Job Discussion Forums

SF21 · Joined: 05 Jun 2007 Posts: 72 Location: California

How much of a salary cut did you take before becoming an EFL teacher? Were you apprehensive about it?

Just curious, because I'm leaving a $75K USD a year IT job to get my CELTA and then go abroad. I'm completely disenchanted and don't like my redundant job anymore (actually, I never really did Razz

), so I think I'm making the right choice.

ls650 · Joined: 10 May 2003 Posts: 3484 Location: British Columbia

I was making about $50,000+ per year as a computer analyst. Of course, as a TEFL instructor in Asia I made about 15% of that. In Mexico I did a bit better, say $15,000 per year.

mdk · Joined: 09 Jun 2007 Posts: 425

I was making about that. I had always wanted to see Spain and even had vague dreams of going off to Seville and do privates. I even had a page about Seville posted on the wall of my cubicle to look at and keep me sane while I was talking to gum-smacking idiots on the phone.

In the event I ended up going to Siberia, instead. It was a woman I met on line after vowing I would never again mess with somebody farther away than Turlock. This was after the woman on Kaui

I don't know. In Siberia I made the money of a Siberian University English Prof... about $300 a month (7,000 rubles). I was much happier because I was out of the cubicle and people treated me as a professor. That was 2002

I'm back in the states now and working to pay off the last of my credit card debt from teaching in Moscow last winter (That side trip to Dubrovnik cost a bit). My social security will kick in after the first of the year and then I am out of here. Wild horses couldn't make me stay here a day longer. Ten months overseas and two months here seeing the kids and making a little scratch. That's the ticket.....I hate golf, you see.

Glenski · Joined: 15 Jan 2003 Posts: 12844 Location: Hokkaido, JAPAN

I made far more in my previous profession than I made starting out in conversation schools in Japan. Money is not everything.

Seeker of truth · Joined: 01 Sep 2005 Posts: 146

I actually make close to double the money I made teaching ESL in the Far East several years ago. However, being financially incarcerated in a cubicle from 9 to 5 makes me wonder if it's really worth it. If money were not an issue, I'd probably go back to teaching ESL full time.

I have one of those accounting/computer jobs which pays me for a 40 hour work week, but gives me only about 20 hours of actual work to do. So, you guessed it, lots of time for surfing. Very Happy

SF21 · Joined: 05 Jun 2007 Posts: 72 Location: California

RebelGirl26 · Joined: 04 Sep 2007 Posts: 23 Location: Portland, OR

SueH · Joined: 01 Feb 2003 Posts: 1022 Location: Northern Italy

Back in 2000 I was on about $55k, as a not very corporate minded (or successful!) systems analyst. As boredom wasn't in the job spec. I volunteered for redundancy and benefited from a small pension starting at 50. This underpins my income and allows me to be selective in what I do, but I never undercut the local market and I always try and be professional.

tedkarma · Posted: Sat Sep 08, 2007 9:22 pm Post subject:

The bottom line is what matters - not just the gross wages.

I was making close to double what I started out making in TEFL.

BUT, by the time you threw in the very low taxes in many overseas countries, free accommodation, the lower working hours and opportunities for "overtime" (like teaching more than twelve hours at the university where I was working), the lack of a need for a car many places, and just getting out of the consumer rat race - I was all of a sudden saving 3+ times more than what I was saving BEFORE I got into TEFL.

Justin Trullinger · Posted: Mon Sep 10, 2007 12:07 am Post subject:

I was a jobbing actor before TESOL.

It hasn't been a paycut.

Best,
Justin

fancynan · Posted: Mon Sep 10, 2007 2:02 pm Post subject:

I currently make about $65, but am leaving my position at the end of the year to start my TEFL class. I am aware that my income will be greatly reduced, but I have banked some money to help me through, and have paid off all debts. I actually have a great job and have done it for 10 years, but the pull to make this change is very strong. The income (or lack thereof) is not the guiding force.

Justin Trullinger · Posted: Mon Sep 10, 2007 3:09 pm Post subject:

Sunny-side Up · Joined: 03 Sep 2007 Posts: 3 Location: Pacific Northwest

You are worried about leaving a 75k job? Well stop blowing your $$ and start saving.. (?) Where do you plan to go and teach ESL? Antartica, or the top of Mt. Olympus? Any other place, you could probably live for nothing for several years. What is your goal? To teach (and benefit someone else)? Or to contemplate opportunity costs?
You must love what you're doing, so don't feel apprehensive--just stay and keep making money, which is what you really care about anyway, obviously. If you're worried about 75k, you wouldn't understand 7.5k/per year in any culture, or less....

Sunny-side Up · Joined: 03 Sep 2007 Posts: 3 Location: Pacific Northwest

Well, so you don't love $$$. Look what you can do and experience as a teacher. How can you put a price on life experience, when you could obviously go back to your 'old life' with your magical IT skills, and make big bucks again?
How much money do you need anyway? It's not like you can't ever get a job again with your IT skills. Do you want sympathy because you are afraid to go out and live?

Go travel, discover, and live, and experience your life, and go back to your IT ($58-69k/year, boo-hoo), terrible, impoverished world that you will re- encounter at that time, when you realize that making 75k/yr is super important,. compared to where you could've been if you'd have remained chained to your desk....

_Please donate the money to charity--directly--rather than let a program divide it up and take percentages on it...... Go out into the world and help someone other than yourself....

signed,
Charity fund for 75k/year starving Teacher...............

SF21 · Joined: 05 Jun 2007 Posts: 72 Location: California