Julia
- 2013-07-20
I see that almost every year someone has posted about the bad teaching experience at TEFL in Zhuji.
It's 2013 now and I have to concur.
For a salary of 4500RMB/month, you will be exploited for your labour. Foreigners, stay away. Unless babysitting children of all ages by repeating and shouting the same words over and over at them is your thing, this is the farthest you'll get from a proper job in China. Perhaps the heart of the issue at TEFL is the improper teaching method that is preached throughout the whole of China (read, memorise, recite, but don't understand!), but much of your teaching efforts here will be worthless. Your boss and colleagues will only see you as a money-generating asset to the company, disregarding your human needs (cold water in the summer shouldn't be too much to ask for, let alone AC).
Accommodation is a joke as well. While the rent is free, the bills come out of your own pocket. I lived on the 6th floor of an apartment building complex - no elevator. No working fridge, no lights in the kitchen. No stove.
Magister
- 2012-07-17
There was a Tefl academy in the last city I worked in in zhejiang (not zhuji). It was a smaller city than even zhuji is so the foreign teachers working across the few schools that there were (both public and private) knew each other fairly well. I can honestly say no Tefl teacher had anything nice to say about their experience working there. Here are some of the primary complaints I heard
1. Unfurnished apartment - rooms had a bed and that was it
2. Very low wages - it seemed to differ from teacher to teacher but some were on as little as 2000rmb a month
3. High hours - at least 20 real hours a week. Teachers would also get called to teach classes at the last minute including on days off
The teachers there were all on some kind of internship/course where they would get basic esl teaching certification at the end of a three month period. To me though it seemed much more like pure exploitation of staff given the high hours and low wage they received.
As far as I'm aware that particular school didn't have a license to employ foreigners and therefore couldn't acquire a z visa. I don't know if that was the case with the school in zhuji. More than likely they found someone else to do your job for a significantly lower wage and cost (acquiring the visa, airfare, etc.).
Steve
- 2012-07-17
Hello,
I have worked for TEFL Academy in Zhuji. They did one of the worst things I could ever imagine. I had been in China for a while on an F visa. They told me to go home to the USA to apply for a Z visa and they would mail the documents to where I was staying. I waited....and waited...six weeks went by...still no documents...emailed the student manager and all of a sudden was told that they weren't taking me back! No reason, just not bringing me back. Fortunately the agency gave me another school in another city. Right now I want nothing to do with TEFL Academy Zhuji. I wish a bomb would hit the building and explode!
I have been offered a teaching position at Tefl Academy in Zhuji, China. I would really apprecitate some feedback on the school and Zhuji..Is it a nice place to live? Thank you