Depends on how you look at the ad. If she's serious about teaching children she'll be in for a shock when she realizes that she'll be lucky to get two hours a day five days a week as they are in school till nearly 5 and having classes later than 7:30 or 8 would be too exhausting for the average child. So unless she's able to get classes really close together or in block hours in the evenings she's going to have a hard time of it. It's basically what I struggled with last year. As a result you end up taking academy classes during the day to fill your schedule.

However if she's looking for more Nanny type of work then by charging more than 10 euros an hour she'll have a difficult time finding a family in Madrid thats willing to pay that. Even ten an hour is pushing it. It's one of the main reasons I don't work as a Nanny in Madrid. I'm starting to miss it though. There is a position thats been out there for a while working for a family with a child less than a year and they are paying 200€ a week. The downside is that they want you to work 50 hours a week for that, far less than 10 an hour. It was an easy position to turn down as I make more than that a week with only my childrens classes and only working 13 1/2 hours. If anyone is interested send me a message off the board and I'll give you the agency's name.

i agree with madsue.

perhaps it is not the only thing Jojo does.

for example, i can tell you fisr hand that many of the people who answered my AD SALES CLASSIFIED are people like Jojo who have more than one source of income.

saludos,
jer...

now this guy works really cheap

quote:

Buy me a beer every 30 minutes and I will help you improve your english.

Cost per hour : 2€ [/QUOTE]

you have to admit he's original

There's this guy who keeps calling me - he needs people to teach English mid day in the middle of the week - Wednesdays (and I think) Tuesdays). It's out Alcobendas way, so the pay should be good, but I'm already booked at this time. So if you're reading this early Nov and need extra hours call his school of Idiomas on 91 804 3966.

quote:

I was quite disgusted the other day when talking to a teacher who told me that he was paid 10� an hour and that was for traveling to see the client. What that really breaks down into is little more than 3� an hour when you factor in transportation time.

LOL, I think that was me you were talking about.

Let's face it. No matter how much we discuss this, it isn't going to change the price that academies pay their teachers. Those without papers are limited with academies, but not limited when it comes to private classes.

If the price is toolow, we certainly don't have to take it. But here's a question for people still in Madrid. is English teaching stillin demand or have you seen less offer for classes? I ask because before I left in November, many academies were scared and were only taking people who had papers.

Thanks,

Shawn

hey all!
i find the demand for teachers as intense as ever. i no longer work for academies, but from what i understand the prices are still lingering from as low as 10 euros (for in academy/contract work/fulltime) to 18 +/- for company classes.

i still get calls and emails out the blue at least once a week.

most long-term teachers i know here have, like me, left the academies and now work with clients directly. some do it legally as autonomas and others illegally. all depends on your situation and contacts.

for these private classes (teacher-client, no intermediary), going rates are 20 and up. however, i've said it before, if you want to get up to high-paying privates, you need to 1) build your skills. 2) build your library of materials. 3) like the job --if you are doing because you have no other choice or resent it, that will effect both the quality of your work and of the jobs you recieve. and 4) develop client relationships and networks.

having a business card to whip out whenever you meet potential clients is also a plus. a website is a good idea as is a blog.

doing all of these things, most of the freelance teachers i know who work fulltime (20-25 hours teaching per week) make close to 2K a month.

anyway, if you really want to make it as a teacher here, no worries at all. just be diligent and build relationships.

good luck!
candela

Candela,

Thanks for the response. I know first hand that many academies are struggling to find GOOD teachers, and that won;tchange for quite a while because the majority of the good teachers leave academies and work for themselves. Who can blame them when academies pay so low, but expect you to travel so far?

I look forward to reading more responses.

Have a great day,

Shawn

i have a question.

i get some teachers telling me that they make like 30-40 euros an hour and work approx. 30 hours a week.

duuuuuuude!!! that is like 1,050 euros a week (30x35) which at 4 weeks a month comes in at an INSANE amount of cashola = 4,200 euros/month.

so, are they full of shit or should i start teaching english

seriously though, what are teachers complaining about?

saludos,
jer...

Jer,

I think that these are the teachers who ARE CHARGING THE COMPANY DIRECTLY and are in Spain LEGALLY. I have heard of some teachers who know legal terminology that they can charge up to 75 Euros and hour.

I met someone who works as an English teacher and he told me that he makes close to 3000 or more a month, and that he plays with his taxes. Basically, he doesn't them. He's American and has work papers.

