Viewing topic: Saint Petersburg Wages

What we've gathered from the forum so far and a few other bits of information:

Benedict School: $3 to $8
English First: Around $8
American Language Master: $8 to $10
Educacentre: $10 to $11 (paid in roubles at 30/dollar)

ILA: depends on their (and your) level of desperation. From $10 to $20 per ast. hour (60 mins).

Anyone else?

Bob,

This is exactly the kind of info peoploe like me need.

Clear, helpful info. Wow, people work for 3 dollars an hour? Well, I guess people who have never taught before, and who have tons of money in the bank, and just do it for fun, sort of like volunteers.

Personally, I think volunteers should be out giving hot tea to those who need it, like old people without much money.

I imagine 8 or 10 dollars an hour, if regular, and if in the same location, is not bad at all, if they schedule them in blocks, no split shifts. Hopefully with enough break in between, but so much as to waste time, like one hour once might be ok. Two-hour breaks can be a bummer though.

My fave schedule:

4 pm - 10pm

4 classes max per day, with one or two on saturday and/or Sunday.

How about this?

3 classes per day, six days a week?

That means NO wasteful commuting, NO suffering knowing you're going to do 5 classes in a row.

18 x 10 dollars = 180 x 4 = 720

= ok if they provide apt.

If you pay 350 for an apartment, two weeks of your labour are GONE, and then food, etc.

I liken paying a third or more of a salary like a mouse running inside one of those wheels. All that energy spent going nowhere.

Lenin had it right getting rid of private ownership of property. And they didn't have 40 million people without medical coverage like in the USA, TODAY, with its pathetic patchwork system that gives money to the slimeball lawyers instead of the doctors and instead of health to the people. Corpocracy.

Russia hasn't been poisoned by this nonsense. It's still pristine in some ways. More social. More cultural. It's REAL. No fake smiles.

It's better to have a babushka tell you off, then a fake smile from someone you can't trust to tell you the truth.

Do I degress? Hahahaha. Maybe I have some "issues", as they are called .

Thank "God" for the orient. Realish incomes without nonsensical stress and high living costs.

So, Russia is NOT about the money, but we at least need some minimum to live normally.

So this is where this clear info about the teaching rates is so important.

WK

Thanks Will.

I'm waiting for an article from Ruth about Educacentre, and hopefully when she get's some time she'll add something to this forum about it.

I've now heard from a lot of sources that it's the 'best' school to work for in St. Pete's, though no doubt that is very subjective. ALM has more mixed reports coming through, but I think on the whole it's also a good place.

Unfortunate thing is that very few of these places can really give full time work.

Benedict School brings over trainees for a so-called 'Via Lingua' TEFL course and then exploits them for $3 an hour and overcharges for apartments. They screwed me over by asking me to come back after a summer trip for a visa, then informing me when I arrived that they had 'enough trainees, thankyou'.

They now seem to be having trouble getting teachers (teachers seem to have wised up, I'd like to think my efforts played a part in that and are paying more than before - the minimum might now actually be $4, but that's irrelevant. Teachers leave/are leaving them in droves. Even the bad ones. Which is how it should be, nyahahahaha...

As long as there are young, inexperienced “teachers” willing to accept slave wages to help support a free vacation until they get bored, homesick, or just plain pissed at their situation, and leave in the middle of their contract, the students will suffer, schools will continue to have their reputations assaulted (because they are willing to accept mediocrety), and professional teachers will be asked to work for subsistence wages. To me, this is unacceptable. To be called a professional, one must first act like a professional. That is to say, negotiating a contract you are willing to commit to for the full term, and demanding the same of the school. Breach of any agreement should carry a penalty for the offending party. I know this may sound naive. In some countries, schools look upon contracts as no more than rough guidelines. However, even this attitude can be effectively dealt with, especially if you happen to be my age. I have never entered into a business venture with any company willing to go toe-to-toe with me over our agreement. Why? Because I only deal with those who believe in the same degree of professionalism as I do. No fly-by-night, mom-and-pop operations allowed. Even the larger schools, with many branches, can be as petty as the sleaziest operation in China. That is why it’s important to meet and evaluate the management in person. They may want a sample lesson from me, but I want proof of their integrity from them. Finally, there are certain methods I employ before signing anything. One is to never go into a contract without in country support. Always remember, leverage is everything.

