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Review of Oxford Kids, Moscow

 
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jh_of_England



Joined: 27 Jun 2016
Posts: 1

PostPosted: Wed Jun 29, 2016 7:38 am    Post subject: Review of Oxford Kids, Moscow Reply with quote

Anyone who is debating whether to work for Oxford Kids or not may be interested in knowing what I know.

Oxford Kids is a new company. They were born out of another company - Oxford Crown - in January of this year (2016). There are three characters involved in this company - Olga, the new boss; Nikolai, the new assistant director; and Elena, comms.

It is a very haphazard company. Dictionary.com defines 'haphazard' as: "characterized by lack of order or planning, by irregularity, or by randomness; determined by or dependent on chance; aimless."

The emotional distress caused by my sudden, unforeseen departure; the constant worrying that another email from Oxford Kids might be waiting for me in my inbox; and the support of friends who recommended me to share my experiences, have led me to writing this present review. I thank them for their support.

My biggest pet hate about Oxford Kids - a view shared by five former employers of which I have spoken to - was the constant last minute emailing of very urgent business which absolutely must be completed at the cost of any and all plans you, the employee, may have. For example, one email sent at 18:00 would finish with: "I expect your reply saying you agree by 10:00 tomorrow."

Granted, with smartphones people can receive work messages instantly so in one light this might not be a problem. However, when you finish a long working day at 20:30 and have a one and a half hour commute to do and dinner to eat, you can see how this sort of repetitive behavior starts becoming a problem.

The nature of emails were always for "the most urgent things." It remains my belief that anything of such vital significance would have been known about in advance. This made me feel panic daily for the next thing which was going to be asked of me which never took into account the other things they had already convinced me to do beyond teaching.

There was also a game of, what could arguably be called "tag teaming" which bordered on manipulation. All emails are directed to Elena, although she forwards messages on to Nikolai for an extra 'authoritative stamp' quite unnecessary in a company run by just three people. I had numerous messages from Nikolai of emotional blackmail directed to my empathetic side and used entirely to get further freebees from me, the employee, for company profit from high paying clients.

It was also a huge life inconvenience that the company could not guarantee me schools for my nine month tenure, and before my departure from them at the end of May 2016 they had sent no information as to whether there would be a repetition in September 2016 of September 2015, in which I was made to teach private lessons two hours from the centre while I waited for the majority of my promised schools to start in October. Two days after arrival back I strongly debated moving to South Korea. Perhaps I should have escaped then.

Housing is not provided and the housing assistance which was provided last year left a lot to be asked for. I lost my first month’s deposit as I had to move out of the diabolical apartment which was arranged by the company and of which it was expected that I would spend nine months. When I left Moscow I lost a second deposit thanks again to the company although that experience I shall save for the end of my review.

I was also made to do a lot of activities unpaid, usually during national holidays (no other free time is given throughout your nine months and asking for a day off comes with a 6,000 ruble a day price tag - 1,000 rubles more than last year’s contract and 1,827 rubles higher than what you earn in a day if you calculate a full-time wage of 96,000 rubles, divided by 23 working days, in a month with 31 days) and to travel around Moscow above and beyond the call of duty.

Let me address each of these three points in detail.

Unpaid activities - include: writing twice annual reports for all of your children whilst continuing to prepare lessons and travel exaggerated lengths across Moscow. On the 8th of May 2016 it took 5 and a half hours for me to write more than 120 reports. I also frequently had my free mornings taken away for doing mandatory meetings at prospective schools for the company for their following years' contracts, and I was even made to sing at one of them, a request which came entirely out of the blue while I was improvising answers to questions which had absolutely nothing to do with me.

Trips to the office in Tulskaya for meetings with Elena and Nikolai when they request a face-to-face talk (something of a common tactic for them when email requests were unsuccessful) and constant errands, also took away from mornings which were supposed to be for lesson planning or travel time to your school far away. The long travel was never factored into their communications from the office and yes, while I am aware Moscow is a large city, the distances were polar, meaning there was no spot in which an apartment could be found to reduce travel times.

No holidays - Every six weeks teachers who are work ordinarily at state schools have a one week holiday. While I don't expect this to transfer across to private enterprise, working non-stop from September to December and then after the national holidays in January to the end of May (except for public holidays which have work given to complete during) is exhausting.

Travel: Open a Moscow metro map and check out these names. My working week for the year was:

Monday = Krylatskoye.

