Job Discussion Forums

CMorrow · Joined: 03 Dec 2006 Posts: 5

I am wondering if it is normal procedure for a school to give you 50% of your ticket to help me pay for housing? I have been shown a contract that says that the school will provide free accomodation for one month(one without airconditioning) and then after that will help you find housing? Also, can anyone fill me in with what I can expect in housing...air conditioning? western toilet? I am beginning to think that I am out to lunch in my expectations!

beefer · Joined: 10 Feb 2006 Posts: 238 Location: java

beefer · Joined: 10 Feb 2006 Posts: 238 Location: java

sorry, gave some wrong information back there. i think i met gusti 3 or 4 years ago. seemed like a nice guy but i've never worked at any of his schools so i don't know personally what he 's like with employees/ contracts and such. but i do know some people had bad things to say about him on this forum awhile back....and he's believed to be a regular viewer of this great forum of ours

gugelhupf · Joined: 24 Jan 2004 Posts: 575 Location: Jabotabek

Oh yes! Mr Gusti is a regular voyeur of these pages.

laughing_magpie06 · Joined: 14 Sep 2006 Posts: 282

Just a warning!!
I met Gusti just once and he told me that in his schools they keep passports and if a teacher requests to go home for whatever reason, you must give the school a deposit of around 8 million rp before they let you leave. Seems he doesn't trust his teachers too easily. So if your favourite aunt is about to die and you dont have 8 million saved to go home....tough.

happy_me · Posted: Thu Dec 07, 2006 7:30 am Post subject:

Funny how people spend so much time trying to cheat other people, wouldn�t life be easier and richer if we didn�t try to hurt others� maybe its just my warped thinking, but a school would run much better if it was not trying to get the better of the students and teachers?

xsbir · Joined: 09 Oct 2006 Posts: 81 Location: The Big Durian

PlasticPill · Joined: 22 Sep 2005 Posts: 51 Location: usa

About housing.....is shared accommodations the typical setup for newcomers, or is that just an ef thing? Also, if anyone is doing the shared thing, would you mind sending me a pm about what that is like; is it an apartment type complex with individual units, or is just one big house that's occupied by x amount of teachers?

Also, if anyone uses broadband at home, approximately how much is it per month? I've been considering continuing my education via online courses, but I'm starting to doubt this being a possibility after reading some of the posts here. I heard in Surabaya it can average $100 a month. Shocked

Quite expensive when one is on a teachers salary. Dial-up would be just as good though, since all I really need to do is check/send email to my professors every week. However, I'm starting to question whether thats even possible for a teacher who's just starting out in Jakarta/Surabaya area.

For the veterans out there who STARTED in Indonesia, did you originally start with a place like EF, or were you able to find something a bit more....for lack of better words, respected? To me, it just seems EF takes a lot heat, maybe it's just this forum though. They also don't seem to pay as much either.

TEAM_PAPUA · Joined: 24 May 2004 Posts: 1679 Location: HOLE

PlasticPill · Joined: 22 Sep 2005 Posts: 51 Location: usa

$100 for broadband internet is expensive regardless of the profession. Maybe I'm just spoiled being that I'm only paying $30 for it....but I was really shocked to hear $100. I'm sure there's probably some legitimate reason behind it that I don't understand, but what can you do, right? Dial-up is more then fine for receiving and sending emails, I just preferred broadband incase I needed to download large files.

And after a quick conversion (love xe.com), are there really teachers making 20 thousand rupiah a month? Thats pretty good compared to the salaries I've been reading up on. Somehow I get the feeling thats NOT a typical salary, especially for someone starting out. I've been wrong before though....

xsbir · Joined: 09 Oct 2006 Posts: 81 Location: The Big Durian

PlasticPill · Joined: 22 Sep 2005 Posts: 51 Location: usa

Yeah. Million. Good thing I'm not majoring in math.

laughing_magpie06 · Joined: 14 Sep 2006 Posts: 282

About housing.....is shared accommodations the typical setup for newcomers, or is that just an ef thing? Also, if anyone is doing the shared thing, would you mind sending me a pm about what that is like; is it an apartment type complex with individual units, or is just one big house that's occupied by x amount of teachers?

You will most probably share a pretty average house with another teacher or a small apartment by yourself but if you have a partner you can bargain a little. If the school is hard up for teachers they will probably do a better deal for you.

gado_gado · Joined: 04 Oct 2006 Posts: 28

[/quote]

Maybe too many "Gado Gados" in the past have renegued on their contracts in this way. Wink

You can't blame the schools for wanting to protect their investment.[/quote]

Maybe there's not enough folk in Indo who have the self respect not to be whipped by Roman masters for bowls of rice pish salaries and require better working conditions.

XsBir, you should be congratulating, not chastising those prepared to stand up for themselves and demand a better life than you endure. How else will standards improve, clearly fighting for improvements in ESL working conditions from the inside out is a waste of time, so bin the rules and make yourself happy, not the director in his shiny mercedes, paid for with YOUR money.

Just a thought.

xsbir · Joined: 09 Oct 2006 Posts: 81 Location: The Big Durian

Good to have you back, Gado Gado. I was starting to think we lost you after the last exchange. I miss your sardonic wit when you're not posting. Wink

I have congratulated you for moving up so fast here. I am impressed that you're already with an international school.

What I do condemn, however, is breaking contracts for no good reason. Maybe I'm old-fashioned, but to me a contract is a promise between two parties. As long as the working conditions reasonably conform to the terms of the contract, there's no good reason to break one. After all, we're only talking about one, or maybe two-year contracts, right?

The reason some schools demand deposits, hold teachers' passports, etc. is that they have had so many people run out on them before. Everyone who does run out and escape their contractual responsibilities makes it worse on everyone who comes afterwards.

I do agree that we need to improve general teaching conditions and salaries. Doing a "runner" does the opposite, I think.

Private language schools pay less in terms of hard currency to a starting teacher than when I arrived in 1997. The way to improve that is from within and proving that we are reliable, valuable assets to the schools we work for.