Job Discussion Forums

[taobenli]

Does anyone know anything about U.S-China Education Services? (advertised on Chronicle of Higher Education website) I'm currently teaching ESL as an assistant in a U.S. public school and was on the JET Program in rural Japan last year. I was in Beijing for six months on a study abroad program in 2000 and have been back to China twice since. I speak Mandarin and am currently waiting to hear back from grad schools to see if I got into China-related programs for next fall. My contract at my current job ends on June 11th and many of the schools I applied to don't start till September. U.S. Educational Exchange advertises that they sometimes have 3-month positions available- but would these be in the summer?

I really want to go somewhere to improve my language skills for the summer before grad school, either China or Taiwan, ideally. I don't care about not making a profit, but would rather not shell out too much money (as working in public schools in the U.S. is not lucrative).....

Any other good ideas for international things to do in the summer months? Something in Japan or Korea would also be interesting.....

Thanks for any advice!

[kimo]

Hi, I'm no expert on summer programs, but people ought to start advertising fairly soon and will continue to do so until the day their camps begin. They recruit students but never actually know the number of teachers needed until the number of students is confirmed.

What does that mean for you? Don't just set your sights on one school in one favored location. These things fall through and you are left standing with a ticket to nowhere. Contact several schools/organizations and see what they have to offer. My experience has been the more in advance I get an offer, the more likely I come out the loser. Some organizations advertise that they will pay for your ticket to come here from overseas, but most prefer not to. Others will make you pay but offer you some sort of experience for it - perhaps a three day tour of Beijing and vicinity.

Good luck!

[taobenli]

Thanks for that advice. Another thing that turns me off about some of the summer programs advertised are the 3-day tours of Beijing, Shanghai, etc. I've already been to all those places and have had my fill of riding around in a Chinese tour bus. I would rather be somewhere interesting- like Yunnan, or Guizhou (went there and loved it, despite its poverty). If I did some kind of program in Taiwan or Hong Kong that offered some kind of "cultural tour" it would be more interesting to me, as I have never been to Taiwan or Hong Kong.

[taobenli]

Does anyone else know of any summer opportunities in China or Taiwan?

Thanks,

taobenli

[artemis]

Gidday,
I am in the same boat - waiting to hear from Grad school, back in the US working for public schools as instructional assistant, 6 mo. in Beijing during universtiy and looking for summer jobs in China. I spent 2 years in Taiwan and I know you could land and have a job inside a day just about anywhere on the island. I'm looking at a summer job in Hangzhou, but employer is not committing to the number of work days per week (I fear it is 7 out of 7). It is a gov't program and ads are posted here at Dave's and at chinatefl.com. Or email [email protected] and address John Zhou.

[whitjohn]

No Mate, it's not govt but the work is 6hrs for 6 days a week. See my post on the thread about helen china tefl. It's John's wife Helen who is the head of the company. They are OK in my opinion

[kev7161]

Last summer I worked for ChinaTefl and it had some good and bad to it. Of course, the summer of '03 was just coming off of the SARS scare and it was "the hottest summer in 100 years" (or something like that) so summer programs were kind of chaotic. Anyway, as I had been to Hangzhou in the summer of 2002, I was interested in coming back here and hooking up with old friends and former students. Sadly, the day I arrived, I found out that I was being sent to Yiwu!! (the program consists of rotation or placement in a variety of cities in Zhejiang province). Yiwu was no cooler than Hangzhou and the program there had already been going for about a week when I arrived, so I was the "newbie" amongst the foreign teachers. I was placed in a dumpy hotel in a very small room with a roommate (the roomie was fine, just the living conditions were not so good - - we had an air conditioner built in 1932 or something - - and the power was out every other day). We were transported to the school every morning and classes began around 8:30. I had junior middle school level and the kids were (mostly) rotten! I mean, high-strung and very little english background. There was no AC in the classrooms so every day these little Chinese men and women would lug these HUGE blocks of ice into the classrooms and place them in plastic tubs. Of course, this was a source of endless entertainment for the kids and a huge headache for us teachers (big, wet, mess all day). I guess the idea was the ice was to cool down the air or something.

So, even before I went to Yiwu, I told John in no uncertain terms that he had told me that I would spend some time in Hangzhou during this program so he got me out of there after two weeks, paid me for 1/2 my salary and set me up here in Hangzhou for a couple more weeks (and then paid me my remaining salary + a meal stipend for that 2 weeks as well - - they fed us in Yiwu). I was placed in a nearby hotel to Zhejiang University and was delighted to find out my new roomie was scheduled to leave the next day - - a room to myself! Oops, not quite. The hotel made a mistake and I was supposed to have been placed in another room to share with a new "friend". I asked John if he would give me "X" amount of money instead of a hotel room and I could find my own place to stay for a couple of weeks (with a friend I knew). John was happy to oblige and I had a relatively easy remainder of the program. (Sad note: the program in Yiwu was cancelled just a few days after I left, due to the heat. All teachers were paid FULL salary and were off scot free to do what they wanted to.)

This summer I am planning on returning to China TEFL and I've already gotten written assurances that I will be ONLY in Hangzhou during the full course. I'm planning on going to see the facilities I will be teaching at BEFORE I sign the contract (as soon as John gives me the locales) to see about AC, DVD players, CD players, etc. The classrooms I were in last year were rather . . . sparse . . . when it came to modern teaching conveniences.

Wow, that was my longest post ever. I'm just saying that they WILL work with you at ChinaTEFL (plus I found out that teachers salaries were quite varied last year). Just politely make your requests/inquiries ahead of time and things should work out fine for you. Maybe we'll see each other. Feel free to email me if you have specific questions. [email protected]