Our Thailand national institute, TEXT-AND-TALK Academy, is the author and owner of the TEFL for Target Learner Groups TEFL Courses Training Program, copyrighted through the Library of Congress. Our Academy was founded in 1990 by our director James Parmelee (pictured at left with wife and Academy Principal, Sureeporn Parmelee), who had taught English to the Thai people himself over a period of 23 years. Being a school owner was a bit different, however, from teaching. It soon became apparent that when we required trained English native-speaking teachers, few were available. We thus coped, as well as possible, with intelligent, well-educated Westerners, who had some experience at one level or another, or who could be quickly trained in grammar and in how to teach from an assigned textbook. It certainly was not the ideal way to conduct language training, but it was the best that could be done at the time.

Reasons for local foreigners not receiving teacher training were several, but mainly centered around the facts that only the Cambridge CELTA teacher training course was available, and the tuition fees were higher than most foreigners living in the Thai economy could afford at that time. It also was quite ' exclusive' in its approach to potential trainees, using non-responsiveness to enquiries and the administration of grammar tests, exams and required 'projects' to 'weed out' persons who were not (from our point of view, at least), minimally half-trained as teachers already.

We knew that persons excluded from that course would stay in Thailand and 'teach' anyway, in most cases, and fully realizing the great potential of most of these persons, we longed for a chance to train them ourselves in a course that was ' inclusive': meaning we would take in talented persons and train them in any areas of deficiency they might have as part of the course itself.

We thus worked very hard and long at developing the course materials, ending with about eight times as much material for the course as is given by any other provider. Among these many materials (six course modules, a professionally recorded pronunciation tape and a carrying bag for all of these), was a book to help Thais and other English students learn about conversational grammar quickly, easily and efficiently through their teacher's course-learned expertise, and a book to enable a course teacher to walk into any classroom on earth knowing through the principles of language comparison and contrast what problems with English the students were having, as well as the origin of the problems and all of the essential means for solving these. (Naturally, the first emphasis was on teaching effectively to our own Thai students, the latter, by the way, being very pleased with our trained teachers as a result and reluctant to let them slip away!)

The next step, of course, was to acquire accreditation for our course, initially through the Thai Ministry of Education. This was hard, as the MOE had always assumed that courses of this type must be administered by universities only (the exact opposite, of course, of what was actually needed in the real world of EFL teaching). Anyway, to make a long story short, after about a year and a-half our course was finally certified and universities and other levels of academia across the world began to appreciate the value of our training. In fact, our certificate is now prized by schools, academies and universities all over the world. Teachers also learn more practical knowledge as a result of all these materials and the smooth way in which the training is conducted than they would from any other course, bar none.

At about the same time that our course started up, however, a local organization was granted a franchise to produce the Trinity TESOL course, which would have been a bit of extra (good quality) competition for us. Unfortunately, the franchise arrangement did not work out favorably (let us say, diplomatically) for the local company, so that organization formed its own course based very loosely on the Trinity. Naturally, since our academy had set the 'precedent' of getting local tefl courses approved by the MOE, and that company had already had the Trinity course approved for conduct on its premises, it was easy enough for them to gain accreditation from the MOE for their new version. Thus, the competition began!

Competition, of course, is healthy, in that, properly conducted, it tends to increase the quality of the services offered. Unfortunately, in Thailand, there have been, in the view of this writer, at least, very few teacher training course providers who have actually focused on quality over taking in money by any and all possible means, and in the highest amount obtainable. Thus it is that, while there were only two other course providers when we started out, there are currently as many as EIGHT OR NINE OTHERS in Bangkok alone, and, at last count, 19 others in the provinces! There simply are not that many qualified trainers, we daresay, in the entire Kingdom!

Indeed, probably no teacher training program in the world (legally established through the Thai Ministry of Education in Bangkok, Chiang Mai, Pattaya, Khon Kaen and Koh Samui) has been so imitated, copied and (let's face it!) 'ripped off'' as our own flagship course. This is especially true of ‘tefl course providers’ operating outside of Bangkok, whose certificates will not be accepted towards a work permit by the Ministry of Education in Bangkok, should graduates decide to seek higher paying jobs in the city. Such imitation is indeed flattering on the one hand, because it authenticates to potential trainees the value of the training they will receive in our own course. However, one downside of this ‘borrowing’, as it were, is that in almost all instances the persons who imitate, copy and rip off our courses, expertise or materials lack the experience, ability and qualifications to achieve the high-level training results that we get regularly, class after class. This certainly impacts badly on both the new teachers they have trained and on any students the latter will be teaching! The final downside, of course (other than their certificates being unacceptable in Bangkok), is that our own highly effective TEFL program, which we have labored so hard to construct and provide over all of these years, is threatened more and more financially by the mushrooming of a huge number of ‘competitors’ enrolling trainees who simply don't know which course would actually be best for them.

