Monday, June 25, 2012

Reader Question: Distance vs in Person MA Degree

This one from Neil:

"I was wondering about what impression you get from your university and others you hear about regarding distance degrees. As several reputable ones are being created each year, I was curious if it counts against one who completes his or her degree online as opposed to in person. I'm considering a distance degree, an M.A. in Tesol, to eventually land a university job in the next few years. The other option is to return to the USA and earn the degree in person from a prestigious university, which is of course much costlier."

MA TESOL distance degrees seem to be fine to get a uni job in Korea.  The ones from Australia have a bit of a bad reputation, but apart from that, you should be good.  I would never go into a huge amount of debt if you plan to be an ESL teacher.  While you can make a decent living, the salary is not high enough to warrant having a crazy amount of student loan debt.  And, it also makes a lot more sense to actually have students to practice the things you're learning on when you're doing your MA.

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