Job Discussion Forums

[dangermouse24]

I've been teaching English in Mexico for several years now and just started working for a new school a few months ago. I seem to get asked quite alot by my boss to audition for a potential student so that this student can then decide if I am suitable to be their teacher. The majority of the students are usually middle aged business men looking for one-to- one classes. Sometimes I feel that its not exactly my teaching abilities that they are checking. Maybe I am just being paranoid.
I'm familiar with practice classes before a school will hire you, having new students to the institute sit in on my classes to see how we teach the lessons in the institute, or meeting briefly with a new student before starting classes. Although this is the first i've heard of this. I've talked to other teachers in the school and in other schools and they themselves are not familiar with the paractice.
I was just wondering how many of you are familiar with this and what you think of it.

[moonraven]

Never heard of it either. Maybe it's time for you to look for a different job?

[saraswati]

I find the idea of auditioning for a student suspect. I certainly hope you are getting paid for all the hoop-jumping you're doing.

[moonraven]

Maybe they are thinking of starting a table dance operation for the non-peak hours? Get out of there.

[dangermouse24]

I'm already looking into jobs else where. Though reasonably well paid EFL teaching jobs are hard to find in the city where I live. I might have to consider looking for a job in another city or doing something other than teaching for a while.

As far as this job goes I get paid $65 pesos/hour when I teach (the average teaching job here pays $20-45 pesos/hour). They have me doing alot of things outside the classroom aside from class preparation like assessing prospective teachers, placement testing for new students, attending meetings with the companies we teach at, recording cds for the students, helping new teachers settle in.... Basically alot of the things the DOS should be doing right now but since we don't have one at the minute...I don't mind this too much because it's good to put on my resume and will be advantageous later for senior teaching positions or getting a job as an ADOS. However the idea of auditioning for the students so they can decide if I am suitable to teach them is more than a bit far fetched even for me. It was bad enough when they gave me some classes because the student requested a young, blonde, female, foreign teacher (which I didn't accept) or when they suggested putting me on a cd along with the other teachers at the school where we introduce ourselves so that the students in companies and private classes could pick their teachers. The more I think about this whole situation the crazier it all seems. I'm better getting out before they come up with something else.

[moonraven]

Good plan. Sounds like you're bored anyway. Change is always envigorating.

[Ben Round de Bloc]

[ls650]

I had a former co-worker (a very attractive woman) who was always asked by her previous language school to do similar 'auditions' for potential students. Only teachers who happened to be physically attractive were asked to do this.

At first she joked about it being 'wh0ring herself out', but after a while she grew to resent it strongly.

[moonraven]

I think it's very important to proceed with caution when joining the staff of any language school. Not only are they businesses, but the majority of owners have neither preparation nor experience in education and/or business. That means that they are essentially opportunists--which is a role of highly suspect ethical content. Very few of their capers would surprise me.

That said, I also believe it's important for teachers to maintain a professional posture, and to indicate to owners of schools that they are unwilling to be part of a meat-market atmosphere. Some of these maneuvers are done out of ignorance--in which you have a good chance of intervening on the behavior. If it's done out of cynicism, you probably don't want to continue working there anyway. Here in Mexico it's more advantageous financially to be fired than to resign....

[Ben Round de Bloc]

[moonraven]

The Federal Labor Law indicates that if you are fired, depending on how long you have been working for the employer (temprary contracts do not bring legal benefits and some employers use them indefinitely to get around their obligations), the employer must pay you 3 months' salary plus 20 days salary for each year worked, plus an amount for longevity if you've been there for awhile, plus pro-rated aguinaldo and vacation pay.

If you quit, they are only required to pay you the days worked in that quincena, plus pro-rated aguinaldo and vacation pay.

If you have been there for at least a year, it's obviously to your benefit to be fired. Unless you plan to use that employer for a reference or want to work for the company/institution again.

I should also indicate that you can sometimes negotiate a severance amount with the employer even if you are quitting. That usually only works if you have been a particularly productive employee, and are leaving because of problems in the workplace unrelated to you about which you have notified the owners several times in writing, and which are interfering with your being able to do your job. I have gone that route a few times--you have to be a pretty good negotiator to bring it off.

[Brenda]

Thanks Moonraven, I'd never been told all that which is very important should I head back to work in Mexico one day. You're a wealth of info, thanks!

[richtx1]

While sexism MAY be a factor in hiring, or not hiring, a given teacher, the teacher-client interview is a fairly common business practice. And, whether we like it or not, foreign language training is a business.

I'm on the administrative side now, but I've had business students who I wish had interviewed me first -- fr whatever reason, we just didn't click, and it would have saved both of us a lot of time, frustration and pesos (especially those students who are paying out of their own pockets).

With new teachers, or new suppliers, the client may need to feel out your ability to provide the contracted service before taking you on.

[moonraven]

That reeks of rationalization and wrong thinking. I have been on the "administrative side" most of my life, and I can't imagine subjecting folks who work for me to the kind of pandering that was described my the woman who started this thread.

If you are running a professional operation, most of the clients or prospective clients that you have came to you because of word of mouth from folks who were satusfied with your services. The only "interview" they should be having is with you. Not only is setting up a policy of interviews with your teachers unprofessional, it is also conveying the message that what really counts is the teacher--not the time and effort you have spent designing an effective program and building your institute.

And by conveying the message that you are just the middle-man in the operation, you are also giving clients and teachers permission to form their own agreements--and leave you out in the cold.

[richtx1]

moonraven and I exchanged a few private messages back and forth on this -- I've had to change some of what I originally said.

The original poster suspected (probably correctly) that her interviewer was assessing her on things having nothing to do with teaching. This kind of "interview" used to be fairly common -- any older professional woman anywhere in the world, has gone through the same ordeal. Obviously, this still happens, and if the original poster is uncomfortable with the potential student, she should turn the client down. If the potential student is typical for her employer, she might want to find work elsewhere. The English training/teaching/language services market is diverse enough for the original poster to find an employer that meets her standards.

All that said, there are legitimate reasons for a client to interview a teacher.

Students who have interviewed me as a teacher have either had special training needs (the one I have now is from an international background and already speaks English -- what he wanted was a structured American Studies course, not something normally given by businesses like mine) or personal concerns (for example, when in a high secuity building or when I had to work with the student at his home, or when I had a student who was 6 months pregnant, and needed someone who could -- and would -- flex around her physical needs).

And, as I've said, there are students who find they just learn better with one kind of teacher than another. Human beings are complicated -- some students are astute enough to recognize what (or who) works for them... and fortunate enough to be able to chose between Teacher A and Teacher B.

The teacher, or the institute may not have an established relationship with the client, or the client may have had bad experiences with a teacher or institute. We have one client with a key employee who is hard to work with... she wanted to replace me (which I didn't take personally). To avoid problems we had her interview -- and approve -- the replacement teacher.

Moonraven has more experience as an administrator than I do, but it looks as if we are coming from different types of organizations with different types of clients and different types of management. Our experiences are different, but the whole point of this kind of website is to share these experiences and hope the original poster -- and others -- will find something useful.