Please don’t fall prey to the 10 month contract SCAM, which robs you of two months salary. It used to be safer to work at public schools, run by the government, than to work for private schools, which are bu$ine$$e$ and only care about anything other than profit if it will increase profits. Sadly, everyone needs a finger in the pie, and the pie is you. Enterprising Foreign Affairs departments and others have found ways to skim the top off your salary in government run institutions.

A government school should have a 6 month contract or a 12 month contract, and include housing for the entire period of either. All the Chinese teachers are paid for every month of the year, and so should you if you sign a year contract. The reason is that you are not actually paid on a monthly basis. You are paid on a yearly basis, and your salary is merely spread out over 12 months, just like every other teacher in the public school. If you are on a “10 month contract” your salary is actually being reduced by about 17%, because you are losing two of your 12 incremental payments.

Like all other teachers you are paid over the long summer holiday and Spring Festival, not because anyone is generous to you, but simply because your pay is distributed in monthly increments. You are never paid for doing nothing. It’s a simple process, but because foreigners don’t understand it and get screwed with their pants on, royally.

Think about it. If you have a 10 month contract, what are you supposed to do the other two months without pay, and where are you supposed to live if you are a returning teacher? I for one, have been on a 12 month contract for years, and a 10 month contract would force me out before a year was up, and also rob me of that 17% of my earnings.

Here’s how to look at your salary. One the left is your salary for 12 months, and on the right is your salary if 2 months are deleted.

12 month (real) contract 10 month (scam) contract
￥14,000 = ￥11,667
￥13,500 = ￥11,250
￥13,000 = ￥10,833
￥12,500 = ￥10,417
￥12,000 = ￥10,000
￥11,500 = ￥9,583
￥11,000 = ￥9,167
￥10,500 = ￥8,750
￥10,000 = ￥8,333
￥9,500 = ￥7,917
￥9,000 = ￥7,500
￥8,500 = ￥7,083
￥8,000 = ￥6,667
￥7,500 = ￥6,250
￥7,000 = ￥5,833
￥6,500 = ￥5,417
￥6,000 = ￥5,000
￥5,500 = ￥4,583
￥5,000 = ￥4,167
￥4,500 = ￥3,750
￥4,000 = ￥3,333
￥3,500 = ￥2,917
￥3,000 = ￥2,500

Finally, you should do us all a favor and demand to get your FULL salary, and if they say “it’s a 10 month contract,” than you can do the math and tell them what the REAL salary they are offering you is. Usually it comes out to about ￥1,000 a month (if you are at the 6,000 yuan mark, you will only be getting 5,000 a month if on the 10 month contract). On the upper end of the scale you can lose as much as 2,000 or more yuan a month.

Where is your money going? In someone else’s pocket.