Is it true that to teach in a high school in Taiwan you need to be a certified teacher back home and just having a BA won’t do… even if the BA is in TESOL?
Thanks guys
[quote=“Elliot_spencer”]Is it true that to teach in a high school in Taiwan you need to be a certified teacher back home and just having a BA won’t do… even if the BA is in TESOL?
Thanks guys[/quote]
Private High School = BA is all you need, a TESOL or TEFL wouldnt hurt
Public High School = I am pretty sure you need what you were thinking
[quote=“Quarters”]Private High School = BA is all you need, a TESOL or TEFL wouldnt hurt[/quote]Not sure about that. I think that schools may get round legal restrictions by having an attached “language centre”, registered as a buxiban.
There was a discussion about this a while back:
forumosa.com/taiwan/viewtopic.php?t=55712
[quote=“joesax”][quote=“Quarters”]Private High School = BA is all you need, a TESOL or TEFL wouldnt hurt[/quote]Not sure about that. I think that schools may get round legal restrictions by having an attached “language centre”, registered as a buxiban.
There was a discussion about this a while back:
forumosa.com/taiwan/viewtopic.php?t=55712[/quote]
Even so, the current situation still stays the same. You can get a legal job teaching private high school with just a BA. Whatever the school does to get “round legal restrictions” is all the school’s business. Sorry, but I fail to see your point.
Surely the problem would be that you’d be working on the high school premises if you got raided, not the buxiban where you were registered on your your ARC?
Chances of getting raided would be slim, though; most of the schools have pretty good connections.
[quote=“Quarters”][quote=“joesax”][quote=“Quarters”]Private High School = BA is all you need, a TESOL or TEFL wouldnt hurt[/quote]Not sure about that. I think that schools may get round legal restrictions by having an attached “language centre”, registered as a buxiban.
There was a discussion about this a while back:
forumosa.com/taiwan/viewtopic.php?t=55712[/quote]
Even so, the current situation still stays the same. You can get a legal job teaching private high school with just a BA. Whatever the school does to get “round legal restrictions” is all the school’s business. Sorry, but I fail to see your point.[/quote]
I did some classes recently at a private high school, subbing for someone.
My foreign colleagues either had open work rights through marriage or were qualified to teach high school in their own country. I don’t fall into either category, so the principal asked that a permanent replacement be found as soon as humanly possible because he was risking jail, seriously, by having me on the premises. The school had been raided some time before and he was fined for hiring someone who didn’t have the right paperwork. To get caught twice was unthinkably bad, so what do you know that he doesn’t and that the cops don’t?
The story he was given by the people who enforce the rules was that if the teacher doesn’t have open work rights then he needs to have an ARC provided by the school. To get the ARC the teacher needs to be qualified in his own country as a teacher. If he’s not a qualified teacher, but has open work rights then he can work in the language centre only.
As you, Quarters, have open work rights you would be able to work in A private high school in Taiwan, although the school may insist that you have a degree, but only as an English teacher. Or janitor. You can’t do skilled work without the proper certification. And the school can’t get an ARC for someone who isn’t qualified as a teacher.
Based on conversations with the assistant to the principal, who was formerly the head of the English department, at one of the leading state schools in Taipei, if you want to work in any teaching capacity in a public (government) high school then you would need to be a qualified teacher. The possible exception to this would be the program started a few years ago to get native-speaking teachers into high schools in less-developed areas of Taiwan. I remember that when this was announced the spokesperson stated that schools (presumably meaning government schools) in the big cities had “informal” arrangements already, which I take as acknowledgement that people were working illegally.
Encouraged by this I decided to try and get a high school job without involving any agent or middle-man. I sent a lot of speculative applications to schools in Taipei, and received a couple of replies from state schools saying that there was no legal avenue for them to hire foreigners. I got a great job at a private high school, but they then discovered that they were unable to get me an ARC without a government teaching certificate from my own country. Their only suggestion, which has been repeated several times since by other schools I’ve done work for, has been that I do what you did to make it possible to work for them - get married.
So, in summary, I think you’re talking rubbish.
[quote=“Loretta”][quote=“Quarters”][quote=“joesax”][quote=“Quarters”]Private High School = BA is all you need, a TESOL or TEFL wouldnt hurt[/quote]Not sure about that. I think that schools may get round legal restrictions by having an attached “language centre”, registered as a buxiban.
There was a discussion about this a while back:
forumosa.com/taiwan/viewtopic.php?t=55712[/quote]
Even so, the current situation still stays the same. You can get a legal job teaching private high school with just a BA. Whatever the school does to get “round legal restrictions” is all the school’s business. Sorry, but I fail to see your point.[/quote]
I did some classes recently at a private high school, subbing for someone.
My foreign colleagues either had open work rights through marriage or were qualified to teach high school in their own country. I don’t fall into either category, so the principal asked that a permanent replacement be found as soon as humanly possible because he was risking jail, seriously, by having me on the premises. The school had been raided some time before and he was fined for hiring someone who didn’t have the right paperwork. To get caught twice was unthinkably bad, so what do you know that he doesn’t and that the cops don’t?
The story he was given by the people who enforce the rules was that if the teacher doesn’t have open work rights then he needs to have an ARC provided by the school. To get the ARC the teacher needs to be qualified in his own country as a teacher. If he’s not a qualified teacher, but has open work rights then he can work in the language centre only.
As you, Quarters, have open work rights you would be able to work in A private high school in Taiwan, although the school may insist that you have a degree, but only as an English teacher. Or janitor. You can’t do skilled work without the proper certification. And the school can’t get an ARC for someone who isn’t qualified as a teacher.
Based on conversations with the assistant to the principal, who was formerly the head of the English department, at one of the leading state schools in Taipei, if you want to work in any teaching capacity in a public (government) high school then you would need to be a qualified teacher. The possible exception to this would be the program started a few years ago to get native-speaking teachers into high schools in less-developed areas of Taiwan. I remember that when this was announced the spokesperson stated that schools (presumably meaning government schools) in the big cities had “informal” arrangements already, which I take as acknowledgement that people were working illegally.
Encouraged by this I decided to try and get a high school job without involving any agent or middle-man. I sent a lot of speculative applications to schools in Taipei, and received a couple of replies from state schools saying that there was no legal avenue for them to hire foreigners. I got a great job at a private high school, but they then discovered that they were unable to get me an ARC without a government teaching certificate from my own country. Their only suggestion, which has been repeated several times since by other schools I’ve done work for, has been that I do what you did to make it possible to work for them - get married.
So, in summary, I think you’re talking rubbish.[/quote]
I accept the rubbish comment as deserved. I apologize, it had slipped my mind that all private HS job offers came to me after my JFRV was obtained. You are right.
You may want to think this part of your post over again. The reason I got married was not to make it possible to work in Taiwan. This part of your post, although perhaps not intended to say such, certainly does.
Quarters wrote: [quote]You may want to think this part of your post over again. The reason I got married was not to make it possible to work in Taiwan. This part of your post, although perhaps not intended to say such, certainly does.[/quote]
Relax boy. We all know you got married to get your hands on the DUCK FARM. 
Quarters wrote: [quote]You may want to think this part of your post over again. The reason I got married was not to make it possible to work in Taiwan. This part of your post, although perhaps not intended to say such, certainly does.[/quote]
Sorry, didn’t mean it that way.
Still, I can’t see any other reason to go through all that fuss. But that’s another topic. I’m sure you done what’s right for you.