ESL Jobs Forum

[mikara.travel]

Hey!

I'm new to the field, just got my cert. and am now teaching in Asia. Maybe I'm naive, but what is with the high number of Asia job givers asking for only women native speakers? I don't see that in Europe or Latin America, and are those parts of the world any more advanced than Asia?

Mikara Dougaras - Japan

[pauldadd999]

Being a male teacher, I have seen this discrimination during the two years I was in Korea. What's more, I am over 35 and see age discrimination as an even bigger problem.

Paul Dadd
China

[johnson.camel]

I agree. I was in my mid-60's when I began teaching in Korea, and was forced to leave as I could not continue to get quality positions. I was probably only hired in the first place as I fudged my picture on my resume and didnt show my beard

[ruth1966]

Two points, just to balance the perspective a little.
Age : It may be more difficult to get a new job in your home country as you age. My friend ( a male by the way) is in his late fifties and got a great uni job in South Korea while I (a younger female) only managed to land the less covetous ( sp?) job of teaching in an academy. ( I was quite happy there however).
Sex : There seems to be a distinct lack of females in this field especially in S.K. Many employers will seek women to balance out the numbers, many employers however will end up being quite satisfied with men despite their preferences.

[sigmoid]

Women and younger people are often preferred for jobs that involve children which require more babysitting than actual teaching.

Girls schools usually prefer female teachers for obvious reasons.

If you're an older male it may be a good idea to get into the more academic side of education, as the poster above mentions (universities, colleges, high schools, language school admin., test prep, etc.)

[kennedy]

In most places in Asia, that's a requirement, not discrimination and that's a fact.

[zark]

I suspect that some of the advertising also reflects that fact that in much of Asia - TEFL is a man's occupation. My guess would be that men outnumber women by at least two to one - and in come countries as much as ten to one (Thailand for one example).

And, frankly, most of us guys aren't so interested in that kindy class . . .
_________________
------------------------------------------
- advice for newbies
Making the decision to go . . .

[sammy]

well to some countries it may be a requirement. but mostly it's a discrimination. this issue has been always a debate for so long now and i truly do not understand why age matters when it comes to teaching.

[Magus1]

The truth is the ratio is 10 to 1 in favor of men, and can you be surprised? Traveling to the other side of the earth, alone, to teach in a foreign land is hardly something anyone would feel perfectly safe doing, for a woman it's quite intimidating.

Now, the reasons why schools keep asking for them, depends on the country, however in a lot of cases, especially with countries like Korea, and China especially, is that they are horny guys who want a foreign female teacher to look at, and possibly do more to. The amount of complaints from the few female teachers who come to China for example, are staggering. many women don't complain because they feel stupid or ashamed. The truth is, Asian oriental men are extremely intrigued about foreign women, and they often hire for that reason alone.

As for balancing things out, I doubt anyone is thinking that when they go to hire a woman, not on such a grand scale. Maybe they feel a she will be more marketable than a he, or maybe they want someone female because they themselves are female. However, most jobs asking for females in the oriental countries are doing so for purely sexualized reasons. Object all you wish, but sadly this is the truth.

Like I said, some of the people doing the hiring are female, this usually has to do with pre schools and kindergartens however, and yes, such jobs are more babysitting than actual teaching.

It's really no wonder women fear coming here, men from countries like korea and China usually hire them because they are foreign women, and just as often try to take advantage, were I a woman, I'd not want to come to China either. No wonder the ratio is 10 to 1.

[sammy]

[MeenBauChewYan]

This school is looking for the blonde blue-eyed woman so that they can take a photo of you and put it on their website.

Unfortunately many places in Asia are still a little backwards when it comes to understanding of westerners. Some people think that all Westerners are blonde, blue-eyed.

If you look for positions in the bigger cities, they tend to be a little more open minded, however, bigger cities also require higher qualifications for teachers.

[JamesAtRealize]

As an employer myself, if I had to chose based solely on how many students would keep coming, and how many would be attracted to coming to my school, then hands-down I'd pick the woman teacher.

For a variety of reasons too.
The market here is flooded with male teachers, many female students are a little intimidated by that at first.
Veteran students who just want conversation practice don't really care who they're talking to so long as that person has a native accent and decent elocution. Given those simple requirements, they'll chose a woman over a man more often than not.
Women in all cultures are stereotyped (in a good way) as being more attentive to detail, and being better educators.
And a female employee is less likely to sexually harass a student or get in trouble from gray-area topics.
_________________
マンツーマン 英会話 神戸 三宮 リアライズ - James

[TutorVanessa]

[lipofootoo]

Sex discrimination is common in Asia. Usually they prefer females, but sometimes I have seen it for males too.

[Faroukjibril]

I love china in particular and would gladly work there.