Job Discussion Forums

Master Shake · Joined: 03 Nov 2006 Posts: 1202 Location: Colorado, USA

Is it possible for an US citizen to get an extended visa (6+ months) in Poland WITHOUT being sponsored by a language school?

I've got a year of experience teaching in Gdansk and am considering teaching privately this fall somewhere in the tri-cities. Dont really want to get tied-down to a language school - pay is too low and I want to make my own hours.

I remember reading something about having to start your own company in order to get permission to stay longer...

dynow · Joined: 07 Nov 2006 Posts: 1080

one option would be to come to Poland and work for a school as a freelancer, but simply give them very limited availability. work 6 lessons a week or something, we have plenty of teachers at my school with similar availabilities. plus, as a native speaker, most schools will take what they can get. a few lessons a week is better than none if they're short on natives and have a few advanced classes, for example.

with that connection to a school, you can get a simple work contract or "promise" written up by the DOS and then just apply for a KB. whether you stay in Poland for 6 months, 10 months, whatever, you'll atleast be legal during that time.

without proof of employment from a Polish company, you may have a tough time. i would imagine you would have to have a substantial amount of cash to show for them to budge.

scottie1113 · Joined: 25 Oct 2004 Posts: 375 Location: Gdansk

Gee, Master Shake, why would you want to return to Poland? And by any chance would your first choice of cities be Gdynia?

But you posed a good question. I'll ask around and see what I can find out. I've got an American friend here-you never met him-who does just that, but he's married to a Polish woman so that helps. He does conversation 1:1's only and charges 50 zl an hour, and some weeks he does 40 hours. Do the math.

Master Shake · Joined: 03 Nov 2006 Posts: 1202 Location: Colorado, USA

My first choice?? Krakow all the way.

Go there and you'll see why, Old Timer.

scottie1113 · Joined: 25 Oct 2004 Posts: 375 Location: Gdansk

So I heard from someone else who lives in Gdynia, but you mentioned the trojmiasto and last time I checked Krakow wasn't a part of it. BTW, May has been absolutely beautiful with almost no rain.

We miss you, kid.

George Best · Joined: 23 Oct 2006 Posts: 51

I am not in Poland now, so I wont be competing for private lessons.I just wondered how to get private lessons in Poland.I heard that advertising on the net isn't that effective and that there are a lot of local Polish also competing for private lessons

redsoxfan · Joined: 18 Oct 2005 Posts: 178 Location: Dystopia

It was always easy for me to pick up privates with a couple quick ads on the net. Actually, out of curiosity, I checked the ang.pl page for Poznan, and noticed that there are a couple guys offering lessons for 35 zl and 40 zl. Not cool. How is someone to advertise lessons for 50 or 60 zl (which is the going rate) when some guy is pretending to do the same job for so much less? There's absolutely no reason to charge 35 zl because there are privates a-plenty who will pay 50 or more. Besides, 35 zl for 60 min is about 27 zl for 45 minutes. Would these guys really do a 45 min lesson for 27 zl? That's about half the going rate. Clearly they have no qualifications nor do they have a clue, but the problem is that schools can figure that out and therefore not hire them--so they wouldn't really be driving down wages at decent schools because they wouldn't be working there in the first place. But private students don't know the difference.

Personally, I don't have such a huge stake in this because I don't like teaching privates--too unreliable and I don't like people coming over to my flat, nor am I willing to travel to theirs. Also, I like to pretend that I have a real job which is hard to do when you're just chatting for cash. Still, a lot of folks have a few privates to round out their salary, and undercutting the normal rates we get for privates is pretty lame. Actually it just looks desperate. The going rate in cities is at least 50 zl/60 min.

Kootvela · Joined: 22 Oct 2007 Posts: 513 Location: Lithuania

nocturnalme · Joined: 11 Aug 2004 Posts: 73 Location: Gdansk, Poland

Blimey! George Best is still alive! But not in Poland ....

nocturnalme · Joined: 11 Aug 2004 Posts: 73 Location: Gdansk, Poland

I meant George 'TEFL' Best, obviously ....
Good to see you're still around too, MasterShake!

dynow · Joined: 07 Nov 2006 Posts: 1080

I have found that unless a private lesson is very