Job Discussion Forums

[bradleycooper]

I saw today that an outfit called Gold Star is recruiting on this website for 8 teachers in Jakarta. The wages being offered are Rp 15 million for first year teachers. This opens up another high wage paying school in Jakarta. Clearly they are trying to match Wall Street style wages. Any comments about Gold Star as an employer from other markets? They say they are already established in many countries.

[Atoms for Peace]

Gold Star appears to be a recruiting agency, rather than a school. According to the ad mentioned by the OP, the name of the school is "Adult Language School", and it is "a truly global company, established in 1965 and now with over 400 centers around the world." and "have established ourselves as the market leader for private language learning."

By a strange coincidence, the same Gold Star has an ad for English First China, which is "...truly a global company, established in 1965 and now with over 400 centers around the world..." and "has since established itself as the market leader for private language learning"

So is EF Indonesia now paying Rp 15 million?

[bradleycooper]

It seems highly unlikely that EF Indonesia would double its salary overnight from Rp 7.5 million to 15 million. That would surely go against the grain for a company which has keep wages stuck in a rut for a decade. On the other hand the similarities which Atoms for Peace notices can't be a coincidence- there has to be some kind of link or explanation. But then "Adult Education" doesn't appear to be EF's bag either. EF have mostly attracted Kids and Teens in the past.

EFs have different owners, so maybe this is for a particular branch only. The Central Jakarta EF opened a new branch at Kuningan in 2012 with nice facilities to go head to head with TBI Kuningan- their flagship school. Could this be for that branch perhaps? I am sure it will become clearer in the coming months.

[jimalthans]

Hi, it's Jim here from Gold Star. Yep you're right, we are an ESL recruitment agent and have been assisting English First, Wall Street and many other schools, public and private, with their recruitment in Asia for a while now.

The ad you're referring to for an adult school in Indonesia is indeed for English First schools! EF actually runs wholly owned schools as well as franchises, which is why the compensation package is quite different between this job and a lot of the others in Indonesia you may have seen. These are new schools, targeting only adult and business English students whereas the franchises teach mainly young learners.

[bradleycooper]

[bradleycooper]

I notice that Gold Star are now recruiting for a DOS for EF Makassar. The job pays Rp 14.000.000, which is good money for Sulawesi. They aren't many decent-paying TEFL jobs east of Java usually.

What do people make of the decision by EF to use recruiters more these days?