Job Discussion Forums

[AbeCross]

I have received many messages and emails form agents for schools in China. Are any of them trustworthy?

[Blistering Zanazilz]

In my opinion some are trustworthy, others probably not so much. If you're a good judge of character and are able to suss out potential problems beforehand, an agent can work well for you. On the other hand if your work history is littered with disastrous jobs and bad choices then best stick with the direct hire approach.

[getbehindthemule]

From my reserach (in SH), many good schools use agents to do the leg work for them when it comes to hiring new FTs. This is probably especially true ouside of Uni level. Teachers will later have the option, in many cases, to sign directly with the school for their second contract.
Many teachers, myself included have used agents. The reliable ones dont take a cut of your wages but have already been paid a finders fee by the school.
In many cases when you sign with an agent, the school pays your salary directly. The agent might cover your insurance, housing & flight allowance. They can be very beneficial to newbies as many will help you find an apartment and broker the contract, help with phone contract, opening a bank account, etc. These can be daunting tasks on arrival without a word of Chinese.
A personal side story:
My first month's salary wasnt paid (other teachers had received their salary that morning but I had not), so I contacted my agent. The agent in turn contacted the school and discovered that there had been a mix up. The agent then offered to put my salary on my credit card that day or I could come to the office and collect it in cash. That was the only issue I had and it was resolved very efficiently.
Not all agents are bad, just do your homework first!

[geosmiley]

I have no idea why you would need an agent to find a job in China.

If schools pay agents there is a reason, usually bad.

Most agents do not have your best interests at heart.

I think talking to a school through an agent when you are right on campus is ludicrous.

Schools that have good positions available have ample English speakers who are helpful and know how to make a new teacher comfortable.

Direct communication with the school is a necessary part of the decision process.

[getbehindthemule]

[Blistering Zanazilz]

[nimadecaomei]

Many good schools that require certain qualifications use agents to vet candidates from the pool. Otherwise, the decent position with required qualification x would be flooded with applicants with qualification y. Then, the school would have to hire someone to look through all of these applications. Probably cheaper for the school to just give their requirements and have the agent find the people who qualify, then the school/employer can do the interview and make the decision.

I went through an agent for my current job. She was very nice and helpful. Initially, I had wanted to stay in Chengdu. She kept me in the loop, but said she just could not find anything there. She asked me if I wanted to look at other options, she did not just throw things at me hoping something would stick. I said ok, a few days later she gave me three positions, all paying much better and with much better benefits than what I had before. One was Beijing, one in Jiangsu, and one in Fujian. I said ok, I am willing to interview with them. She said go ahead and interview with the Beijing one, but I would not recommend it. The pay/benefits are the same as the other two, but Beijing is more polluted and expensive (pollution came up because she knew I had a family). I interviewed with the Jiangsu employer directly. She asked after the interview if I still wanted to talk to the others. The interview went well, so I said we could wait until the Jiangsu job responded. She said fine. Jiangsu job came with a very solid offer so I accepted. She did not force or push me either way. Nice woman in my opinion.

[geosmiley]

I'm in Hangzhou at a very good university and I didn't need an agent to get the job and they didn't need one to hire me. I've done this before, it's not my first job. Usually, people who are the first to scream that someone else doesn't know what they are talking about,[b] doesn't know what they are talking about. [/b] Every year I try to develop a better position than the one I have even if I'm happy. It's always interesting and informative going over contracts at various institutions. I've never been constrained by not using an agent. In many cases, it's easy to just go around them. if your resume is interesting enough the school will cut the agent out of the process willingly. In conclusion, I guess needy people need agents but it is neither necessary nor desirable as far as I'm concerned.

I wish some posters had the maturity to handle differences of opinion based on different life experiences in a somewhat more mature manner.

[Modernist]

I think it depends a lot on the sort of schools you would like to work at. Obviously, if you are happy with the lower pay found at universities, it is easy enough to find them and try to forward a resume. There's not an enormous number of them, even in China, and they are pretty prominent. If you have a certain few cities you want to work in, and you should, it makes it even easier.

Myself, I am trying to find the higher paying jobs at international departments of high schools. These are not so simple to find, and my experience has been that nemadecaomei is correct, these schools do tend to use agents to sort out the candidates that they want to talk to. I've rarely seen any public posting of these job offers, and as for, I don't know, trying to figure out their names and emails via Google and then blind-mailing them resumes in the hopes that they might have an opening and want to hire you...well, I just haven't had any luck with that strategy. There's no master listing somewhere that I've found that can even say what programs exist in any given city, so how you would find the information you would need in order to apply without an agent telling you about it is beyond me.

This isn't even to mention the places like Search Associates or Dipont that work with certified teachers to get the actually REALLY good jobs. If I get one paying 25K a month via an agent (last week I was a hair away from getting that, a job I only even knew to try for because of an agent), I'll happily be a 'needy' person.

[Blistering Zanazilz]

[geosmiley]

Dear BZ:
Perhaps you could pass along the wonderful and thoughtful agent who got you a job in Dongbei. That would be a real service to the forum readers. It always tops my list of desirable locations here in China but I just can't find anything there.
Bests,
G.

[eternalw]

[getbehindthemule]

I think part of the problem, on this site, is that many poster think that it is a forum of Uni teachers only and have the blinkers on when discussing numerous topics such as this one

[cormac]

[Non Sequitur]