Job Discussion Forums

[Tretyakovskii]

On the thread about getting started in Mexico, I mentioned that I found pay here to be low: it seemed there were many who were willing to work for modest sums, there seemed to be an abundance of language schools of all stripes, and students were reluctant to pay much for lessons.

Not knowing what to expect, I decided to set rates at what I felt I'd be comfortable with, and see what would happen. At the prices I wanted to charge for private, group lessons (100 pesos/hour/student), or classes taught on site at organizations/corporations (1,000 pesos/hour), I found the market to be soft. It was difficult to find sufficient students, or sufficient contracts, to fill my time (I don't do one-on-ones).

Those who've been here longer probably could have predicted what was going to happen, but I hadn't dealt with Mexico before, and thought I'd give it a test. Clearly, I could have reduced my expectations and found more takers, but I hadn't reached a point where I felt a need to experiment with that solution when I got an offer of a full time position- which I took, rather than continue with the experiment.

If this experience does not surprise you, and you are trying to work at the high end, rather than the bottom end of the market, what's your sense of "what the market will bear," in Mexico?

[Isla Guapa]

Unlike you, I do teach one-on-one, something that I enjoy and that brings in sufficient income, since I am working only to supplement my pension income. If I had to depend entirely on teaching to support myself, I'd go with small groups instead since you can make more money per hour that way! Anyway, I have had no trouble getting students, charging $175 per hour if they come to my house and $200 if I go to them. My students all have decent jobs but are not wealthy, and all but one pay for the classes themselves and find my rates reasonable. If I raised them by much, I fear I might lose some of them.

[Phil_K]

Regarding corporate classes, I've seen a general shift from companies paying for them as a perk for their employees, to a situation where the company offers time and rooms, but requires the student to pay. Together with the global economic situation, this has probably lowered the inpedendent teacher's expectations somewhat, and in D.F., I'd say $250-300 ph. is top end for a one-to-one class. You say you don't do one-to-ones, but I think this policy prevents you getting a lot of work.

Of course, the ideal would be a group, with the individual fees scaled down, but there is also a danger here of your income varying widely due to absent students - for which a cancellation policy is required.

Overall, I'd advise an independent teacher to think like a language school (a good one! ), design a first-class, innovative, and if possible, unique product, and go out and test the waters.

[TeresaLopez]

I don�t think, for the most part, that it isn�t that students don�t want to pay more, it�s that they can�t. In my experience, high level exec�s classes are almost always paid for by their company, and for lots of reasons they prefer to go through a language school. For most of these students speaking English at a certain level is a job requirement. The students that I currently have that are paying out of their own pocket are not at that level, but are more middle income students - secretaries, travel agents, etc. who know that knowing or improving their English will almost always lead them to more money, but in the meantime, it is a sacrifice to them to pay $150 pesos an hour. I think $150 - $200 is pretty mich all the market can bear, even if you can get a group of 3 or 4 students together and only charge them $100 each, they aren�t going to progress as quickly or at the same pace, and that isn�t always a lot of fun for the teacher. I do think presenting a polished, professional proposal to a company outlining what you propose to do as a teacher will get you a little more money. Another thing I have done is to offer a 10% discount for classes outside of the high demand times, or if a company has two classes back to back, and that has worked out well.

[Guy Courchesne]

[MotherF]

I meant to post this in the other thread but it's been locked.

My husband has at various times over the last ten years given Math classes. Starting before he even finished his BA. For a pre calc class at a private high school he got paid 150 an hour. Just after finishing his MA he gave one on one tutorials to a secundaria student who missed most of a semester due to a bad car accident and was trying to catch up. He also got 150 pesos for that.
While a PhD student he gave a Calculus class to engineering undergrads, he got 250 an hour for that.

Equally qualified English teachers should earn similar wages.

[Tretyakovskii]

I suppose many would feel good about getting paid, as TEFLers do in Vietnam, the equivalent of something like 200-250 pesos/hour, working for a language school.

Mexico is the 12th richest country in the world: there is no reason I can see why pay should be so low here, when poorer countries manage to pay more.

[Prof.Gringo]

I remember I had a student that I took from another teacher. His fee wasn't as high as mine. And the new student was a fresa Mexican lawyer complete with a brand new BMW and just back from a vacation in Switzerland.

His first question for me was: So, let's talk about pay, I think I should pay less for my classes.

Needless to say that was our first and last class. As I explained to him I would actually need to charge a higher fee as my travel time was much greater and he wanted to still pay me less.

So there is the problem. Even students that are well-to-do are loathe to pay well for language classes.

As long as there are "English teachers" (even some that have a terrible command of the language) willing to work for 30 or 40 pesos an hour and give business classes for 100 or so pesos an hour, it's hard to upsell many students who simply don't see the value of having a trained native speaker.

[Prof.Gringo]

[Dragonlady]

[Dragonlady]

[Phil_K]

Maybe we can work backwards with this:

If I offer a product that means you can speak English immediately, how much would you pay?

A fortune!

I can't offer you that, but if I can address most of the problems that people have learning a language, and you become fluent very quickly, how much would you pay?

I'd be prepared to pay a good price.

And so on.

What I mean is we can offer anything from a Vocho class to a Ferrari class, and charge accordingly. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but (by developing our experience, product and reputation), soon, and for the rest of our lives.

[Isla Guapa]

[Dragonlady]

[Phil_K]