Hi everyone.

Has anyone had any trouble finding work in Ecuador without a university degree or diploma? If I do go down, I will just have my TEFL certificate and I'm hoping that will be enough! I have been volunteering at a school here in Canada so I will have some in class experience, but I'm concerned that the lack of college education might cause problems. Thank you.

Mike

Hey Mike,

You might want to chat to both Kallen and Alix - they've very recently both been offered jobs in Ecuador and neither had degrees - so should have some good advice: http://www.tefl-chalkboard.com/alixm09 and http://www.tefl-chalkboard.com/kallenfranchise.

Good luck with your job hunt and keep us posted with how you get on!

Hi,

The degree is mostly for the purposes of getting a work visa.  On the website I read it said "degree or other certificate of excellence" or something, but anyway, the trouble is that they change the law all the time!  I think some schools will require a degree for their own prestige, but some will help you get round the problem.  The one I'm going to advises to come on a tourist visa, then they will take me to Peru to get a work visa because it's apparently loads easier than getting one in the UK.  Lots of people do this.

Make sure you take with you your TEFl certificate and a criminal record check.  I think they both need to be apostilled (legalized - here it's done by a notary and costs loads of money).  Definitely the TEFL cert should be anyway.  They also want to see that you have a bank account in the black.

When you are in Ecuador you cannot change one visa for another; they say you must return home to do it but what everyone does is go to a third country, Peru usually, where you can also extend your work visa, I think.

Good luck ;)

Also I forgot - the work visa currently costs $230.

I have an associate's degree but it is not equivalent to university degree. However, the more education and experience you have, the better your chances are. Do you want to teach in specific area in Ecuador?

I've looked at several areas of the country. I really wanted to be close to the rainforest, but I heard jobs in Tena could be tough to land. Also I don't know how easy it is to travel to a neighbouring country from there, when my Visa expires. I looked into Loja quite extensively too. It looks nice. Then there's always Quito and Guayaquil. I guess to answer your question, I'm not 100% set on one city as of now. Those are the four cities I researched (and to a lesser degree, Cuenca) but aside from those, I don't know much about other towns. Any suggestions?

...And thank you to all who posted, I already feel better about this.

There will probably be jobs near Tena, as it gets more touristy there all the time, especially around Misahualli, where there is some kind of eco-hostel and other hotels as it's famous for the monkeys that live almost in the town.  The difference is that Loja is a beautiful city (in a mountainous area) and Tena is really a little backwater town.  The area is beautiful, rivers and jungles, it's quite cheap and they've even tarmacked the road recently making it a bit safer, but there's not much in the way of social and night life if you want that.  I've never tried to travel to Peru from there but within Ecuador, buses are cheap and plentiful, although often a bit scary.

I plan to spend time in Tena, or at least Nueva Esperanza, so if you end up there, keep in touch - my dad's widow still owns a farm there.

Other touristy places (I'm not suggesting that's where you want to go, it just seems to me more likely that people will want to learn English if there are tourists, because in the jungle, why else would you need to?) are Puyo and Banos (watch out for the volcano!), both lovely towns as far as I remember, but small.