Tuesday = Yasenevo

Wednesday = Buninskaya Aller

Thursday = Baumanskaya

Friday = Petrovsko-Razumovskaya

Monday one could walk to the location from the metro in 10 minutes. Tuesday was a sturdy 15 minute walk which was difficult in winter time. Wednesday needed a 15 minute bus after arrival at the very last station in Moscow region (so no longer in the city of Moscow). Thursday was walkable to the school and Friday required a 25 minute bus after arrival at the metro.

Monthly Friday morning meetings were quite simply a farce. A woman would come and give small presentations on course content which were just taken straight out of the contents page of the books we were working from...

...which reminds me: Oxford Kids provide little to no materials to you directly to run your courses in state schools. All of the materials you eventually manage to scrape together over the first few months (yes, that means giving a month or two of lessons using either the childrens’ books or the internet - if the state school has internet access working that day) you must carry around with you like a mule, as materials are not given for each class. So, if you have two schools at the same level you can’t leave materials you don’t need for lesson planning at one school as you need to take them to the next school. That said, you are not given a space to leave materials. In September 2015, when I asked the company who would be providing materials, they said: “the state schools.” State schools had to provide us at the private enterprise with the materials we needed to teach the English course! When I returned all of my materials at the end of May (the email which alerted you to this by the way didn’t say: “please remember to return your materials at the end of the academic year,” but “return your materials on or before the 31st of May or we will dock your pay for the retail price of buying a new one from your last month’s salary on June 1st”) the office was surprised I had so many materials. That is because they gave me just a few old, tattered books to teach from and the rest of the materials should, I suppose, belong to the schools that I was working at.

[straight out of the contents page of the books we were working on...] and give us no instructions on what to do if schools refused to buy materials or if there were no facilities at all such as printers, photocopiers or the internet. Suffice it to say, making extra trips to the office for photocopying and printing was out of the question, one because they did not have a colour printer and two because the office isn’t set up for teachers to come and reproduce materials but almost entirely for administration. A trip to the office before travelling far out of the centre was also out of the question and some of the schools we went to refused many, many times to provide printers, photocopiers or materials to allow us to prepare at the school in question.

I speak specifically about the school at Baumanskaya. I taught there for an entire year and not once did a child bring a notebook or a pencil to class. School children did not buy course books and the state school itself provided old library books to teach from, which did not match the childrens’ levels or even belong to the children. Has anyone tried teaching a course for an entire year where the children can not take notes, can not complete exercises in a course book, read passages to classmates or simply follow a course structure from start to finish? I can not comprehend what role the course director had if a school was permitted to be run in such a fashion for an entire year. That class also went through three teachers this year, two of which left, and the entire time Elena was sending emails to the supervisor to no result and, as such, leaving the status quo to thrive. It was terrible.

Be aware that after you sign your contract. After a while almost all emails to you will begin with: “Well, according to the contract, you must...” The contract becomes its own entity without a face and to be adhered to without the space for reasoning or discussion (except in completing Its will). For the more, when the company changed name I did not sign a new contract. Neither was I informed of the change except when I tried to log-in to the online system - a daily activities sheet which must be completed online for every class, every day and, again, later turned out to be “part of the contract” and, therefore, unpaid - and when it didn’t work I was treated as though I of course should have known all along that the website had changed. Considering the amount of unpaid company promotion events I personally had to do over the year, a fundamental change in boss and change of name should have been communicated by the new boss in the very least, preferably with a little explanation. But that wasn’t so.

It is also quite lonely working for this company. They don't organize socials for employees (although tried to organize afternoon bowling the day after the last working day of the year) and as a result, I didn't know who my fellow English teachers were or have the opportunity to make friends with them. Once a month I saw some of the teachers at Friday morning meetings but this is always a two hour 'sit and listen' affair followed by the necessity to leave immediately to go to work.

I was also referred to as “the favourite” by the assistant director at the start of May 2016. That changed at the end of May when Oxford Kids scheduled a meeting, urgently, on the same day and at the same time as their rival company (Oxford Crown, my employers at the start of the year) who had emailed far in advance. The Oxford Kids meeting was poorly worded in English which generated the initial confusion, but it was also labelled “urgent” and “obligatory to attend” and, of course, was unpaid. Olga - the new boss - “did not like” that I asked this time to be paid for my time, and a meeting yet again had to be held in Tulskaya which specifically questioned my “loyalty” (to use their words) to their company and suggested, again, that they might not be able to renew my visa if I did not do as they asked.

