Teaching English (and Psychology, in English) in Ecuador

I arrived in Ecuador in July 2010, with a somewhat vague idea of working as a teacher. Nineteen months later, I've trained as a teacher, taught at two universities, two language institutes and now stopped teaching. Stopped teaching here in Quito that is. I'm now preparing to move to Tokyo, to take up a lectureship at Chuo University.

Finding work as an English teacher in Ecuador isn’t difficult; there is a constant need for native speakers. But the conditions and pay will vary greatly. Backpackers turning up with little experience may receive as little as $5 per hour working at language institutes. The hours will be long but not too taxing, big employers here are English First and Wall Street. Those with teaching experience, or just the knowhow to find better jobs, could earn up to $20 per hour (e.g. at UDLA). I worked, for a while, at Southern Cross who employ only people with a CELTA qualification, their pay is somewhat better than other language institutes, but still less than the ‘real jobs’ in, e.g., universities and international schools.

Southern Cross also runs the most exotic CELTA training programme. CELTA is the Certificate in Language Teaching to Adults, awarded by the University of Cambridge. It is an entry level training course, usually over four weeks. The Ecuadorian one is different, it is taught on a pacific beach. All things considered, it is probably cheaper than ones taught in European or North American cities. I did the Southern Cross beach CELTA and they hired me to teach shortly afterwards. I didn’t even ask for a job, I was just asked to pop in and then given a schedule (starting in two hours). But then I never left either. They just stopped giving me schedules. This is the issue with language institutes, they are inherently flaky.

I never really wanted any language institute work anyway. My plan all along was to work in universities, as this is what I’d done all my life in the UK (I'm a research psychologist). I was hired fairly quickly to teach English at Universidad San Francisco de Quito (USFQ). But what you find with the universities in Ecuador is that they don’t like to take people on full-time, so multiple part-time positions are the norm.

Me with psychology students at USFQ

I was also able to get part-time psychology teaching work at USFQ. In fact, they were very friendly and accommodating, and ran two courses especially for me to teach, in English: ‘Health Psychology’ and ‘Depression’. USFQ is possibly the only university in the country with enough English speaking students to make this possible. I could have taught elsewhere easily, if I could have taught in Spanish. People with PhDs here are quite rare and sought after. However, if you don't speak Spanish well, opportunities  are limited, though one other option for English speaking psychologists (or linguists) is teaching on ‘Applied Linguistics’ courses. These are really just training courses for Ecuadorians who want to teach English professionally. They are taught mainly in English. I very nearly took up a part-time position teaching psycholinguistics on one of these courses at PUCE.


However, Christmas eve bought the news that I have a new job in Japan, so I pulled out of the PUCE psycholinguistics job, and cancelled my courses at USFQ. I still have some psychology research going on here. As a psychologist that is another option. More of that in my next blog.