Job Discussion Forums

[Master Shake]

If not spending an arm and a leg for decent food and grog makes me a backpacker, then so be it.

There're not only cheap and cheerful places, but also reasonably-priced, mid-market ones serving great food as well. You can get a very tasty curry / pizza / pasta / Thai meal / roast duck or even decent Mexican food for 25-50zl a plate.

I lived in Warsaw, as you're no doubt aware.

I take your point about how it's not as easy to find the better paying TEFL jobs outside of the Big Potato. But you're based in Poznan, so don't think your comments hold true for all the rest of Poland either.

[dragonpiwo]

It is what it is: 50 pln/hour in a language school and 80-100 freelance. 100 hours a month makes you 5,000 gross or 10,000 gross minus tax and social security.

I've never met anyone who makes 10k a month teaching in Poland. (since 1995). Most I ever made was 7.5k net and a free flat in Warsaw. Getting that job was a total fluke and I literally worked 7 days a week.

This guy's going to arrive, do a CELTA and get a job at a language school with a missus in tow. That's a hard landing.

They'll struggle unless they have savings or the bank of mum and dad. Warsaw is full of work but it's also expensive. In most major places, the market is flooded and the Poles are excellent teachers these days.

Our local curry house is 35 for a main, 8 for the rice, 12 for the bread and 28 for the starter. The 3 Thai restaurants I've been to (Papaya in Warsaw, Thai Thai in Sopot and Whythai in Poznan) have all been expensive. Anyhow that's irrelevant. If you're making 5,000 Gross ie less than 4,000 net and your rent is 1300, you're left with very, very little on which to live let alone buy clothes, pay for medicine, fly home and join a gym.

[nomad soul]

[chuckMC]

But why would they want to work in Poland? They are probably in the 30's now. There's no money in Poland. Why can't they get serious and get a REAL teacher license in the US, instead of a entry level CELTA, either back home or online (i.e. TeacherReady program)? With a professional teaching license they can find better paying jobs.

[Master Shake]

[simon_porter00]

[sparks]

10k isn't that much in Warsaw nowadays. To being doing "well" in the quagmire of TEFL Poland 12-15 is a better marker. Of course, the more the better but this requires having others work for you.

[Master Shake]

[chuckMC]

Who would aspire to work in Poland to make only $2,500 a month? My goodness, if you have the skill and ability to achieve such a high income by polish standards, than you should be using those same skills and ability in countries that offer more money. Why not Germany?

Again, Poland is only a good option if you are a womanizer and/or a drunk.

[dragonpiwo]

If we stopped 100 EFL teachers at random in Poland, 95 of them would be earning less than 5k gross.

As the man said;'30 hours a weekat 100/hours is 12,000 minus tax and NI/Zus payments ie around 9k.'

While that is a great salary for Poland and just about doable, 30 hours/week in different locations, often starting early and finishing late, is not a lifestyle choice you'll enjoy as you get older. Employing others to do it makes a lot of sense. however, as I've repeated ad nauseam, it's a tough call outside Warsaw.

[simon_porter00]

[nomad soul]

[dragonpiwo]

From http://www.bankier.pl/wiadomosc/4-5-Polakow-zarabia-mniej-niz-3549-zl-netto-7228674.html this article (and I'm taking it at face value & its 12/2014 figures) it says only 20% of Poles make it past 5000 zl pcm.

So if you stopped 100 POLISH people (you changed my words), 20 would be making 5k or more. Maths not your forte?

I make 30,000 a month plus bens like food and housing in the UAE. I don't need lectures on working hard. EFL owes me nothing you are right but I object to people suggesting 10k is the new norm. It patently isn't. I know dozens and dozens of EFL teachers/lecturers who supplement with writing and translation and none of them, NOT 1 of them makes 10k gross and I know them all across Poland and have done for the past 20 odd years.

I don't know anyone who can teach 40 contact hours a week effectively, running from A to B for 12 months of the year to make the sums Sparks is on about.

I'm not telling people to avoid Poland, I'm just telling them they will be skint as feck in all probabilities even if they work 'hard'.

So you can't stick that 'imperialist' tosh in your pipe. I'm not try to sell sand to Arabs, just telling it how it is.

[simon_porter00]

I put my hands up - wasn't so careful at 6am in the morning, maths isn't my forte, much as your forte isn't being able to speak about Poland without blathering on about the UAE - which, as me, you and other people have discussed and hopefully agreed on by now, the UAE isn't even remotely relevant to the TEFL market in Poland - make more money elsewhere? Gosh, what a shock.

You're trying to tell it as it is? So am I - it's the same as anywhere else. Start off and then work hard. If you get lucky - and in a damn sight less than 20 years - it's because you've put in the hard graft.

TBH my beef wasn't so much with you, I'm sure if I were ever to cross paths with you, I'd quite like to sit down and have a beer. It was more with that Chucky fellow talking rubbish.

[sparks]

The ten k I was talking about was gross, so, yeah, 12-15 to be pulling that net. I sort of agree with Dragon on this, you can't stay in Poland and keep thinking that making 5k a month is acceptable, you also need to think that if you have a couple of thousand extra zl. laying around at the end of each month, it's only about 500 dollars--not much to save considering our generation probably won't be able to rely on the gov't. I know the pay is better elsewhere but I like it here--usually, and am sort of making a go of it.