my earlier post on this thread, due to the low birth rate in Taiwan in recent years, universities here are now trying to attact students from other Asian countries. They must do this by increasing their research output and thus lifting their rankings above those of universities in Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia and China .

IMO, they will also have to appear (on paper, at least) to be innovative and to offer something substantial in the way of teaching real, transferable skills, rather than just facts, if they are to be successful in this survival strategy. This applies to the teaching of your subject, English literature, as much as it does to any other subject.

Taiwanese universities that are unable to compete will not survive. Remember, we have 165 universities here. As a sobering comparison, it is worth noting that Australia, which has a similar size population has, I believe, just 39.

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This would appear to imply (critical) thinking skills.

IMO and perception, there is massive, deeply entrenched cultural resitance to that at all levels of the society.

The word “doomed” springs to mind.

If, OTOH, it implies US-Management-stylee bullshitting /smoke and mirrors skills, I’d say they were in with a chance.

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The more I look into this, the more I’m inclined to Korea, despite the fact that I have zero interest in Korean culture and language, and I loved my life in Taiwan (financial considerations aside – that’s the main reason I left in the first place. Working 14 hours a week eats at your soul).

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S. Korea would be better, at least in terms of a job. There are plenty of full-time university jobs there that will accept MA holders. It may not be the “best” job in the world, but one would think that it has to be better than running around between three to four universities in Taiwan working split shifts trying to make a living.

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Best of all you can get permanent residency in South Korea now. So if you decide you like it, you can do your own thing later on.

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This gets stated quite often–I’d argue it’s more about what you do while completing the requirements (as well as after that) that determines whether or not your advanced degree is seen as acceptable. My MA from a Taiwanese university recently helped me attain a continuing FT position at a respected Canadian university. I may be the exception, but it’s worth noting.

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I got off the phone with my Mom, who’s spent 30+ years in the education system here in Arkansas. I’ve talked to the education department here about being a high school English teacher. I have three basic options, one of which involves being a “novice” teacher – which according to my Mom, means sending me down to the Delta. You know - West Helena. West Memphis. West etc. Because the Eastern part of Mississippi doesn’t want to associate themselves with such poor trashy parts of town across the river.

Two years teaching poor black kids in the most depressed section of the U.S.A. Have you ever been down there? Working for 55,000 NT a month suddenly does not seem so bad.

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Whatever. My ultimate dream has always been to follow in my grandpa’s footsteps

youtu.be/piUWIqWSthA

That’s the life, my friends. Too bad that life has disappeared, along with the railroads…

Good morning, how are ya? Ah, the life…

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[quote=“adikarmika”]In the end, all you can realistically hope for is a gig at a small private university that is probably destined for closure in a few years. Your contract, should you win one, will probably only be for 10 mths (i.e., no paid summer vacation), and your monthly salary as a starting lecturer will be less than NT$50,000 after tax (unless you end up teaching lots of excess hours).

Seriously, you gotta really love living in Taiwan if you’re prepared to accept those sorts of working conditions. If I were you, I’d just take on one casual university class (4 hrs/hk) so that I could put “Lecturer at Such-and-such Univerity” on my name card, and then slowly build up a portfolio of privates for NT$900/hr plus. Three or four hours of teaching per day - around NT$60,000 (tax free) per month. It’s probably the best you could hope for in the short to medium term.[/quote]

Japan. That’s where most of the lucrative university EFL teaching contracts can be found. But most contracts are non-renewable and only good for 2 or 3 years. Also, the Japanese can be a lot more difficult to live and work with than the easy going Taiwanese in their “chiao budo” culture.

NT$45, 000 ~ NT$50, 000 for university EFL teaching position in Taiwan is pretty bad, although the light work week and long vacations are definitely appealing. In Japan you’d be making more along the lines of NT$170, 000 ~ NT$200, 000 a month, not to mention the generous annual research allowances that most university teachers receive. Many universities in Japan also pay 2 months salary for each of the summer and winter bonuses in Japan.

However, competition is fierce for university EFL teaching positions in Japan. Everyone wants to live in Japan and so the market is saturated. That’s where all the Ph.D holders go, not Taiwan. You’ve seriously got to really like Taiwan to go and work there for $20, 000 ~ $30, 000 a year.

