If you teach English in China do you have to have a degree in teaching?

Question

http://www.chinese-tools.com/teach

this is the site that allows you to teach English in China.

I really want to learn Mandarin and by then will have a 4 year BS degree. I'm also planning to get a Ph.D or M.D.

Answer 1

I know a few people from Canada who have gone to China and Japan to teach English. They did not have teaching degrees, they did have B.A's.

Answer 2

China has changed a lot over the last 3-4 years, and although it was very possible in the past to simply get a job teaching English in China with no degree, experience, or qualifications, it is no longer possible.

Current laws state that in order to be employed as an English language teacher in China, a person must have:

1) A Bachelor Degree or higher  (it doesn't have to be in teaching)

2) A TESOL Certificate (ie. specialist training in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages; but if your Degree is in TESOL it'll cover point 1 and point 2)

3) At least 2 years teaching experience  (it doesn't have to be language teaching)

4) Be at least 25 years of age  (an addition to prevent people lying about work experience - in China people start Uni at 19, and a BA takes 4 years, so by the time you have 2 years experience you must be at least 25)

5) Be from the USA, UK, Canada, Australia or New Zealand

There are a lot of ways around some of these requirements.  For example, the only quality TEFL programmes are the Cambridge CELTA, the Trinity Cert TESOL, and University conducted TESOL training programmes of 160 hours or more with assessed teaching involved - but many people get weekend or purely online certs.  A lot of employers will only go for the recognised ones, but the government allows any kind, and demand for native speakers is high, so if you're not worried about the quality of the company that hires you, an onliner will do.

Also, people with 2 years work experience in any field can often get in, as employers will just fluff your resume when they apply for a visa (ie. they'll change your resume so that it looks as though you have 2 years teaching experience instead of whatever else you were doing).  Many schools do this, even the ones who are more picky about the teacher training.  But if you have no work experience at all, they don't have anything to play with.

Also, the government has its own way to decide on exceptions to point 5 - and non-native speakers with fluent English (or native speakers from South Africa) who have extensive qualifications (eg. MA/PhD TESOL & over 5 years teaching experience) may be accepted.  Companies however, have no way of knowing for sure, and are more likely to higher those from the 5 countries mentioned above to save going through all the rigmarole and red-tape for an application that might just be denied in the end.

Finally, there are plenty of companies that will employ you as something like a 'consultant' but actually have you teaching, or even employ you on a Business Visa.  Many people do this and get away with it - but you must be warned, it does mean you are illegally employed, and you could be fined and/or deported if there ever was a crack down.

Hope it all works out for you though!

Answer 3

It depends on the school/university what credentials you need -

but you should be able to find a job without a teaching degree