The Hire Wire · For Irish institutions
Teaching abroad, for the people your students ask first
A free fortnightly briefing on where English teaching jobs are, what they pay, and when the applications close. Written in Ireland, for advisers who get asked this every term and have nowhere current to send anyone.
New to it? Read the current edition of The Hire Wire. Or carry on below for what this means for your students.
The problem this solves
Half the advice online is written for Americans, and your students are not Americans
This is the part that catches people out. Spain’s flagship assistantship, NALCAP, takes applicants from the United States and Canada. Most of the well-ranked guides your students will find are written around it, and an Irish graduate can read three pages of enthusiastic advice about a scheme they cannot apply to.
The routes that are genuinely open to an Irish or EU passport holder are different ones, and they are less well documented: Meddeas placements in Spain, the language assistant schemes in France, Germany, Austria and Italy, private academy hiring across southern Europe, and the student visa route. No freedom-of-movement paperwork, no sponsorship question, and almost no clear guidance anywhere.
So the useful question is not “how do I teach English abroad”. It is “which doors does my passport actually open, and when do they close”. That is the question we answer.
Why an institution can link to it
What we hold ourselves to
- Ministry sources, nothing else. Every deadline and salary figure comes from a government, ministry or programme notice. Not a forum thread, not a competitor’s blog, not a recruiter.
- The date we checked is printed beside the figure. You can see for yourself how current a number is before you repeat it to a student.
- Corrections are published, not buried. When a window moves we say so in the open rather than quietly editing the page.
- Named authors with classroom experience, and an editorial standards page setting out exactly how the writing and checking works.
- Nothing behind a form. No paywall, no registration to read, nothing a student has to buy at any point.
A note from the editor
I am the person who checks these figures, so it is fair that you know who I am before you decide whether to link to us.
We started the briefing because we kept hearing the same story. Someone comes in asking about teaching in France, and the window shut in January. Nobody had told them, because nobody was keeping track. It is a small thing to fix and it costs a graduate a whole year when it goes wrong.
And to be straight with you, because you will reasonably wonder: we are a TEFL course provider. Course fees are how the company pays its way. A few readers eventually train with us and most never do, and I check every figure the same way either way. There is no course advertising inside the briefing.
If you ever find something on our site that is wrong, email me directly rather than the team. We will correct it in the open, with the date on it, and I will thank you for it.
Katie TroyManaging Director and Editor, The TEFL Institute of Ireland · katie.troy@tefl.ie
Six standing references
Link once, and it stays useful
These are permanent tools rather than articles, updated alongside every edition. Nobody on your team has to maintain anything. They all sit under The Hire Wire, which is the page to link if you would rather point students at one place than six.
Deadline alerts
The single most useful thing we can give an adviser
The big schemes open once a year and close without warning anyone. Spain is the one to know about this term. The Department of Education and Youth’s English Language Assistant scheme, which is how a new Irish graduate enters Spain’s auxiliares de conversación programme, states on gov.ie that it cannot offer any new places in Spain for 2026/27 because of continued administrative issues. There is no direct alternative for a new Irish applicant this year: the Spanish Ministry routes Irish candidates to that Irish scheme rather than to its own portal. What is still open is the private route (Meddeas) and direct academy hiring. France’s TAPIF opened its 2027/28 window on 15 October 2026 and closes it on 15 February 2027, but it is open to United States citizens and permanent residents only, so it is not a route for your students — it is worth knowing about because most of the France advice online is written around it. The Irish route to the French and Italian assistantships runs through the same ELA scheme, whose 2026/27 round closed on 12 March 2026 at 5pm; no 2027/28 dates are published yet, so check the current round before advising on it. Spain’s NALCAP is the North American strand and is not open to an Irish passport at all. Deadline facts on this page are taken from The Hire Wire dispatch board and its standing desks, each of which prints the date it was last checked against source. Japan’s JET 2027 application opened on 21 September 2026 and the Irish closing date is 23:59 on Friday 4 December 2026, set by the Embassy of Japan in Dublin; the United Kingdom closes 5 November and the United States 13 November. A student who comes to you in February about teaching in France next September has already missed it, and there is nothing you or they can do until the following year.
