Job Discussion Forums

[haopengyou]

I have been teaching in the mainland for 15 years, and private schools - if well established - usually pay better than public schools, are more likely to provide accommodations but are more likely to have more classes to teach. Is there a generalization for Hong Kong private schools? assume high school, at least medium sized and established more than 15 years.

[Perilla]

By private schools do you mean international schools?

[sistercream]

Some international schools here are "private", some are "state schools abroad" (at least in one of their language streams, such as the German stream in GSIS). Then there's the English Schools Foundation. Neither of these categories of school normally employs TEFLers per se, but for a subject teacher with QTS in a relevant jurisdiction (or with IB quals) these can be very nice places to work.

The other schools that would be called "private" in some systems (or "public" in England) would be the Direct Subsidy Scheme (DSS) schools - the full list can be found here: http://www.dsssc.org.hk/main2/SchoolList_eng.htm
As with private schools elsewhere, the ethos and praxis of the different schools varies wildly - you'd need to look through the websites and read between the lines. Competition for jobs at these schools is sometimes tougher than even for top tier international schools. The DSS schools that employ TEFLers generally offer the same pay and conditions as the government NET scheme.

There are also some really top-notch subvented (HK-speak for virtually fully government funded) schools which have not joined the DSS elite simply because of parent pressure (fear of fees increasing and academic standards decreasing as places become skewed to those able to pay rather than the most able students).

[Joshua2006]

DSS generally pay less than the NET scheme but you have more scope for promotion.