TEFL Accreditation: what is the importance?
Going for any TEFL course without verifying its accreditation can land you in troubled water when you set in for job searches across the globe. Accreditation is important for any educational course and TEFL is not an exception.
When you choose teacher training institutes offering TEFL certificate at the end of a particular duration, one thing you must ensure is their affiliation and accreditation. This ensures that the academic standards offered are of highest possible range suitable for professional certifications.
Teacher training courses offer quality assurance to the service users. Students who choose them are provided with the affirmation that their chosen institute and course has successfully gone through a screening process of evaluation and international bodies have recognised it.
Thus the role of accreditation in Teaching English as a Foreign Language or TEFL and Teaching English to Speakers of Other Language or TESOL is of pivotal importance. If you are thinking of taking up a TEFL or TESOL course and eying a career in teaching the same in abroad, you must be concerned about the accreditation.
Why should you choose accredited certification courses?
If you are up for grabbing a TEFL diploma or TEFL advanced diploma degree, you must not settle for anything less than excellence. Accredited certification in TEFL ensures just that. Undergoing such a course will make your EFL or ESL teaching career an outright success.
When you opt for settling abroad with a teaching job there you have to produce your certification, academic records etc. It will not matter how higher a degree you have, you may have a TEFL PG degree too, but it will not be meaningful if the programme is not accredited. The employers will only recognise it if proper accreditation is identified.
This will ensure that your skills and the knowledge you acquired through the course will be taken into consideration while considering you for the job you applied for. No or questionable accreditation will put your whole career at risk too.
How should you know that your course and certificate are accredited?
There are a set of norms which international teaching diploma providers have to abide by to call themselves accredited. Missing any one will result in failure of claiming accreditation. You must check whether your chosen certification course meets all of them.
To make sure that you put your money and invest your energy in the right place you should check the following:
The training period must be no less than 120 hours without compromising with the quality of training provided.
The training and the curriculum provided must be up to date with the current trends of the international market of education.
The trainers associated with the course must be accomplished in respective fields and must have years of experience too in teaching the relevant topic to the students.
There must be scope of hands-on experience while you are a part of the teaching practice sessions.
The course and the certification must be recognised by bodies of international reputation
The service providers must provide assistance in job placement or other post completion services. These services and options provided to the learners must be genuine and authentic.
Accreditation and Membership: are they same?
These three commonly used terms are quite different from each other and you should know them well too. Accreditation is far more important in terms of weightage than the two. While any institute can apply for membership of a reputed university or college, it does not guarantee accreditation. Only minute review and screening will confirm that. The institute seeking accreditation must fulfil all the above-mentioned criteria.
Thus to be a master in TEFL it is not only enough to grab a certificate. But you have to check for other variables too. With all the check boxes marked, you can choose your institute, achieve the degree and finally be qualified for a ESL or EFL trainer job anywhere around the world without the worry of making your career jeopardized.
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