Updated 24 September 2026: this paragraph previously said Japan’s JET “opens in October”. The 2027 application in fact opened on 21 September 2026. Updated 1 October 2026: three changes. The Irish JET closing date has been published and this paragraph now names it instead of saying it could not be verified. Spain’s ELA closure has been added — it published in Issue 005 on 30 September and should have reached this page the same day, because it is the single thing an Irish adviser most needs to know this term. And the paragraph previously gave 15 March as the closing date for the Irish route to the French assistantship; that is TAPIF’s date, which is the American route. The Irish route is the ELA scheme and it closed on 12 March 2026, per gov.ie, re-read today. Updated 16 October 2026: TAPIF has now published its 2027/28 window, 15 October 2026 to 15 February 2027, and this paragraph names it instead of calling early November a pattern. The Spain ELA position was re-read at source today on both the English and the Irish-language gov.ie pages and both still carry the 2026/27 closure note, so the Spain wording above stands unchanged. Updated 28 October 2026: two facts added for advisers. The 2026/27 ELA terms on gov.ie, read at source today, paid 1,036.21 euro gross a month in France, about 820 euro net, and 1,000 euro net in Germany, each for 12 hours a week, and approximately 2,000 euro gross in Austria for 13 hours, so a student can see what the Irish route pays before the 2027/28 forms appear. And for graduates who trained as teachers abroad, a PGCE in England for example, without finishing induction there, the Teaching Council’s timebound provision lets them register in Ireland and complete induction here. It closes at 23.59 on 30 December 2027, read at source today. The ELA closing date of 12 March 2026 was re-read on gov.ie today and stands. The JET dates were not re-read today.
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For your resources page
Wording ready to paste
If this is useful to your students, a link from your working-abroad, graduate-opportunities or languages resources page is the most helpful thing you can do. Take either of these and reword them however suits your page. No attribution required and no tracking parameters.
Short, for a list of resources
The Hire Wire: a free fortnightly briefing from The TEFL Institute of Ireland on English teaching vacancies, salaries and application deadlines worldwide, checked against ministry and programme sources. Includes an eligibility checker for Irish and EU passport holders. tefl.ie/the-hire-wire
About 40 words. Select and copy
Longer, where each resource gets a paragraph
The Hire Wire is a free fortnightly briefing on teaching English abroad, published in Ireland by The TEFL Institute of Ireland. It tracks which countries are hiring, what the roles pay in local currency and euro, and when the major government schemes open and close. Every figure is checked against a ministry or programme source and carries the date it was verified. It also hosts an eligibility checker that shows which routes are open to an Irish or EU passport, alongside a salary index, a visa desk, a paperwork checklist and a country matcher. Nothing requires registration. tefl.ie/the-hire-wire
About 90 words. Select and copy
Point the link at https://tefl.ie/the-hire-wire/. If your content system needs it in a particular format, email us and we will send it however you need it.
Other things, all free
If a link is not the right fit
None of it costs anything, there is nothing to sign, and there is nothing to put through procurement.
Talk to someone here
Tell us what your students keep asking and we will send you the version of this that is actually useful. We will not add you to a mailing list.
Full disclosure
Who publishes this, and how it is paid for
Set out plainly, because it is the first thing an institution should ask and the last thing most providers answer.
Who publishes The Hire Wire?
The TEFL Institute of Ireland, a trading name of The TEFL Institute Limited, registered in Ireland under company number 613324, registered office 4 Shandon Street, Dungarvan, Co. Waterford, X34 A365. The editor is Katie Troy.
Do you sell anything?
Yes. We are a TEFL course provider, and TEFL course fees are how the company makes its money. That is worth knowing before you decide whether to link to us.
So why is the briefing free?
Because it is how we earn a reputation with people who are thinking about teaching abroad. A small number of readers eventually train with us. The great majority never do, and the briefing is written and checked the same way regardless. There is no advertising for our courses inside the briefing itself, and nothing on the site is gated behind a form or a payment.
How do I know the figures are right?
Every salary and deadline is checked against a government, ministry or programme source, and the date it was checked is printed beside it. When something changes after publication we correct it in the open rather than editing quietly. The full method is on our editorial standards page.
Do you place students in jobs?
No. We publish information. We are not a recruiter, we take no commission, and we charge no placement fees. If a page ever implies otherwise, that is an error and we would like to know.
What do you want from us?
A link from your resources page, if the briefing is genuinely useful to your students. Nothing else. No contract, no fee, no data sharing, and nothing to put through procurement.