next »

[runwithscissors]

I just wanted to gauge people's reactions to the idea of taking a mini-career break for 12 months and doing some ESL teaching.

I have a little over 2 years experience in a fairly emotionally draining social science postdoc. I've had various problems with the PI, arguments over authorship, money and grants moving to a different university. It's killed my enthusiasm for my work, but I've managed to get my head down and have secured quite a few solid pubs from both my PhD and this new project. I have 9 months worth of money left and was thinking that once the money runs dry at the end of the next academic year, the significant other and I would take a year out to teach ESL (we were looking at options in Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia and China - but that's a subject for a different thread). To be clear this is a 12 month deal, not a complete career change.

I was thinking that it would give me a chance to regroup and refresh my brain, gain some valuable teaching experience (I don't have a lot of teaching on my CV) and learn about a different culture. My worry is that it will leave me out of the loop for 12 months when I should be networking, writing grant proposals and maintaining a grip on latest developments in the field (it's a policy type field so things do move on if I stop paying attention). Presumably throughout the 12 months away my published stuff will be coming out in print, so it won't look like I've totally abandoned the field from a CV perspective. There's always the possibility that I could take something away with me to work on whilst abroad and submit halfway through, though without access to journals and books and the like that could be tricky.

Any thoughts or suggestions on how this might be viewed by a SC would be appreciated.

[msparticularity]

I was thinking that it would give me a chance to regroup and refresh my brain, gain some valuable teaching experience (I don't have a lot of teaching on my CV) and learn about a different culture. My worry is that it will leave me out of the loop for 12 months when I should be networking, writing grant proposals and maintaining a grip on latest developments in the field (it's a policy type field so things do move on if I stop paying attention). Presumably throughout the 12 months away my published stuff will be coming out in print, so it won't look like I've totally abandoned the field from a CV perspective. There's always the possibility that I could take something away with me to work on whilst abroad and submit halfway through, though without access to journals and books and the like that could be tricky.

Any thoughts or suggestions on how this might be viewed by a SC would be appreciated.

Unless your field is literacy or TESOL, experience in teaching ESL will not be viewed as "real teaching" by a SC. And I do think there is an enormous risk to appearing to "take time off." If you want to do this, you must find a way to demonstrably make this a professionally-focused year for you. This means you must be actively engaging in research and (I think) you must still return to the US at least once to present at conferences.

Teaching a couple of ESL classes on the side to support an interesting research agenda might look interesting and understandable to a SC, I believe. Taking time off from your career to travel and teach ESL would not, IMO. 

[embitteredhistorian]

I've taken my ESL experience off my resume--it certainly doesn't help unless your field is ESL specifically. And I mean very specifically. I don't think it'd help someone doing sociolinguistics, even.

[lorelei]

I think it will be regarded in the same way as if you took a year or two away from academia to do anything else. At best, it’s neutral. At worst, it says “I’m not serious about academia”.
As others have said, unless your research field is second-language acquisition or ESL education, the teaching itself isn’t going to help you.
However, if you can spin some career relevance out of your time abroad, this could help.
“I have recently been working in Thailand where I collected specimens of the xyz butterfly. An article based on my research there is under review at the Journal of Butterflies. While there, I networked with local scholars and presented papers at conferences in Bangkok and Singapore”. If you’re applying to a school which is trying to increase its international student recruitment, you might also be able to play up having connections to educators abroad. Or you could work it in terms of a study abroad option you’d like to offer students. But you’ve got to stay active with whatever your research is while you’re there.

[michigander]

ESL experience might enhance an otherwise good application when applying for positions where you'd be working with a significant number of international students, but only if you can tie it in with your field, research, teaching, and so forth.  The ability to assist foreign graduate students who need to write papers, theses, and dissertations could be a big plus under such circumstances, expecially if there aren't others in your department who are comfortable doing so.  If you can make it tie in well, there's less danger that it will look like taking a break to SCs that aren't specifically looking for someone with that experience.  But do take seriously the comments that it might not be as valued as teaching in your field.  You don't want to look like a dilettante. 

[higherandhigher]

If, say, you were taking a one-year position at a foreign university in a English-language STEM program, teaching academic writing/research to those participants, that could enhance an app for certain positions where you might have a lot of international students to deal with. However, if this is the typical "I'm a native speaker so I'm qualified to teach English while being paid very little by private language schools with no credentials", that would be a lot less valuable--and perhaps even a detraction at this stage in your career (post-Ph.D.--it wouldn't be as much a problem before grad school, post-Bac.).

[runwithscissors]

Thanks for the responses. Unfortunately I ended up on the academic track without a break BA, MS, PhD - so I have never set foot outside of the university. Now it appears I risk losing what I've worked for by taking a gap year too late in life (not that I'm particularly old mind you). I suppose my only alternative is to apply for postdocs in exotic sounding places... if only the market was less competitive. Quai sera sera and all that.

[embitteredhistorian]

Thanks for the responses. Unfortunately I ended up on the academic track without a break BA, MS, PhD - so I have never set foot outside of the university. Now it appears I risk losing what I've worked for by taking a gap year too late in life (not that I'm particularly old mind you). I suppose my only alternative is to apply for postdocs in exotic sounding places... if only the market was less competitive. Quai sera sera and all that.

See my thread--postdocs in exotic-sounding places may hurt you too. If what I'm told is true (and I believe it), it seems a lot of SCs are parochial xenophobes who recoil at the thought of anyone spending 5 minutes not obsessing over tenure, syllabuses, journal articles, and amputee-awareness committees.

[lorelei]

runwithscissors: embitteredhistorian raises some points to keep in mind, but I don't think an international postdoc is damaging on the cv in the same way that having a permanent/t-t job in an exotic region can be.

You've just got to come up with a reason to go there that doesn't involve the word "beach" ;)

In your OP you said you worked in governance: if you had a postdoc in Thailand studying their political system, for instance, that could be a way to get some time abroad while doing something cv-enhancing rather than damaging.

The distance caveats do apply, and if you're in a field that does conference interviews, plan to be there.