My necessity to have summer work was rendered mute with the argument “John. We’re talking about giving you nine months of work. Surely that’s more important.” It was suggested I “pick strawberries in Britain instead” for the summer, and it was beyond Oxford Kids to think that their teachers might need to get through the summer months first before they could think about that nine month contract again.

As a result Oxford Kids ‘won’ and I cancelled my summer camp meeting to go to theirs. The pictures of me at last years summer camp when the company was still Oxford Crown however, remain on the wall of the conference room at Oxford Kids.

I must make two more comments and I thank readers if they have made it this far through my review.

I love my children. In my last classes at my Friday school, children stayed back after class, aware that the year had finished, to enquire with eyes wide open like Antonio Banderas’s cat in ‘Shrek,’ as to whether I would be returning the following year. In my very last class one of the girls said: “I was the best teacher she had had in her entire life.” When I informed the school supervisor of the news that I wouldn’t be returning for 2016/2017 she said: “It’s awful news! I’m very disappointed. The children will miss you,” and she is absolutely right, though I know I will miss them more as they were my day-to-day life in Moscow for the past year and a half.

My last story I take from my Facebook status the moment I landed safely in Bulgaria on the 9th of June, one day before my visa ran out, and from the message I told to former supervisors. I remain abhorred by my savage treatment.

Facebook status: “So, after being told - by email, and then twice on the phone when I called them confused and frustrated - that I have four days to leave the country as Oxford Kids failed to renew my visa on time (even after a message in the evening of Tuesday 10th of May saying that I must come in the next morning to discuss my visa - there had been a three day national holiday before, so for the company there was no urgency during their holidays - and an email which stated: “due to your refusal to come tomorrow morning, we can not guarantee to renew your visa on time.” I of course came in on Wednesday morning to secure this guarantee), I now find myself in Bulgaria furious that I had to flee the country and leave behind a summer camp in Moscow where everyone cried at the news that I had to leave against my will or face being barred from the country for five years. I lost my deposit (for the second time) and seven working days of earnings and was distraught by the necessity to enter survival mode and round up or abandon my affairs and leave the country on such short notice.”

Message to former supervisors: “Greetings from Bulgaria! I thought I should communicate to you that I won’t be returning to your school in September. The new managers at Oxford Kids - who took over from Oxford Crown in January of this year - have proven themselves time and again to be poor communicators, constant excuse makers and highly demanding to the point of extortion. As a result of many incidents, the red line of which was Oxford Kids’ mishandling of my visa forcing me to flee Russia with four days’ notice, I now have to look for other work, although this has the worst outcome on the children, whom I wanted so passionately to continue teaching.”

I thereby recommend caution to all those who may wish to have dealings with Oxford Kids in the future.

Adieu.
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Foma87



Joined: 13 Sep 2011
Posts: 116
Location: Moscow

PostPosted: Wed Jun 29, 2016 11:58 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Sounds like you were taken advantage of, which is too bad. A couple of points:

Typically, when a school starts making demands based on your contract, you should counter by making demands based on the Russian labor code, which is actually quite generous, especially as far as holiday is concerned.

If the company starts making outrageous demands or threats regarding visa, you can counter by threatening to report them for any number of tax or labor violations they have undoubtably committed.

You can always get a business visa if your teacher visa runs out. This will allow you to look for a new job, and even work, while you find a long-term solution.

I lived on Baumanskaya. Loved it.

Hope you don't give up on Russia just yet.
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Spasibo



Joined: 02 Dec 2015
Posts: 31

PostPosted: Mon Jul 04, 2016 8:47 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Sounds like a nightmare, you give an inch they take a mile.
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maruss



Joined: 18 Mar 2003
Posts: 1145
Location: Cyprus

PostPosted: Tue Jul 12, 2016 9:54 am    Post subject: Oxford Crown again! Reply with quote

I posted on this site before about my experience with this firm in early 2006 and will not go into it again now, except to comment that things don't seem to have improved!But I will admit that I did learn a lot about living in Moscow and met some great people,including one of the firms former co-ordinators who helped me a lot but I lost contact with her after I left the firm and she also left some time after me.By the way was the school you taught about 25mins by bus from Petrovsko-Razumovskaya number 1951 near Taldomskaya Ulitsa market?It is a rough area(Degunino) but the school was quite new and kids and and the director of the English dept. who spoke good German,were always nice to me.I used to go there every tuesday in winter and it was a hell of a journey but then the contract finished in January.
Was that accomodation the firm gave you right at the northern end of the red metro line and a tram ride from Ulitsa Podbelskogo in a terrible appartment block in a run-down and intimidating area?Luckily I had my own elsewhere to start with that was good and one look at that dump, basically a dingy room in a shared flat with the strange daughter of a former university teacher,was enough to make me run a mile!I'd be glad to read more of your experiences-the golden rule of course is to never upset the woman who owns the firm-although delectable and very intelligent, she is feisty and formidable if you cross her!!
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evinierato



