Once again someone who does not know everything wants to sounds off as if he does know everything.
"meaning it's a crap load of teaching, over 30 classes of 45 minutes duration each week."
No one teaches 30 classes at an Aston school unless they are getting overtime. Aston's classes depending on the level are an hour with 55 minutes of teaching or 2 hours with 2 - 55 minute classes.

Yes you share an apartment but you can request a single apartment and pay have the rent! I never minded sharing with any of the three different roommates that I had.

I will be the first one to say that Aston is not perfect! I have taught at other schools like Aston and these have been completely Chinese owned and they were far worse. This also goes for the public school and college that I taught in. This is China and business is done differently here. Survival of the fittest! Not much different in Korea, Indonesia and Taiwan from the forums that I have read from those countries. Most of the teachers that I have taught with had a good experience at Aston. I was at one Aston School when it was at one of its lowest points and it was mostly due to a western manager that did not have the PR skills of a dead dingo! Actually we had two western managers in a row there that did nothing good for the foreign teachers but they are gone home now like most of us.

I did get 7000 RMB for a 20 hour contract too. I was happy with that. So if you are at such a great school there please tell us and we will apply to work there.