Ageism in Thailand - On Teachers

Thailand discriminates against older English teachers who are over 45 Years of Age. People who are over the age of 45 need not apply for teacher as they are seen as unwanted in the profession.
More English teachers in Thailand are seeing Advertisements saying "Teachers Under 45 Wanted”. In Thailand, these discriminatory advertisements are completely acceptable and legal. Even the job advertisements in the local newspaper do state that teachers must be “25 years of age or younger, female and attractive”. English teachers that have spent their life teaching in Thailand are not surprised to see the job advertisements as it is common in the country. Furthermore, more job advertisements for western English teachers are stating that they “must be under 45 years of age”.

There are reasons why the Thais discriminate are against teachers who are over the age of 45.

Firstly, if a teacher were to teach English in Thailand, he or she must be an entertainer as well as an educator. For a teacher to be entertaining and fun, the Thais’ mindset of the criteria for one to be a teacher is that the teacher must be young. The Thais dislike being bored during the lesson and they assume that young teachers would make the lesson more lively and fun.

Secondly, it is due to that the citizens have a mindset that older people are weak as many eld
erly are suffering from poor health in Thailand due to poor healthcare and infrastructure. Although the retirement age in Thailand is 60 years of age, the Thais would retire earlier as they want to enjoy retirement age. Besides that, they also added discrimination against western teachers that are older than 45 years old. The Thais also assume that the westerns in the range of 50s-60s years old are weak and thus unable to teach.

A good teacher does not necessarily have to be young. In fact, in my opinion, younger teachers are not as experience as an old teacher who has been in the profession for a long time. Hence , older teachers may be as good as younger teachers or even better than them.