Job Discussion Forums

[Guinea Pig]

This it has just been announced that Caledonian School will be cutting the pay of all staff by 4% and all annual pay increases that staff receive on the anniversary of their start date have been cancelled for this year.

If you are a new teacher starting at the school you will be offered 175Kc per teaching hour. Taxes and social payments will take approximately 20% off of this. Most teachers are given about 28 teaching hours per week but you can expect at least 2 of these to be cancelled each week by students.

Currently to live in Prague you should expect to pay between 6000 to 8000 Kc for rent depending on the location and how many people you are sharing with. I pay 6500Kc including bills to share a 38m2 appartment with 1 other person. Food expenditure obviously depends on each person, I am vegetarian and spend about 3000Kc per month. You can have a look on the Tesco website to give you a quick and easy comparison of current prices.

Then don't forget that you will have some expenses related to your work for example phone and teaching materials such as whiteboard pens and files.

So after these expenses you will have about 4000Kc left per month for clothing, services (500kc for a for lady's haircut), leisure activities, social activities and travel back home. Therefore my advice would be if you are currently planning to move to the Czech Republic either be prepared to teach a number of additional hours or use some of your own funds to while you are here.

I hope this is helpful to anyone travelling here this year and if anyone living here would like to add any comments please do so.

[mr tree]

i'd just like to point out a few inaccuracies in the OP which I'm fortunate enough to be privvy to...

the pay cuts don't affect all staff - beginner's salaries are still the same.
the 175kc per teaching hour quoted (176kc actually) is a NET figure, AFTER taxes.
i also believe that such things as whiteboards, pens and files can actually be provided by the school

i can't disagree with the OP's conclusion though. salaries throughout the TEFL industry are tight at the moment, not only at the school mentioned. for example, another friend of mine just started full-time, 26 hours a week and is being paid 16000kc GROSS per month

[sisyphus]

It is a dreadful time to efl in Prague, firms have slashed or closed in firm language courses, and czech owned language schools are even more cheekier and dishonest than normal...The only people making a living here now are EFL Traning firms pretending there are jobs here. There are not and there is little freelance work. it is the worst ive ever seen it in 14 years...if you are thinking of teaching here it is a bad idea. Belarus?

[corij]

[musicalchef]

At my school they're cutting the pay a bit too for new courses.

I love the school I'm at, but I'm definitely learning Czech to increase my job options here!

[RabbitWho]

This is part of the reason why I had to make the decision to leave CZ, I do love it here, and I can live and get by and save in the town i live in now, but i've always wanted to live in a capital city, I can't justify moving to Prauge when it won't even be possible to get more than 2 Czech lessons a week and I really want to get past that B1 hump that I see all my students hit the same I have.
You can't study Czech as a foreign language in a university here unless you have at least a C1 level, which is insane, so it makes more sense to me to just move somewhere else and start a new language and life from scratch.

So to the poster: If you move outside of Prauge to a small town you will make slightly more money and have much cheaper accommodation, you'll also have a better chance of learning Czech as you won't meet a single soul who speaks English, that's what I did and I think B1 in 10 months was good... the problem is it's been 16 months now and i haven't made any progress since that time! I really need to live and breathe Czech to improve, and there are just no options available to me for that.

[smithryansmith]