Korea is somewhere in between but can be very hit and miss. Salaries are a little higher in Korea and often a free apartment and possibly airfare are included in the terms of the contract. Demand for university EFL teaching positions is quite high in Korea, so as long as you have a relevant master’s degree, you’d likely find a job. But you’d probably have to go to Korea first; applying from the U.S. would be quite difficult to impossible. Also, most Korean universities do not have caps on the number of times contracts can be renewed, unlike the contracts at Japanese universities for foreign EFL teachers. Unfortunately, however, Korea is probably even more difficult of a place to live and work as Koreans are very tribal and xenophobic. If you can’t get a job at a Japanese university, I’d recommend heading off to Korea and working at a university there.

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Full-time English-Native Teacher Wanted
Job Announcement: Full-time teaching position
General description: The Department of English Instruction, Taipei Municipal University of Education, offers a four-year program leading to a Bachelor of Arts degree in Teaching English as a Foreign Language. One of the major goals of the Department is to provide high quality education for teachers of elementary school English. A graduate program leading to the Master of Arts degree is also offered in the Department. The Department invites native English speaking applicants for a full-time teaching position at or above the Lecturer level, beginning from August 01, 2013.
Qualifications for the applicants: 1. Native English speaking candidates should hold a Master’s degree or preferably a Ph.D. with specializations in TESL/TEFL, (Applied) Linguistics, English Literature, or other related fields.
2. At least two-year TESL/TEFL teaching experience.

Applicants will be required to teach some of the following courses:

  1. English Pronunciation Instruction
  2. Listening and Speaking Practice (Basic, Intermediate, and Advanced levels)
  3. Writing Practice (Basic, Intermediate, and Advanced levels)
  4. Public Speaking

Applicants should submit the following materials by regular mail:

  1. Current curriculum vitae/resume (e-mail address, mailing address, phone number, date of birth, experience and expertise/specialty, etc)
  2. Photocopy of passport or ID
  3. Photocopy of diploma, master’s thesis/or doctoral dissertation, and transcript for highest earned degree
  4. Three recommendation letters
  5. Course syllabi for at least two of the courses listed above.

Deadline: All application materials must arrive at the following address no later than January 18, 2013:
Ms. Josephine Chen
Department of English Instruction
Taipei Municipal University of Education
1, Ai Kuo West Road
Taipei, Taiwan, 10048, R.O.C

For any questions, please contact us at:
E-mail Address: english@tmue.edu.tw
Phone number: (02) 2311-3040 ext. 4612

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Lol - There you go! Question answered :sunglasses:

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Another job posting:

National Dong Hua University (Hualien County)
Full-Time Contract-based Teaching Position
College of Management
Qualifications: Native or native-level English speaker with a Master’s degree in TESOL, English education, or other related fields
Starting salary is [color=#FF0000]NTD$47,700 per month [/color](before tax)

http://web1.nsc.gov.tw/newwp.aspx?act=Detail&id=1011128006&ctunit=199&ctnode=278&mp=7

The salary for this position is a bit lower than other universities in Taiwan. However, this still might be an attractive offer to a new teacher with a Master’s degree, or someone who would prefer living on the East Coast.

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Ouch! 47.7k :astonished:

That’s the absolute minimum to provide an ARC, isn’t it? I made some seriously poor career choices somewhere down the line :cry:

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Hi all,

I’m the other “foreign teacher” at the Taipei Municipal University of Education, and I suggested that they post the ad above in this thread. Given that there are a wide variety of dubious uni gigs around, I just wanted to say that the position is the standard public university contract for a full time lecturer: with a masters degree it’s basically around NTD 53,000 for a minimum of 10 hours per week, summer and winter vacations are paid, and there’s a 1.5 month bonus. You will probably wind up teaching 12 or 14 hours a week (at a poor hourly rate for the extra hours, something like NTD 575/hr), but definitely no more than 14 hours. Overall, it’s quite a nice working environment and I highly recommend it. Feel free to pm me if you want more details.

Matt

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