London - Former British prime minister Tony Blair said he is "a bit nervous" about starting a teaching post Friday at Yale University in the United States.

"I'm sort of a bit nervous for it, really," he told the university's Yale Daily News. "I was never a star student, and I'm coming along mixing with a whole lot of people who I'm sure are a whole lot more clever and smarter than I am."

At Yale, Blair is to lead a semester-long "faith and globalization" seminar.

He said he was drawn to the prestigious Ivy League university after his son Euan graduated from there earlier this year with a master's degree in international relations.

"The chance to actually come to such a great institution as Yale and be able to interact with students, for me, it's a tremendous privilege," Blair said.

The course is to explore the issues concerning the public roles of religious faiths in the context of globalization. Hundreds of students applied to take it, the paper said.

Blair is currently the representative of the so-called Middle East Quartet of mediators - consisting of the United States, Russia, the United Nations and the European Union - as well as having a number of consultancy jobs. (dpa)