Hello everyone,

I am not currently a teacher. I am an IT analyst with a medium size company in The States with a mortgage and a 401K, living the American dream. However, I am feeling the need to do more with my life than to pad my cushy nest.

I have always had a feel for teaching. I'm the one who is 'volunteered' to give the training classes in my company; in fact, I really enjoy it. I now have the opportunity to go to an ESL training seminar hosted locally. The purpose of the training is to provide volunteer tutors to the new non-English speaking residents of our community. In the short term I plan to volunteer locally but, my long term plans have been drifting more to the international teaching role.

I have a lot of questions but, for my first post I'll keep it simple.

Many of the posts on this site are very negative. I understand that this is an 'inside' group where you feel you can safely come to vent and I'm not knocking that. However, my question is, is it worth it? Is teaching overseas, for less money, less security, less Western comforts, etc, etc... really worth it? I know you can't answer this question for me; I'll wrestle my own needs and wants to come to my own conclusion. Is it worth it to you? What do you get out of this? Why don't you get frustrated and pack it in? What makes you keep going? Is it the adventure, the people, the slower pace that some other cultures provide? What makes you successful in this field of work? Why do some stay (for years) and others can't take a 2 -3 month temp job?

Maybe this isn't the simple question that I thought it might be. But, what I want is a full disclosure of what it may take for me to be successful in this possible endeavor. That answer is probably different for everyone but, hey, there are a lot of you out there.

Thanks for your answers. I'm really interested in reading them.

syzygus