I’m trying to figure out what I’m going to do in the fall when my contract runs out, and I’ve been searching the forums for info about Adult schools. I’ve found little tidbits here and there, but most of the posts quickly stray away from the question, choosing rather to bicker about this or that theory about teaching or life in Taiwan.
I’ve already taught in Taiwan for almost a year, and I’m just trying to guage what people think about most of these schools. If you have valuable information about the schools, please post it. If you think that someone who posted is a bad teacher, please start another thread.
Things to take into consideration, though not a complete list:
- How much prior experience do you need to get hired?
- Do you need to be able to speak Chinese? How well?
- What’s the pay like?
- What are the hours like? Do you work during the day or at night? Do you have regular hours, or does it vary from day to day? Do you work on the weekends?
- What’s the work environment like?
I’m sure there are things that I’ve forgotten to put in, but these are the most important to me.
So far, I’ve got the impression that Global Village and Wall Street aren’t too great. David’s and William’s are alright, it seems, though they have their faults. Here’s a list of schools I’ve found so far:
David’s
Lado Consultants**
Excell*
Cambridge
Foresite*
Elite*
GJun
China Post
Gram*
William’s
City’s English*
Milton*
Zachary & Associates**
- means I know next to nothing about them other than that they are for adults, except Foresite, which is for high school kids. Some of these places I haven’t even found websites for. Others, I just haven’t found much opinion about.
** These two places, from what I understand, help businessmen with their english and offer various other translation/editing services. Haven’t found much about what it’s like to work for them, but I’m interested.
A lot of these schools came from this post on another thread: http://forumosa.com/taiwan/viewtopic.php?t=57597&postdays=0&postorder=asc&highlight=best+adult+schools&&start=20
[quote]With some experience you could try getting into test-preparation classes, which can be a bit different. Read up on TOEFL, TOEIC, IELTS etc, and start doing the rounds. Read what Tomas has to say on the subject. I can think of no finer example of someone who has that particular market under control.
Another thing to think about is that adults rarely study 9-5, M-F. It’s evenings and weekends, and nobody can make a living doing just that. You may get an ARC, but you’ll need to supplement your income somehow. A lot of people do it this way.
Some names for you:
Berlitz: do it our way, wear a tie, and expect to be poorly-paid.
GJUN: invited me to interview and demo recently after I had told them my minimum payment expectations, then told me that they never pay anyone more than 650/hr. Wankers.
GVLC, GEOS: seem to hire just about anybody who is willing to work for less than 600/hr
David’s, William’s: A bit better than the above, apparently, but not great payers.
Hess: Often get overlooked, but they do corporate English classes and they’re fairly professional.
Elite, Trinity, Time, Howard: pretty fair employers who offer decent renumeration. General English and also exam prep classes
Excell, Cambridge: Focus on IELTS prep, well paid, foreign managed
Steve Loi: an agent with a pretty good reputation.
Wall Street: Don’t know much about them, but there are people here who do.
Foresight: Not adult classes, but high school - ie daytime work. Pay and conditions vary, but reasonably well-run.
Studio Classroom, Live ABC: Poorly-paid writing work for educational magazines. All writing work is poorly-paid, btw, but it’s a day job.
Lado Consultants: Business English and writing work. Pretty well-paid from what I hear, and they take some real weirdoes.
[/quote]