It seems there are an abundance of posts touting discouragement towards the marketability and availability of humanities degrees and positions. Surely there have to be some successful international teachers who teach humanities courses and not just in the ME or third tier schools.
Are you a humanities teacher and found success on the international teaching circuit? I would love to hear your story!
Thanks.
Any successful humanities teachers out there?
I would wager that the vast majority of discouragement comes from a certain knowitall who in fact knows very little. I can't think of any schools that don't hire teachers for any of the various subjects under the "humanities" umbrella, and, indeed, the IBMYP offers a specific humanities course. You do not have to settle for a school or location that does not appeal to you.
Reply
Humanities is just what social studies is called in IB at the MYP level, its not really a separate course in addition to other social studies courses.
My apologies if it sounds dismal for humanities teachers. Humanities is one of the largest departments in an IS and composes one of the highest portions of teachers hired. Their are rock star humanities teachers, there are just more of them and thats the problem, because its a lot more of them. We usually get hiring questions on this forum, mostly "Im new to IT, and I want to know how to get started, or what to do". For a humanities teacher thats a challenge because the field is so saturated. Its the difference between 5 qualified applicants for something like math and 500 for humanities. Some of the factors that contribute to the saturated market are:
1) At DIP/IGCSE/AP humanities and social studies means history. Psychology, economics, and the rest of the humanities are popular but nothing is as big as history. The rasons have to primarily do with how college credit is awarded in those fields, and what students major in when entering university. Most universities require you to take their courses within their major, so if your a psych major you may have to take intro to psych whether you got placement credit for it or not. Second, most universities only allow you to satisfy general ed requirements using placement credit. AT most universities there is a year of history and only one term for things like psychology and econ, etc.
2) The fields in humanities produce far more college graduates, then the tech and science fields. Some of the most popular college majors fall under humanities.
3) Their arent a lot of career options for those in the humanities, most of them require extensive graduate school to make a career in their field. You need a masters in Psychology before you can get paid talking to people. A B.A. in History is only good for three things: Military (officer) service, Teaching, and Law School. Its not like math or computers or business where there are far more career (not just job, but career) options.
4) Many of our readers who ask about entering IT are really asking about how to get into teaching in general, and one of the biggest challenge is building a resume in your subject. If your asocial studies teacher you can wait years before ever getting a teaching position locally.
5) Humanities is kind of a "give me" teaching field. Not to disparge the really top end history teachers who are fantastic educators, and definatley worth the expense, but in education teachers get into social studies and humanities because they want to coach. Its not a difficult subject, most of us have a couple years of history and other humanities from our general ed requirements and especially at lower grades where you have a hybrid of history, culture, sociology,civics, and religion in the humanities curriculum, you can teach from just following a text book. Most schools dont have a problem with "humanities" performance in their students, and most students/parents arent looking at getting their kids into those elite Ivy universities to major in Psychology and History.
There are very successful humanities teachers but when applying for those positions your apply with a much larger number of also successful humanities teachers, and thats when factors like logistics become the deciding factors.
My apologies if it sounds dismal for humanities teachers. Humanities is one of the largest departments in an IS and composes one of the highest portions of teachers hired. Their are rock star humanities teachers, there are just more of them and thats the problem, because its a lot more of them. We usually get hiring questions on this forum, mostly "Im new to IT, and I want to know how to get started, or what to do". For a humanities teacher thats a challenge because the field is so saturated. Its the difference between 5 qualified applicants for something like math and 500 for humanities. Some of the factors that contribute to the saturated market are:
1) At DIP/IGCSE/AP humanities and social studies means history. Psychology, economics, and the rest of the humanities are popular but nothing is as big as history. The rasons have to primarily do with how college credit is awarded in those fields, and what students major in when entering university. Most universities require you to take their courses within their major, so if your a psych major you may have to take intro to psych whether you got placement credit for it or not. Second, most universities only allow you to satisfy general ed requirements using placement credit. AT most universities there is a year of history and only one term for things like psychology and econ, etc.
