Job Discussion Forums

[NLuchs]

Hello!
My name is Nadine and I have a few questions for those among you with experience teaching English in China. You see, I'm thinking about going to China to teach English next year and I've already contacted a couple of agencies. I was wondering if anyone happened to know anything about the agency New Times/ Teach in China (http://www.teachinchina.cn/) and/or has first-hand experience?
Secondly, I would love to hear from those among who have taught/ do teach in China! Preferably from someone who's situation is similar to mine: a college student taking a gap-year, or someone who is relatively young and isn't planning on staying for more than a year. However, any experiences with teaching english in China are very welcome, because I don't really know what to expect!
Thanks in advance!

[rogerwilco]

I am not familiar with this agency, but I do have a problem with agencies that ask you to pay a USD400 fee to "volunteer". I know they provide other services, supposedly without fees, but this volunteer stuff is a scam in my opinion.


http://www.teachinchina.cn/vol.php

It is always better to contact schools directly, if possible.

[NLuchs]

Oh wow.. that's new. Or maybe I wasn't paying enough attention.
Okay, well I noticed a thread in the newbies-section about this, but I just want to ask here as well: does anybody have good/ bad experiences with any agencies? Because I'm a little hesitant about just hopping a plane to china and seeing where I'll end up..

[xiguagua]

My first year in China I was with Buckland Group http://bucklandgroup.org/

They are pretty good. Good support, good resources and preparation, and after you got shipped out to your school, if you had some problems, they were still there to help you and deal with the schools. Since that time though, a lot of their key people have left, a lot of the front office people that I knew and even their top support woman and her husband left. Now they have a new girl dealing with recruiting named Ping who is nice....but she's young, and has basically no teaching experience so I can't say how good she is.

The boss Owen has some negative things about him, but I never had any problems with him and he was always very good to me if I needed some help.

Anyway you can give them a shot. They primarily send teachers to smaller cities though. Their contracts are pretty standard and for smaller cities the salaries are on par. Pretty much if I needed a good job and couldn't get anything lined up, i'd go back to them.

[NLuchs]

Thanks xiguagua, I'll be sure to check them out! Though I was hoping to go to a somewhat larger city, because I hear not many people speak english in the smaller cities.

[Non Sequitur]

You shouldn't go to China not knowing where you'll be teaching and living and not having had DIRECT contact with the school. There will be a chance to get creative in Year 2 or 3 but play a very conservative game to start with.
If you can find a thread 'Job Offer Checklist' look through it. It condenses the views of a lot of seasoned campaigners.
My view is that about 20% of agents are reliable.

[NLuchs]

Thanks Non Sequitur, I'll start searching for a thread. Unfortunately, there won't be a year two or three for me, since I only have up to one year. I'm taking a sort of gap-year in between my bachelor and master. So is your advice to hop a plane and start my search when I get there?

[The Great Wall of Whiner]

Hi, Nadine.

Agencies are in it to make money--make no mistake. And teachinchina.cn is one I personally would not use.

Why?

Too many to list, but the information seems sorely outdated (No new announcements in 5 years?? Announcements from 2007 for a start!) and also...

- 'Volunteer' positions that YOU pay the school the privilege of working for.

- Non-professional website with a plethora of spelling mistakes

- No mention of salaries, contract information, etc.

- 2002-2006 listed as its date of copyright.


Besides... in the West, we have a little idea called "customer satisfaction" which means that we do whatever we can to keep the customers happy because we want them to recommend us, to get repeat business, improve our rep., etc.

Even IF these recruiting agencies do play by these rules, just who do you think the customer is?

Yup, the schools hiring you. So the agents are on the side of the schools. Keep this in mind when looking for work. Unless a recruiter is on the teachers' sides (which is seldom) then forget it.

Remember, China is only one of dozens of countries you can teach ESL in.

[Brian Hugh]

So many of these agencies change their names and phone numbers. To go against the grain I suggest comming to China and checking the school out before signing a contract. Check out the recruiting company. I dealt with one last year that burned me badly. They had many name changes and specialized in providing teachers for schools that really weren't supporting of their teachers. They also advertised for volunteers. One of the volunteers realized the scam when she found herself working in Hangzhou teaching rich parents kids. We were promissed 7,000rmb but had 2,500 deducted for rent. She was livid about the experience.
You need to meet the students as well as previous teachers. If the place is run like a prison it might not be the most enjoyable experience. China needs to start working like other countries. OLd teachers whould welcome the new teacher and pass the torch.

[Miles Smiles]

To get an idea of what's out there, look at abroadchina.org. It lists all kinds of teaching jobs all over China and it'll give you a good idea of the salary spread as well as job requirements. You can post a generic resume there and get a LOT of responses.

I also recommend esljobs.com. At one time, one could subscribe to the list, but I believe that now you have to wade through the many job descriptions that this service handles. It's worth it.

[NLuchs]

That doesn't sound like a pleasant experience Brian.. I'm starting to think maybe I ought to just look for a job myself. And checking out the school beforehand is definitely a good idea. You're right, ideally the old teacher would pass the torch. Or at the very least you should be able to contact them.
Thanks Miles! I'll be sure to check them out!

[Miles Smiles]

[NLuchs]

No, I meant searching online! But thanks for the kind words of warning I'll try Esljobs.com

[xiguagua]

So....you're going for one year and one year only. May I ask what you hope to accomplish? Making money? Learning Chinese culture? You're not gonna do a whole lot of that living only in huge cities and hanging out with foreigners......so what's the purpose?

No offense but you might as well stay home and get a part time job for a year, you'll make more money.

You only have a year to experience Chinese life and culture.....a year goes by FAST FAST FAST and you don't have as much time as you think to run amok and travel and see everything you wanna see. Go big or go home imo.

I'd go with a recruiter personally, at the risk of sounding like an advertisement, the one I suggested is good (an of course there are others that are also good but I don't have 1st hand experience with them) if you hate your location, they will get you a new school, they will give you support and they will have your back should things go wrong. Going by yourself gives you no support, and you're stuck if you hate your job. For a newbie, that is positive they're only going for one year, i'd def go with a recruiter. Like I said......there is ALWAYS people that speak English......every city.

[Non Sequitur]