Job Q&A
By Allan Hoffman
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Monster.com: Tell us about your experience as an English teacher in Mexico.

Eric Dondero: In Mexico, teachers need to do training during the summer -- they need to gain "points" in order to get better positions. All the English teachers come from all around Mexico to Normal Superior, a very prestigious school located in Tampico. It's one of the few schools in Mexico that offers summer school programs for teachers. I was teaching English to teachers from all around Mexico.

Mc: How did you find the position?

DD: It was an accident, really. I've worked for a U.S. congressman, on and off, for the last 12 years. I took a few months off to do some interpreting at the local courts, and I was taking a French class in Houston. I had had a girlfriend in Tampico; some of her family lives up here (Texas), and that's how I met her. There was a girl in my French class from Tampico, and she kept telling me I could teach English in Tampico, that her father's really influential in Tampico -- and he was. I said I'd love to do that for the summer. I went down, and I interviewed with the principal. It was the first time they had ever had an American teach at the college, and it was a very big thing for them. They gave me six classes, teaching conversational American English. The funny thing is, down in Mexico, the English teachers are from England and Canada. As a result, the Mexicans, who just have book knowledge of English, end up speaking this weird English. It's very pretty, but it's not the English that we use.

Mc: That's a busy schedule, teaching six classes.

DD: I started at 7 in the morning and finished at 5:30 in the afternoon. I had three beginning-level classes, two intermediate, and one advanced. I had 180 total students. Out of that 180, only about 20 or 30 really could speak English. All the beginners were really beginners. I taught out of a conversational book, and I taught "real" English. I taught English as it is spoken in the United States. I even taught a little slang, and dialects, like Southern American English or the English of Black Americans. I tried to teach them that sort of lingo. Their English certainly improved, but what they need more than anything is conversation.

Mc: What were your students' perceptions of the U.S.?

DD: They have a lot of serious misconceptions. They think that we're all crazy -- that we carry guns, and we shoot people on the streets, and we're all drug dealers. Everything that Hollywood portrays us as, that's what they think of us. That is their view of the United States, and I tried to dispel a lot of stereotypes.

Mc: What was it like living in Tampico?

DD: Spectacular. Utterly spectacular. The Mexican people are the nicest people you'd ever meet. At night, when I didn't have to grade papers, I had a lot of time to enjoy the culture and see the city and party a little bit with the locals, especially with my students. They'd have a party at the beach every night, and that gave me another opportunity to answer their questions about the United States. They're intensely curious about us. It was a lot of hard work and a lot of hard play. There was virtually no moment when I wasn't doing something.

Mc: You're obviously interested in languages. Do you want to use that knowledge to further your career?

DD: I love my job right now, I love working in politics, but I've acquired new skills that not many people have, being multilingual. I'm looking for a position where I can utilize these skills -- my ability to speak these languages, and, in particular, my knowledge of Mexico -- perhaps in the international trade sphere. On both sides of the border, because of NAFTA, everything has opened up, and there are enormous opportunities.

Mc: What advice would you have for someone thinking about teaching in Mexico?