Teach English in South Korea, World English Service Ltd. - Qualification Levels

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Qualifications Levels

Applicants without Education Experience and a Bachelor's Degree

If you were a North American applicant (Canada and USA) then you would most likely be offered a starting salary of 1.9-2.00 million won a month.
If you are a citizen of Australia, New Zealand, Britain, Ireland or South Africa you will be offered a starting pay of 1.8-2.00 million won.

Applicants with Education or Teaching Experience

North American applicants: 2.00- 2.2 million won.
Other qualifying applicants: 1.90- 2-2 million won .

Applicants with TESOL training, CELTA certificates etc.

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In Korea there is NO official immigration requirement for any applicant to have a TESOL qualification to obtain an E2 work visa. Because of the amazing variance of ESL teaching qualifications on offer around the world, and also the fact that Korean employers are not able to evaluate the benefits of each of these qualifications, you may find that employers generally do not always place a high value on a candidate having any form of TESOL certificate.

There are no 'official' international standards and some countries such as Hong Kong/China and Malaysia may favor British recognised qualifications, whereas Korea does tend to recognise American systems and standards of achievement. Also 90% of jobs will have a wide a variety of student ages to teach (4years-20 years) meaning some expensive British qualifications that are applicable to adult teaching may not be as beneficial as first thought.

Many different Internet TESOL qualifications now exist that can issue you with a very 'impressive certificate' without you even needing to work in a classroom, or without relevance to Korean students.

An employer is more likely to look carefully at employment and work experiences you have had related to teaching ESL students and offer a higher salary based on your ESL teaching experience rather than based on a TESOL certificate that may have taken 10 hours (or 100) hours to complete.

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