Joined: 03 Jun 2006
Posts: 3
Location: Moscow, Russia

PostPosted: Sat Aug 13, 2016 9:50 am    Post subject: Ocford Crown AKA Kids are cheats Reply with quote

Reading these posts caused me to remember my similar treatment, but what irritated me most of all, was being cheated out of pay for teaching done. I even went to the schools partner in England, who did nothing to assist. My time there was 2004-2005, and it seems nothing has changed over the years.
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kolya02



Joined: 19 Oct 2014
Posts: 2
Location: Moscow, Russian Federation

PostPosted: Sat Aug 20, 2016 8:37 pm    Post subject: Punctual Payment and Visa/Contract Renewal Issues Reply with quote

I'm sorry to have to say this, but the OP is spot-on with his assessment of Oxford Crown/Kids. I worked for them very recently, for AY 2015-2016 - in fact, I think I might know who the OP is!

One of the very annoying parts of working for Oxford Kids was the timing of payments. The contract we signed stated that payment would be made on the eighth of the following month, and already by December (3rd month of contract) payments had been late TWICE. Then the company informed us that our payment for December would be made after the eighth of January, because of the New Year's holiday. This was too much as I would again be late meeting my financial obligations, so I did a little research into Russian employer laws for salaries, and what I found out, of course, is that pretty much every TEFL program in Moscow is breaking this law. "Avans"-es (basically bi-monthly payments) are required not optional, and if the pay date according to your contract (the eighth of the month in my case) falls on a weekend or holiday (including the reallly long New Year's Holiday), payment must be made on the business day before the holiday, wow! So I was polite with my employer, trying in late December to find out how to remedy this payment delay, but they threw the most asinine and unbelievable excuses that I essentially asked what would it take, a lawsuit to get the salary payments made on time!? They offered to pull strings to pay me "early," as I recall, but I was so frustrated by the experience that I didn't even take the early payment - I waited until after the New Year's holiday like all my other sad sap expat colleagues.

This obviously soured our relationship but I did nothing wrong - I just "knew my rights" - and would advise all other expats working in Moscow not to play the passive aggressive nice guy and let yourself get jerked around, as with the Russian directness mentality if you don't assert yourself you will end up with some serious butt-hurt :/

The other egregiously unprofessional thing that occurred regarded my contract for the next (2016-2017) year. I had a feeling as early as January that this was not a company I'd want to keep working for, nor would they want to keep me on as an employee, but I wanted to keep my options open so I frequently inquired and sought to confirm whether Oxford Kids could keep me on at least part time for the next year, and they assured me that yes, this wouldn't be a problem. This was a big freakin' deal for me as my wife and daughter (both Russians) are here with me and I need the visa support to stay with them!! Well I didn't trust Oxford Kids at all so I interviewed with other companies then actually took an offer at another company and did the necessary visa run. Can you believe that upon my return, on the day I was planning to send a resignation letter, they actually "fired" me!? (my contract wouldn't have begun until Sept. anyway but they would have extended my work visa through the summer so I could have stayed with my family)

So similar to the OP, Oxford Kids (formerly known as Oxford Crown) played some shenanigans with my visa. They informed me three weeks before my visa expiration that they wouldn't rehire me for the next AY, despite their assurances all Spring long that it would be easy to keep me on the team PT if not FT! Do the math; work visa invitation letters take a least four weeks to process so if I hadn't smelt the rat that is Oxford Kids and found another employer I would have been separated from my family while I hustled to find another job and work visa!! What utter incompetence and un-professionalism; the whole time I was blunt (like a Russian) and said hey look, I understand if you don't want to renew my contract but just be direct with me, as I need visa support to stay with my family! And like cunning little hypocritical Westerners they lied to my face and said for the whole Spring that working with them next year is no problem; a done deal. Then in June they informed me in a blunt, brief email that they could not renew with me because the schools I was working at didn't want to bring me back the next year. I had had issues with these schools previously, so if my new contract was contingent on their reviews of me Oxford Kids could have warned me of the possibility of not renewing with them much earlier. But no, I guess they enjoy messing with their staff's livelihood, and just as with the OP they told me at the last possible minute that I needed to find another job/other visa support!

