Job Discussion Forums

[moemanco]

Hello,

Just after figures here. What's the highest paying job anyone has seen or known of to be offered in Egypt and where in Egypt was it located.

I'm trying to weigh up the income potential difference between Cairo and Alexandria mainly as they are the two biggest cities and I'm guessing they will have the highest paying jobs, but I could be wrong.

Thank you,

Salam Alikom

[veiledsentiments]

Rather obvious... if you have an MA and some experience in the Arab world, the highest pay is at the American University in Cairo.

If you have good American public school certification from your state and solid experience, the best pay is Cairo American College - which is the K-12 American school.

It's pretty much all downhill from there.

VS

[Sekhmet]

VS is completely right (of course!), but bear in mind that regardless of where you go in Egypt, you're not going to be able to get good rates compared to other countries in the Mid East. Egypt is a poor country, and for "normal" jobs (language schools, adult education centres, etc), it's unusual to get paid any more than 25-30LE per hour. For an Egyptian working at a language school, they would be looking at around 500LE per month!!! (And no, I didn't leave off a "0"!!)

Most people here run more than one job, and then private students. For native speakers, getting private students should be relatively easy, but like Egyptian teachers, you need to have a class or classes to draw from first.

Without a TEFL Certificate and an MA, finding work in one of the universities is possible but difficult, and often not fulfilling. I have friends who worked at the Alexandrian Uni, and really didn't enjoy it! It's possible to find a job without any qualifications, but they would be far from decent pay.

Just out of interest, what qualifications do you have?

[Stephen Jones]

The best international schools pay the same salary you would get living in the home country, with certain overseas perks, so you can really do rather well as Cairo os still a lot cheaper than London or Birmingham.

[moemanco]

Well....

I didn't mean for this to get personal but I guess it's already gone that way. I was hoping to make some reference posts to give new comers to Egypt (like myself) some reference figures so that people would have an idea when negotiating salary's since everything is up for negotiation.

To answer your questions Sekmet I've got no education certification but I'm here on holidays with my Egyptian (Alexandrian) wife and thought I'd check out the prospects. I'm an Australian and I'm currently working in Japan teaching English. I've got some good references and Egyptians highly value Japan so having work experience there must work in my favour (I hope )

I've got a few interviews lined up but I don't like how there are no standards here for just about anything. So I'm worried about what figures to ask for or how to consider their offers.

Moe

[veiledsentiments]

I think the problem was that your original post was vague and you didn't say anything about your lack of credentials or limited experience. This is not really a topic that one can generalize about because these two details have a significant effect.

One thought that occurred to me was that you wouldn't find two teaching situations in EFL much different than teaching Japanese and Egyptians. While in Japan, the students won't talk - the Egyptians won't shut up. (no criticism meant... they will just talk your arm off. ) The Egyptian and Arabic speaker's weak skills are reading and writing.

With only a couple of years of experience and no certification or related degrees, you won't make much. A search of this board could tell you more as this topic has been discussed many times. Survival for a married couple would require that both work... or you teach and also tutor as many students as possible. That would be true of both Alex and Cairo.

VS

[moemanco]

Thanks for that VS. You have a few good points there and I'm sorry for my lack of details in the first post but like I said I hadn't intended to make it a personal post.

That's one thing I've been struggling with though. While I don't enjoy living in Japan I do have a good opportunity to make decent money but the hours are long and you basically have no life. But I feel that life in Egypt would be more lively just not much of a chance to save much. Always a difficult choice. Is money really the most important thing in life

I've also found that the students from different countries have different weak points. The simple one that I've noticed is their pronunciation, especially inability to differ between B and P.

What other weak points do you see with Egyptian students of English and how do you tackle them?

Moe

[Sekhmet]

Imagination!!!! Complete, total and absolute lack of imagination!!! They're hopeless... When asked to tell the teacher about their weekend (following on from a model that the teacher gave), they practically repeat exactly the same thing! It's not so bad if you catch them young, but persuading the adults to do anything more than learn by rote is like pulling teeth.

Thats not to say that Egyptian students are bad or lazy - they just prefer to take the easy way. They will spend an inordinate amount of time looking up words in a dictionary, reading English novels and marking down the words they don't know, etc. but then they'll cheat on a test! I think cheating is as much part of the system here now as it is in China. They just don't seem to care any more.

VS makes some excellent points - Egyptians like to talk. And they like for their children to talk properly. If you have a western accent, you should be able to find tutoring work fairly easily, but this will take up a lot of time in your week. Again, as VS said, you will both have to work at schools, or you will have to take on a lot of private students in order to have a comfortable life. But this takes you straight back to the problem with too long hours!!

I hope you find something decent. Why not consider taking a TEFL course? You will be able to find some higher paying jobs, especially if you add in your experience to that. For some reason, experience plus certificate goes much further than plain experience.

[veiledsentiments]

Sekhmet, you made me laugh... because it is so true. Their whole educational career, including English classes, has been an exercise in memorization. So, we shouldn't be so hard on them since it is the only way that they know to 'learn.'

Moemanco,

The p/b problem is just the usual reflection of people's inability to produce a sound that is not in their first language - just like the Japanese r/l. Even when you show them allophones where they do use the sound, they can't hear it. But, since it took me years in the Middle East to be able to hear the new sounds that Arabic presented me with, I can relate.

They don't know how to read because 'reading' for knowledge is not part of the usual Arabic teaching process. They have only used reading as an oral exercise for pronunciation. As to writing, the problem is that it would be impossible to find two languages more rhetorically different than Arabic and English. Whereas, in English we want to say as much as possible in the fewest words. Arabic is verbose to the extreme... with repetition impressing your readers with your vocabulary knowledge. What we consider a run-on or a comma splice is a perfectly grammatical Arabic sentence construction. I could go on and on.

But, back to your basic problem. I don't think that you would gain anything financially or in free time by moving to Cairo. But, you would have a very different lifestyle - in a very different culture. That is what you should look at when you are making your decision.

VS

[stoth1972]

To be fair, there are international schools in Cairo (and perhaps Alex, too) that will gladly hire someone with experience and no teaching certificate. You can potentially earn around $1500 (or equiv), but you'll want to aim for the international schools, and not the language schools. $1500 goes a long way in Cairo! Try El Alsson School, The International School of Choueifat, Misr American College, Maadi Namaar, etc. They aren't always "ideal" teaching situations, but many of them can guarantee a regular paycheck, a housing allowance, airfare and then some. There are new schools opening up hiring experienced teachers (not all of them qualified). Hayah International Academy is reasonably new and looking for teachers. Thebes has some horror stories, but the American International School and Heliopolis American School are also options.

If you're serious about staying in Egypt, consider the doing the MA TESOL at the American University of Cairo. I believe fellowships are available and would help you avoid paying the fees while you complete your masters.

[CairoMig]

I got 70 an hour for EFL at the BC and 110 for teaching dance. Much more fun teaching dance, and the students were more appreciative.