Job Discussion Forums

drewteacher · Joined: 03 Oct 2005 Posts: 62

I've heard Februrary/March are the best months to get a job in B.A. Is there another time of year you can recommend as well? Thanks.

Righteous · Joined: 05 Jan 2006 Posts: 6

I'd also like to go down to Argentina but i just can't find any info about schools... Please let me know if you hear anything...

Thank you and good luck

Sang · Joined: 19 Apr 2006 Posts: 5

I too would like to go to Argentina around Aug/Sep though I know when the peak hiring season is. I am very close to looking into teaching in another country because it is so difficult to find anything for around that time.

Can anyone share any experiences in getting the job? Did you get it before you moved there or did you start your job hunt after you moved? When did you get hired?

Thanks

sheena maclean · Posted: Sun Apr 23, 2006 7:13 pm Post subject:

I arrived in buenos Aires in July and by the first week of August I had 20 hours work with just one institute after only one interview. I think this is a good time to come because lost of institutes work on a module system and the second module of the year started at the beginning of August in my case. To be honest there are always people coming and going from Buenos Aires, alot of people get disillusioned really quickly with the teaching scene here and move on or go home, so there is always work available.

Sang · Joined: 19 Apr 2006 Posts: 5

Thanks a lot for the reply. So I guess my best bet would be for me to go there and search for a job rather than looking before hand. Just to get a general idea, can you give me an average of how much money I should bring in order for me to live until I get a job. I would probaly look at the cheapest way of living which I'm assuming is hostels.

Thanks again.

sheena maclean · Posted: Sun Apr 23, 2006 9:01 pm Post subject:

Well that really is a hard question as I don't know what your lifestyle is. It's unlikely you will be able to live off your wages alone so you will need some money to substitute your wages. I would say you would probably need an extra US$200 per month to pay your rent then use your wages for spending and the odd trip away if you can save any. Sorry I can't be of more help.

Sang · Joined: 19 Apr 2006 Posts: 5

Actually, you have helped me.

Thanks!

Maria Kirby · Joined: 26 May 2004 Posts: 56

Just wanted to add my experiences ... I moved to BsAs in the summer of 2005, August , after finishing my teaching jobs in Madrid. I didn't work right away but that was more to do with my trying to get used to the city but around the last week of August, early Sept. I was working around 15 hours . There are jobs in BsAs and I'm happy with the schools I work for and have worked for when I just started. good luck.

Maria

drewteacher · Joined: 03 Oct 2005 Posts: 62

Is that true?!....full time teaching doesn't pay enough to live a modestly comfortable lifestyle?

vivaBarca · Posted: Sun Apr 30, 2006 10:45 pm Post subject:

sheena maclean · Posted: Mon May 01, 2006 12:01 am Post subject:

Drew
Maybe you should describe what you think is a moderately comfortable lifestyle and we can help you from there.

drewteacher · Joined: 03 Oct 2005 Posts: 62

A clean, apartment (preferrably alone but shared OK) with kitchen, eat out a couple times a weeks. Have a little money left to buy a shirt, CD, or something else at the end of the month. Maybe a trip once or twice a year. What kind of lifestyle is realistic?

sheena maclean · Posted: Mon May 01, 2006 8:57 pm Post subject:

Sorry to be the bearer of bad tidings but- No chance!!!!

Ok, here goes with the explanation (even tho this has been covered a million times before on this site if you take the time to look!!). Lets start with the incomings side of the equation. Let's say all your teaching hours will consist of teaching businesspeople in companies, then your full time teaching hours a week would be around 25 hours a week tops. You also have to take into account cancellations with notice that you don't get paid for, so that will cut our hours down to maybe, say, 22 hours a week, at between 15 and 17 pesos per hour, so tops of $1500 per month, though doubtful as I've never earned that kind of money through teaching alone.
so the realistic figuer could be somewhere between $1200-$1300. If you have private students you can charge $25-$30 per hour but frankly as far as I'm concerned privates are too much hassle, they always cancel and don't want to pay for cancelled classes, and are very unreliable, plus the cost of gettinbg all your own resources can add up too.
OK sorry I just realised I have no time to finnish this and there is no way of saving it as a draft so I'll just send this bit and write more later!!!
Sorry for the bad spelling no time to cheak anything
Bye

veggieboy · Joined: 24 Aug 2005 Posts: 32 Location: Buenos Aires

I basically agree with Sheena's numbers. If anything, as she says, some of them are ideal and optimistic. So you can take that as a ceiling and figure that at first your numbers will probably be significantly lower.

You would almost certainly have to share an apartment. You could probably find a clean one, but it probably wouldn't be anything to get excited about. When I was apartment-hunting, I saw a lot of basically clean but relatively bleak places. And you'll find a lot of the smaller places have "kitchenettes", often times very small. Sometimes literally located in a closet.

As far as eating out goes, there's a wide price range there, of course. You could probably buy a hot dog or a few slices of pizza a few times a week. But anything beyond that might start to stretch your budget.

Also, prices for everything are going up (including rent, which seems to rise even faster than general inflation). Meanwhile, getting the income side of your equation to keep pace is not necessarily so easy, i.e. I haven't heard of any sort of English teacher shortage, so good luck getting more money out of the institutes.

It's not impossible to make it work, obviously. But you should know what you're up against.

sheena maclean · Posted: Tue May 02, 2006 6:28 pm Post subject:

Yep I'll agree with veggieboy!!! Rent here really is the sticking point for most peoples budget!!!! Really if I hadn't found a good cheap deal (after living for 3 months in a hostel) I would have had to have gone home. This is often why people get dissillusioned with BA so quickly. Really look at spending aything from $600 (sharing) to $1200 (for your own place). The only way you'll get cheaper is by sharing a room, getting lucky and meeting an Arg who will rent you a room and not charge you gringo prices (not too likely tho!!), or for your own place paying 6 months up front in cash or having an Argentine citizen living in the country act as your garuantor might do the trick.