2) The fields in humanities produce far more college graduates, then the tech and science fields. Some of the most popular college majors fall under humanities.
3) Their arent a lot of career options for those in the humanities, most of them require extensive graduate school to make a career in their field. You need a masters in Psychology before you can get paid talking to people. A B.A. in History is only good for three things: Military (officer) service, Teaching, and Law School. Its not like math or computers or business where there are far more career (not just job, but career) options.
4) Many of our readers who ask about entering IT are really asking about how to get into teaching in general, and one of the biggest challenge is building a resume in your subject. If your asocial studies teacher you can wait years before ever getting a teaching position locally.
5) Humanities is kind of a "give me" teaching field. Not to disparge the really top end history teachers who are fantastic educators, and definatley worth the expense, but in education teachers get into social studies and humanities because they want to coach. Its not a difficult subject, most of us have a couple years of history and other humanities from our general ed requirements and especially at lower grades where you have a hybrid of history, culture, sociology,civics, and religion in the humanities curriculum, you can teach from just following a text book. Most schools dont have a problem with "humanities" performance in their students, and most students/parents arent looking at getting their kids into those elite Ivy universities to major in Psychology and History.
There are very successful humanities teachers but when applying for those positions your apply with a much larger number of also successful humanities teachers, and thats when factors like logistics become the deciding factors.
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teacherguy
- Posts: 37
- Joined: Sat Aug 18, 2012 11:11 am
I am a humanities/social studies/history (whatever) teacher. It is a tougher IT job market for us. My take has always been that we who teach these subjects might be more inclined to head overseas because, you know, "living in the heart of history." And, as much as I hate to agree with our resident Expert On Everything, there are a lot of us.
There are jobs, but they're at the lower tier for-profit schools where turnover is constant. The better schools keep teachers longer, and when there's an opening hundreds of humanities teachers who have been paying their dues in Cairo or Hong Kong or Kuwait apply.
I paid my dues, beginning with a horrific school in Cairo. Still, after teaching at three different int'l schools, each better than the last, it was tough going. I'd apply for the one opening at a great school and not hear back from them. I finally returned to the USA to get a special ed endorsement.
This spring I applied for a SPED job, was turned down (technically a new teacher... again) but the director said I should apply for the humanities opening. I did. I got the job. I'll teaching at a dream school, in a dream locale.
If you pay your dues, suck it up and slog through the crap gigs, and most importantly BE A GOOD TEACHER, you'll find a good job teaching humanities. It won't happen quickly though. At least that's been my experience.
There are jobs, but they're at the lower tier for-profit schools where turnover is constant. The better schools keep teachers longer, and when there's an opening hundreds of humanities teachers who have been paying their dues in Cairo or Hong Kong or Kuwait apply.
I paid my dues, beginning with a horrific school in Cairo. Still, after teaching at three different int'l schools, each better than the last, it was tough going. I'd apply for the one opening at a great school and not hear back from them. I finally returned to the USA to get a special ed endorsement.
This spring I applied for a SPED job, was turned down (technically a new teacher... again) but the director said I should apply for the humanities opening. I did. I got the job. I'll teaching at a dream school, in a dream locale.
If you pay your dues, suck it up and slog through the crap gigs, and most importantly BE A GOOD TEACHER, you'll find a good job teaching humanities. It won't happen quickly though. At least that's been my experience.
While my current major is history with a minor in secondary education, I've often given thought to changing it to a science major instead. My question when confronted with this dilemma is;
Would I rather major in and teach a subject just because it is more in demand or teach a subject that I enjoy more?
Points to consider for myself in my situation:
- Math is my weakest area, science and math go hand in hand.
- My entire curriculum (credits) thus far has been followed for a history major and therefore switching would set me back at least a year in order to take the science classes that I had not been taking.