One institute that comes to mind in this general category is Chiang Mai University. Yes, a university! Let's face it: A Thai university is not a UK or U.S. university, and the professors here more often than not know less about teaching English effectively than language schools do. The truth is that our Academy over the years has enjoyed excellent relations with CMU, by whom a number of our own course graduates have been employed while they were not able to produce teachers on their own. Thus, while in no way will we accuse CMU of ripping off our course materials, the staff of that institute verifiably did spend a huge amount of time observing and learning from the way our trainers conducted our own course in Chiang Mai – with the result that they now purportedly have invested more than 70 million baht into the construction of facilities to be used as a tefl training center of their own. Upon launching their operations, they announced a course fee “just under that of the competitor’s” (us), as a marketing launch. In their advertisements, they offer free use of their library, which is fine – though busy trainees would hardly have time to enjoy it, at least if they were doing our own course! They also state that they hire their course graduates. Although this latter statement is truthful in a general way, it is actually misleading to the extreme to potential and actual trainees who think they are going to end up working there, as by no means could CMU hire all of their own graduates, or maybe any of them, at any given time. Certainly, CMU is not Cambridge University or Trinity College, and does not have to cope, as most other Thai institutes do, with students who are still learning English as a foreign language.

Our own Academy provides the best possible TEFL Course training already, preparing teachers as no one else to teach both ESL and EFL learners, and both adults and children. We see no reason to invest a huge sum of money to enhance our own already attractive facilities. Should the fact that CMU is a university, reportedly providing highly technical and theoretical materials to prepare trainees to teach in the real world of EFL (not ESL), induce you to study there instead of with us? Only you can decide! If you do decide to do so, however, you might keep in mind, for the moment at least, that you will need to maintain a teaching career in the provinces only, as CMU’s certificate is not currently on the list of those accepted by the MOE in Bangkok towards the issuance of a teacher’s license and work permit!

We wish we could state eloquently enough just how much we wish that at least one or two of our competitors' courses might have been constructed to improve on our own. What a delightful challenge that would have been for us! But it was not to be. As a case in point, the following unsolicited e-mail was sent to our Course Director from one of our newly trained teachers and refers to graduates of the 'watered-down' course provider described below the quotation:

"Well I'm almost through my first week at Wittiya and it's going pretty well. No classes are too out of control and I teach about 18 hours per week. Basically I prepare two lesson plans per week. Not to stroke T&T or anything but... some of the other T's from the other schools around here were scared sh..less. They had no idea how to teach to a large class of Thai kids. I thought this one guy was going to throw up. Now the administrators are having one guy sit in on my class to get ideas on how to teach his own.

I'll tell you more when I swing by the office.
Later,
Vince"

Regarding the provider referred to above of the greatly watered-down course which he claims is 'the one preferred' by the Thailand Ministry of Education, and that his organization is 'non-profit', we can only hope that you are able to sort through the 'truth or falseness' of such claims without any lengthy comment by us.

It seems clear, nonetheless, that though the Thailand Ministry of Education cannot have, or express, preferences for one registered course over another, this provider takes full advantage of having previously been paid by the MOE to conduct a special training course for Thai teachers only (for which the MOE alledgedly was grateful) by stating in banner ads promoting teacher training for foreigners the words, 'Choice of the Thai Ministry of Education'. There must be many non-Thais who have been taken in by this, as, obviously, being chosen to train Thai teachers (most only semi-literate in English) how to teach better is vastly different from being chosen to train foreign persons in a TESOL or TEFL course! In any case, upon having it called to his attention that this ad is both unfair to other providers and misleading to persons who don't know any better, he responds in his own lofty manner, as follows (and we quote the words in his e-mail to us precisely):

"Even if Khunying Kasama Varavarn [a high ranking official of the Minisatry of Education] told me to take it down I would tell her no and she would have no right to demand that I do so.  I earned the right to advertise that and I will continue to do so until you or some other course provider is hired to train large numbers of Thai teachers."