Few things worth while are simple. Everything worth while merits the investment.

in the orient, contracts are not one of the things that really exist.

russia seems to be semi-asian, and the russians also seem to not put a lot of importance onti contracts, which are not enforceable anyway.

it's total law of the jungle. get paid every two weeks in cash.

contracts in asia, and eurasia (i will include all of russia in that one) are just things that westerners do.

for all intents and purposes, you will have zilch access to russian courts for things like salary not paid.

if they processed all of these cases, russia would have to train about 50,000 judges per year to keep up with demand.

the truth is, in russia, you WILL get ripped off, lied to, and cheated. this is so going to happen, it's not funny. no-one, and i mean NO-ONE has any inkling of business ethics.

all you need is a control mechanism

=

independance (living in your own apt)

and insisting on getting paid every two weeks in cash.

the FIRST time they don't pay on tme, leave that school, and never go back.

they will test you and your personality and see what they can get away with. russians are scientific, and yet, paradoxially, EXCELLENT at sussing out people, which is so subjective. this combo makes russians impressive people.

these guys will use psychology and any opther tools at their means to "rip you off", which to them is nothing but their way of makiing money.

you will find working in russia a lot like a chess game. power shifts, etc. make sure you always have at least a fair share of leverage. i like your leverage idea. that's exactly what you need there.

Being referred to as an innocent civilian certainly seems to make one feel small. Guess I'll have to work on the picture thing.

I agree with you Willka, contracts seem to have different meanings to different people. However; and I think Will would agree, I have dealt with Germans, Japanese, Mexicans, Canadians, and Americans while in the oil and gas business. Believe me, calling Oil Execs Cut throat is considered a compliment. Hard ball is something they play to tone down their business life, and mercy is like "love" in tennis...it means nothing. I'm not saying that it's always easy to take control of a teaching situation. Sometimes the best strategy is to let it go and move on. But in the long run, hard work, good planning, and a lot of ground work will go a long way.

You're right about one more thing. Always be prepared to be raked over the coals. I have been out flanked more than once, although not recently, and firmly believe in having not only an exit strategy, but also a pay back plan. Another one of Jim's Rules; If screwed, never let them get away unscathed.

It's a fairly general approach to employing teachers. If the school changes its mind, the contract was only an agreement. If you change your mind, it was a contract.

Don't worry about the picture, I'll fix it later from home Yes, it's way past time to make you something a bit grander than an innocent civilian, just can't yet make my mind up what

Jim

thanks for the info. kind of interesting, but now i do my own visa in china.

i do a business visa. then i get my own apartment in a big city, and work for different schools. gotta be independant in china. in asia, nothing is ever final, everything always moves. and there are no contracts.

all of these promises the chinese schools make are almost worthless. very few schools in china keep their promises. they just hold you as a slave by waving the airfare in your face for a year, then they decide not to pay it after you finish. so airfare means nothing to me. plus i stay long-term, or go to a close country by train, or however is cheapest.

i make up to 15,000 RMB per month (150 RMB per hour) in shanghai, not including accomodation, which is about 2,500 in shanghai. so let's say 12,000 plus apartment.

total independance is needed in these countries. they lie about the visa system, they steal and keep your passport, etc.

I had to call the police on my school in china to get my passport back. they lied about where it was. after the police incident, they pretended everything was normal. freaks.

i wouldnt even tell any school which visa im on, and would lie about my nationality and my address if necessary. it's none of their business. my housing is also none of their beeswax. how and where i go after my visa runs out is also none of their business.

i might open my own school. but gotta have 50% chinese interest in the school, which is ok.

weekly pay IN CASH without "taxes" taken off. non-negotiable.

no children's classes. no split shifts. no long commuting.

all you have to do is say NO to all of this nonsense, and they will respect that.

they take total advantage of you if they can get away with it.

they would literally ENSLAVE you if they could get away with it. but they can't.

i had these demands translated into chinese so all employers (partners, really) understand them clearly. they need me more than i need them.

ditto for russia. ten bucks an hour minimum. AT LEAST every two weeks salary in cash, rubles and/or dollars. salary net. no delay. no withholding.

i have ZERO tolerance for nonsense. THIS strategy actually works! no other strategy actually works!

be able, willing, and happy to not only bluff, but just walk away without threatening them. just walk away. leave them in silence and disappear.

one school in china didnt pay when for TWO classes i had done. i was very low on money.

i went to their office to raise shit. they didnt budge. then they left the room. i saw the manager's phone book. i took it, never came back. it had emails in it, and the passwords to his recruiting email addresses. i changed the passwords, and told all prospective teachers to F OFF (on his behalf).

