Job Discussion Forums

[derya]

Hi,

I am new to teaching abroad so I appreciate anyone who can help.

*Has anyone heard of Tower School of English? (in Silesia region)
*How much do I need to live proerly?HOw much work load should I expect?
*Shall I expect the employer to pay for the accommodation?If not how much will it cost?

Thanks.

[Alex Shulgin]

I've never heard of Tower school in Silesia. There is one with the same name in Warsaw which may or may not be connected. The one is Warsaw puts out the kind of advertising that is not normally connected with a quality school but I don't know anybody who works there so I can't say anymore.

Outside Warsaw 4000PLN will give you a pretty good standard of living. Try not to work more than 30 classes (45 minutes each) per week.

Never have accommodation linked to the place you work. If you do and your boss turns out to be the boss from hell you'll be looking for a new place to work and a new place to live on the same day. Plus you won't be able to choose a place based on what is important to you in where you live. Outside Warsaw/Krakow 1000PLN will be enough to get you a reasonable apartment in a good neighbourhood.

[Chris]

Jastrzebie Zdroj and Zory are nice locations, but they are rather small towns in/near the Bieskidy mountains.

Cost of living will be quite low there, but you'll probably want to spend several of your weekends in a more lively area such as Krakow or Bielsko Biala.

Apartments should cost between 500 and 800 in the center of town. Beer there is about 4-5.5 pln, and eating out would be rather cheap.

Pay wise, 3000 in hand would let you live a fairly comfortable life, even with having to pay for your flat. You would be able to save about 1000 pln a month pretty easily if you'd like. I made about 4000 during the academic year, and I was able to save quite a lot of money (about 10000). This is even after spending a week in Rome, a week in Bavaria at Christmas, Prague for New Year's, and many weekend trips to Krakow, Wroclaw, Zamosc, Warsaw, etc.

Personally, I don't know much about Tower. They are a Callan Method school, and while I'm not a personal fan of this method, I've had several friends who actually didn't mind teaching it. (I did it for 1 semester and hated every second of it.) But the really nice thing is that once you've done it for about a month, there is almost no prep time necessary.

BTW, I've been living in Sosnowiec (in Silesia, well, more specifically Zaglebia) for the past 6 years. It's a fairly large city (13th largest with 250,000 people) next to Katowice. I'm paying 600pln for my nice, 35sqm furnished flat in the center. Beer is on average 5 pln, but in some places I'll pay 4 or 6.

[derya]

Thank you.

You two were very helpful cause I did not know anything about the place and pay rates.

[misteradventure]

If you accepted a position with TOWER, hope to see you when you get there!
-rob