Beyond those two issues there are core flaws in their business model which involve impotent "kurators"at the schools who cannot provide materials or regular, normal facilities for you, but Oxford Kids expects the schools to provide this for you and takes the "it's beyond our control" bureaucratic attitude when issues inevitably arise. It's a Catch 22 where you work for Oxford Kids but the schools are your daily workplace/supervisors, and since the latter get (I presume) little to no cut of the revenue from these extra English classes, they could care less to offer you the most basic levels of support.

I can give more details about working at this company by PM, especially if someone's thinking of working there!!!

Since we're so close to the new school year, if you're already locked in with a contract and work visa I'd recommend switching to a PT schedule with them to save yourself some serious headaches!

Good luck everyone Smile
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kolya02



Joined: 19 Oct 2014
Posts: 2
Location: Moscow, Russian Federation

PostPosted: Wed Aug 24, 2016 8:24 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Thanks for all the PMs and the interest in my post. Smile) Please reply to this thread - no need to PM me (on second thought) as I've got nothing to hide. And I think all of y'all's information could also be useful to anyone consudering working at this outfit!
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maruss



Joined: 18 Mar 2003
Posts: 1145
Location: Cyprus

PostPosted: Thu Aug 25, 2016 9:48 am    Post subject: Oxford Crown-now Oxford Kids-no jewels in this one! Reply with quote

Although I am going back to 2005/6,this outfit is basically a business which earns most of its income from sending kids for study trips in the U.K. in the summer and teaching English lessons is a sideline which feeds it,most of it being centred on teaching kids in various state and private schools around Moscow.They do have various private lessons for adults too.They also had-and maybe still have- an English partner based in Norwich who used to work for the British Council.
Not having much experience teaching children,I wouldn't have taken the job on if I had known this would be most of my work,but was led to believe that they were starting a new contract with the Ministry of Tourism,which is something I have many years of work experience in.
To avoid writing again the several extensive postings I have made on the site some time ago about this firm and my experiences,I will try to summarise with some key points:
1)Despite my initial enthusiasm and being assured by the director that they had plenty of work for me and needed me until the following summer(This was in November) I arrived back after New Year to discover that most of my previous teaching hours no longer existed,due mainly to the failure of the person responsible in admin to renew the contracts in time!!(She had just been dismissed after her personal problems caused the firm serious damage!)
2)Expecting that the director would at least ask to see me urgently to discuss the situation,I waited in vain for at least some moral support but she never spoke with me again until I left completely a few months later!
3)Due partially to the problems already mentioned there was frequent tension and arguments between the admin staff,although to be fair one of them did her very best to help me from the first day I arrived and I will always remember this.She also advised me to consider returning home when it became clear what the situation was after I returned in New Year and said that it was very difficult to survive in Moscow,even more so in the very cold winter of January 2006 and that finding extra freelance hours outside the firm at that time of year would take time and be very difficult for me, during which time I would spend the money they had paid me in the previous months when I had over 30 academic hours per week and naively thought that I was on to a good thing!.
3)It also quickly became obvious that the turnover of expat teachers with the firm was high and we were not encouraged to mix with each other socially,for obvious reasons?A new recruit actually arrived while I was there when they didn't even have enough hours for me and they were struggling to find him any work at all!
4)The supposed new contract with the Ministry of Tourism which I had gone there anticipating teaching, was just a pipe dream of the directors,as I soon discovered from the other staff,and had no definite starting date or agreement signed,despite the directors re-assurances to me.
5)The only plus factors were that I gained a lot of experience of living and working in Moscow,met some great people and admittedly was paid for all the hours I had worked,although they would not pay me for the weeks I worked in December before going on holiday until I returned in January,alleging that the firm did not have cash at that time to pay wages etc.
6)But without the support of my close Russian friends and one very decent and experienced ex-pat teacher who is just about to retire,who gave me some very good leads and help with finding other freelance work,I would have given up and left as soon as I saw the situation at the firm in January.Furthermore, I would have been homeless without the offer of renting a room from another close friend,I would have become homeless as despite me advising the firm well before my holiday that I needed to find another appartment to rent from January,nobody could help with this.
7)Unfortunately, it seems there are many firms like this one in Russia if reports on this site and elsewhere are anything to go by so be warned and don't get caught by them!They don't care about anything but their own profits and peope are expendable to them!
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