- let's just say I'm not 24 years old and I don't have 10 years to get through school and begin my teaching career.
- It is not that I don't enjoy science, I actually very much enjoy the science part of it immensely, just not the math portions.
- I know that I could be an effective teacher in either subject so this is not the worry, I'm an Honors student and overachiever which is why I hold a 3.945 GPA. Even in math I've only ever made one "B" which was in Honors Probability and Statistics.
Would I rather major in and teach a subject just because it is more in demand or teach a subject that I enjoy more?
Points to consider for myself in my situation:
- Math is my weakest area, science and math go hand in hand.
- My entire curriculum (credits) thus far has been followed for a history major and therefore switching would set me back at least a year in order to take the science classes that I had not been taking.
- let's just say I'm not 24 years old and I don't have 10 years to get through school and begin my teaching career.
- It is not that I don't enjoy science, I actually very much enjoy the science part of it immensely, just not the math portions.
- I know that I could be an effective teacher in either subject so this is not the worry, I'm an Honors student and overachiever which is why I hold a 3.945 GPA. Even in math I've only ever made one "B" which was in Honors Probability and Statistics.
In comparing the two when it comes to the availability and desirability of the locations for say history vs science, what are we talking about exactly?
Is it that science teachers can pretty much have their locations of choice and history teachers are stuck in the guts of the ME or what is the situation exactly? The explanations are so broad when talked about it, for those of us not in the world of IT yet, we need a more detailed picture to be painted for us.
What are some case comparisons in terms of both for entry level science teachers vs entry level history teachers?
Is it that science teachers can pretty much have their locations of choice and history teachers are stuck in the guts of the ME or what is the situation exactly? The explanations are so broad when talked about it, for those of us not in the world of IT yet, we need a more detailed picture to be painted for us.
What are some case comparisons in terms of both for entry level science teachers vs entry level history teachers?
Reply
Its not that science teachers get to write there own ticket, science teachers with a Masters, certification, 2 years home experience and 5 years IB experience and great test scores get to write their own ticket. Its simply numbers, there are more humanities teachers then science teachers, lots more. Humanities teachers have fewer career options then science teachers.
We need to be more specific when it comes to demand for science teachers. Physics and Chemistry are high needs areas, Biology not so much.
If your a science teacher you have to be able to do all grades and really the whole trinity (Biology/Chemistry/Physics). You cant do DIP/IGCSE/AP physics or chemistry without being able to do the math. Statistics is soft math and would serve you better in Bio and ENS. You cant be marketable as a science teacher and only do the soft conceptual material you see in the early grades and convince a recruiter/admin to hire you.
You cant be a science teacher just because "you like it", drive and enthusiasm isnt enough. You need the skills and abilities. You dont sound like you have the background or the skills (weak math) to be a math teacher. For an entry level teacher one of the strong factors in deciding to hire someone is what their academic background is. You dont have experience to look at so you have to look at the academic background.
I dont know which state your in but after your certified you may be able to add a science endorsement fairly easy. You dont have to choose one or the other and be forever committed to that one track.
We need to be more specific when it comes to demand for science teachers. Physics and Chemistry are high needs areas, Biology not so much.
If your a science teacher you have to be able to do all grades and really the whole trinity (Biology/Chemistry/Physics). You cant do DIP/IGCSE/AP physics or chemistry without being able to do the math. Statistics is soft math and would serve you better in Bio and ENS. You cant be marketable as a science teacher and only do the soft conceptual material you see in the early grades and convince a recruiter/admin to hire you.
You cant be a science teacher just because "you like it", drive and enthusiasm isnt enough. You need the skills and abilities. You dont sound like you have the background or the skills (weak math) to be a math teacher. For an entry level teacher one of the strong factors in deciding to hire someone is what their academic background is. You dont have experience to look at so you have to look at the academic background.
I dont know which state your in but after your certified you may be able to add a science endorsement fairly easy. You dont have to choose one or the other and be forever committed to that one track.