What arrogrance, and how insulting that is to so many really worthy schools in Thailand! We understand his position, namely that he is going to continue his misleading ads no matter what. (Actually, he most likely knows that many other schools' teachers have trained far more Thai instructors than his have. In fact, altogether, our own academy has trained more than 1,000,000 Thai students (including renewals!) since we began business in 1990, including numerous Thai and other Asian teachers.)

Now, predictably (one might say), this provider has gone into a joint venture with Chiang Mai University for mutual benefit! Any comment that we might make beyond 'Birds of a feather...' would surely be redundant.

Finally, lest we be misunderstood ourselves, please note that we do not fear competition from other courses or course providers per se. Indeed, this is healthy, and none of these criticisms would be mentioned here, in any case, if only the above providers' courses were really effective in producing professional teachers – which, from our own experience with their graduates, we can only conclude they are usually emphatically not. After all, producing good, professional teachers who earn high wages is what we are all about, regardless of any claims made, false or otherwise, by competitiors, and whether or not it happened to be us who trained them.

It should be noted, on behalf of ALL local course providers, however, that we advise persons interested in becoming English teachers to consider how one develops as a teacher. It can't be done just by reading a book or a computer monitor, or by watching videos! We feel sure you would agree that, no matter how diligently we might study an instruction book on How to Play Golf, we would probably never be invited to join a foursome that included Tiger Woods.

WE THUS ADVISE YOU AGAINST WASTING MONEY BY ATTEMPTING TO LEARN TEFL OR TESOL ONLINE OR THROUGH LISTENING TO CDs – AND THIS DEFINITELY INCLUDES COURSES OFFERING ANY PRACTICE TEACHING ONLY AFTER THE "TRAINING" IS FINISHED.

"Online courses", as we have said, loosely include those advertising:

— which assign the listening of CDs showing actual teaching of English as a second, but not as a foreign, language, and who "put you to work" at low wages teaching EFL long before you are ready. (We believe it is clear to everyone that being given students to teach before you have learned how to do so effectively is unfair to both them and their teacher.) The information you acquire from such courses may, in fact, be both interesting and useful to your comprehension of how to teach, but the only way to learn how to teach is to study in a highly-interactive TEFL/TESOL course, and then teach, teach and teach some more!! — and, of no small importance, your online (or one-week classroom generated) certificate definitely will not be accepted by the vast majority of quality schools as being anything more than what it is: just an introduction to teaching, which will not get you a job with them. 

As for the much better known UCLES CELTA, this course also is conducted over just four weeks, but reportedly inflicts an enormous amount of pressure over very long days, the daily training hours reportedly exceeding by far the length of  time during which psychologists find the human brain actually can continue learning. Even so, the course is good, except for the fact that it was developed to help you teach foreigners residing in an English-speaking country (persons already using ESL), not to help you teach EFL in Thailand and other foreign countries. Most courses other than our own or the CELTA are very much just 'watered-down' versions of a real course, which do offer minimal help and instruction – but certainly not enough to launch a career on.

Finally, it should be apparent from the above that if you are just interested in a watered-down 'quick fix' (or, just as bad, an intensely pressure-packed) type of course that will gain for you, one hopes, a teaching qualification and a minimum standard of  TESL (not TEFL) ability, you probably should enroll in some course other than our own. However, if you are a 'people person' who gets satisfaction from helping others, who wishes to improve continuously and to become more and more effective, and who also likes earning as much money as possible, then ours is right for you. Through our training you will continue to develop your own capabilities throughout a rewarding career and – by application of the "Nine Different Teaching Techniques and Methodologies" training we give you – will learn to customize classes properly according to need, much to the delight (and improvement!) of your students. This, and only this, provides teachers the element of 'fun' and accomplishment which makes teaching worthwhile. Indeed, our conviction is that teaching may be a lot of work at times, but it also should be (and generally is) quite a bit of fun!

As for most of us, we want a solid foundation of training which will enable us to grow and grow as teachers and perhaps even one day be the discoverer of new ways, and new techniques, that other people will want to go to the bookstore and buy information about – namely the books written by ourselves. This can only be achieved through initially training in an interactive onsite TEFL course containing at least 120 hours of training plus ample observed teaching practice.