Teaching English
If you are interested in
teaching English, you need to decide which level of English you want to teach,
who you want to teach, and where you want to teach. Below are some suggestions;
feel free to contact an English department advisor to discuss your plans in
more depth.
1. If you want to teach middle school or high school English-This requires
earning a teaching license through a teacher education program at an accredited
university, like IUPUI. You can do this by applying to the School of Education
at IUPUI. It is possible to do a double degree program in English (School
of Liberal Arts) and English Education (School
of Education), but it takes careful planning and usually requires additional
time. For information, contact Jim Powell in English at (jepowell@iupui.edu,
278-2985) and the School of Education.
See their
website, especially these two pages: http://education.iupui.edu/soe/applying/undergraduate/index.aspx
or http://education.iupui.edu/soe/forms/sheets/te.aspx
1a. If you ALREADY HAVE A B.A. DEGREE IN ENGLISH (or will soon have one), and you are interested in becoming a middle-school or high-school English teacher, there are two programs at IUPUI you can apply for. One is the Transition to Teaching Program, an intensive one-year program; for more information, see this web page: http://education.iupui.edu/soe/programs/graduate/t2t.aspx.
A second route
is the two-year licensing program, less intensive, but still resulting in teacher
certification at the end. For more information, contact the School of Education.
2. If you want to teach English at the college level-This requires at
least a master's degree, which enables you to apply for part-time and full-time,
non-tenure track positions, or a Ph.D., which enables you to apply for full-time,
tenure-track positions. You can talk to any of your English professors at IUPUI
about their graduate degree programs and their decisions to become college teachers
and professors. IUPUI has a master's degree program in English. It can
take from two to five years to earn a master's degree, depending on whether
you are full-time or part-time and how quickly you write your thesis. It can
take three to seven years to earn a Ph.D., and most Ph.D. programs in English
require a master's degree.
3. If you want to teach English as a new language (ENL) - If you want
to earn a teacher's license with dual certification in a teacher education program
and in ENL (English as a New Language). See the School of Education website:
http://education.iupui.edu/soe/forms/sheets/dual.aspx
If you want
to teach ESL to adult students, you might be interested in the TESOL certificate
program offered through our English Department. This is a graduate level program
and can be combined with earning a master's degree in English. For more information,
see the TESOL certificate website:
http://english.iupui.edu/esl/tesolhome.html