he ripped me off, but it cost him at least 300 times over. he had hundreds of foreign teachers in his email boxes. i also got the passwords to their access to advertizing sites online.

it's karma. i love it.

anywhere east of west germany is a place full of people taking the piss. it doesnt mean dont go there - it just means be very careful and not to trust anyone. it's not bad - it just is.

there are certain ways to deal with these "people". every once in a while, i allow myself some little bit of enjoyment and revenge. i earn it. then when i get the chance, i spend it.

these scumbags are NO LESS honourable than the scuzball management of Home Depot. same sort of anti-social short-sighted hate-the-employee (slave) mentality. Home Depot dehumanizes you. well, so do the chinese schools.

this is the Zen reality of the ESL world.

hai. so desu.

arigato gozaimashita.

Anata no ESL Eigo no Sensei

Hi,

Like to correct you on the Educacentre wage - it's around $11.30 an hour, standard wage for all native teachers. Paid in roubles, it never alters from 330 per hour...

What? Are you people stinking rich are something? How does one get by on such low wages, or is there a special area of St. Petersburg where the cost of living suddenly plunges?

My investigation indicates that the cost of living in St. Pete is higher than L.A. California and only slightly lower than New York. These are two of America's most expensive cities. Perhaps living on the edge of poverty is expected of EFL teachers. If so, it needs to change.

Yes, this needs to change.

However, if we peep a bit further into the providence of said teachers, we see signs of slave wages in those places. I implicate: The UK, Canada, USA.

There are charts and tables showing Moscow to be the world's second-most expensive city, but this is truly way off the mark. You can live on next-to-nothing in Moscow. In Moscow, I went out every night, and still couldn't spend all my money.

Tokyo is much more expensive, but even in Tokyo, there are 100 yen stores. [dollar stores]

11 dollars an hour over in Russia is like 25 dollars an hour in the US - not a lot, but someone careful on how they spend it can do ok.

I think the future is in not teaching, but also in sharing accomodation - as in married couples.

Starting one's own school is a good way to go, but this is very difficult in Russia, as the krysha ["roof" - "protection" money] would have to be paid.

I think an hour is usually an academic hour, which is 45-55 minutes. I try to give at least 55 minutes.

WK

Folks, since the first post I've been doing more digging into the wages question, and funnily enough I was discussing this in a meeting with a director from an SPb school today.

There's quite a difference between advertised/offered wages and 'real' wages, which might explain a lot about the crazy lack of decent teachers in St. Pete's at the moment.

Advertised/offered wages seem a good deal lower (10 to 20% average, some cases much more) than actual wages paid to teachers. This may be because those teachers have been there longer & had pay rises or simply negotiated. Wages are actually almost never advertised publicly (maybe more to do with taxes than anything else though).

Now, to me that seems a bit odd. Attracting skilled professionals to a job requires that you pay well, or they go elsewhere. Like to a different school, a different city, or a different country.

Maybe the schools won't advertise/offer decent wages, because they want to:

a) pay their native Russian teachers much less and keep them in the dark about what their (often lower-qualified) foreign colleagues are receiving

b) hope that they will get teachers who will take their offer no-questions-asked

Now, there are schools that want to attract top teachers (proper teaching qualifications, lots of experience, professional, flexible, etc.) at $10 - $12 per hour. This might work, but they will either start asking for a wage rise when they find out how much other teachers are earning or simply leave without warning. That's just not enough.

An interesting point came up - the schools that run in shoddy, damp, run-down buildings are paying as much or more than some of the schools in renovated office blocks in the centre of town with glitzy receptions and classrooms.

From what I've seen so far, the shoddy places seem better-equipped with resources and have bigger teachers' areas (doesn't cost so much).

The teachers in the shoddy places seem pretty happpy. Probably because they don't suspect their students are being charged over the odds for lessons and are more relaxed. They don't feel under pressure to match the glitzy surroundings with glitzy classroom performances.


The teachers being paid the same or less in fancy offices know that they are subsidising the upkeep of the facade because they know they're not getting paid better than elsewhere.

They know that their students are likely to be paying much more to have lessons in a glitzy office.

They might feel under pressure to be as glitzy and glamourous as their surroundings. Pressure = stress = nerves = poor concentration = poor lessons = job dissatisfaction = go elswhere or go nuts.

Bobs, the last I heard is that ALM was giving you 15$ per hour for an easy and awesome class with great students. Are you tryin to keep all the good work for yourself? sneaky.

Hello owner of American Language Master Check the date of the post - I wasn't working for you then

Put your wages on your school overview, you equally sneaky American!