All in all, it depends on who the teacher is working with. If I had papers, I knew that I could've taken business away from ges. Companies are looking for good teachers and not backpackers, who are flooding the EFL maket in Madrid.

Shawn

shawn is right.
if you contract right with the company--often as their sole teacher or their in-house teacher coordinator--the pay can be 30 or 40 per hour. in these cases, the companies often need to be legally billed.

i charge 40 for specialty classes, but sadly those are as of yet, the smallest bulk of my work. but i'm working on it!!!!!!

also, remember, that even doing all the above, you must still take into account working only half months in dec and jan. reduced hours in summer and not working at all in july and aug. which of course affects the median monthly pay.

and shawn you couldn't be more right. companies are sick of the backpacker. they contract with a "prestigious" slickly marketed school and then get a backpacker who is 10 minutes late, reeks of smoke, and is totally...like...unprepared. but, until schools are willing to pay more, that is what they get.

Candela,

I saw that slick marketing and we both worked for a company like that one. The backpackers are running rampant in Madrid, but I know that I can do a lot with private classes and give them my personal touch. If you know that you are good, word of mouth gets around.

The reason that slick marketing can work is because these Human Resources Directors, who usually handle English classes, know nothing about English Language Teaching and are looking for the lowest price. It's all bout the Euros, baby and who can save me money.

When I was fired from ges, I know that they lost 3 clients because my students didn't want another teacher. 2 of those students went straight to Human Resources and told them exactly what they did to me and how they hire people without papers. Karma, if not done correctly, can turn around and bite you in the ass and leave a good mark.

As far as those months of not working, many teachers make that up by signing up for summer camps with kiddies, but you even have to start doing that in December or January because by March, things are full with veteran teachers returning. Money can be made in English teahing, but I advise all teachers to save for the lean months.

Shawn

quote:

Originally posted by Redwood:
Candela,

Thanks for the response. I know first hand that many academies are struggling to find GOOD teachers, and that won;tchange for quite a while because the majority of the good teachers leave academies and work for themselves. Who can blame them when academies pay so low, but expect you to travel so far?

Shawn

Which brings up a good question. Why don't more teachers buy cars or scooters to get around. The number one complaint I hear is everyone enjoys teaching but hates the hassle of getting around.
To me the extra cost of owing a car is more than offset by the extra hours you can teach. I currently teaching 24 hours a week and could easly bump it up to 30 hours if I wanted (I'm waiting till the fall because I want to work through all the books once) I love teaching, I feel like at times I'm getting paid to talk to people, beats real work. But I have a car so I'm not worried about how easy it is to get to the loction.

Rob (tim hortons "coffee" man in case you were wondering)

Tim,

I will tell you why most teachers complain about travelling and getting to classes. I can tell that you haven't been teaching for long and you do say that you have your own car. The fact that you even bring up buying a scooter or a car has nothing to do with how much a person gets paid to teach a class. We are talking about pay, not transportation.

But to answer your question, many teachers complain about travel time when they have to go outside of ZONE A. Those green buses going to Pozuelo or Alcobendas or in general all of those entering ZONES B and B1 are very unreliable when it comes to travelling to and returning from your class.

Many English teachers who teach in ZONE A also make the mistake of thinking that the metro is faster and better than the bus. I'll give you an example. I taught classes in OMRON ELECTRONICS on Calle Arturo Soria. The metro stop Arturo Soria was at least a 12 - 15 minute walk away. I took a bus (11, 70, 114, or 122) to get there and the bus dropped me off one block away from OMRON. So, it was convenient to get there by bus and I didn't have to go down a ton of steps to enter and back up a ton of steps to exit. For me, the bus is better because many times, it drops you off right in front of your destinantion.

I always gave myself plenty of time to leave the house when I caught the bus and I also didn't take classes where it was virtually impossible to get from one to the next without enough time. Let's face it. Many people in general hug the pillow until the last minute to get in that extra minute of sleep and in the end are in a rush and we know that as soon as we need the metro to run smoothly, it doesn't.

It never bothered me personally to travel. I used that time to read, meditate or even take in the scenery. Just before I left, all of my classes were in ZONE A. I started out teaching in Alcobendas at 8am and it didn't bother me, once I stated taking the earlier bus with less people on it.

Many times, I would walk to class on a nice day and would walk home too. Another example, I walked from Plaza de San Juan de la Cruz to Avenida de la Paz. It was about a 50 - 55 minute walk and it was refreshing. I got in good exercise and it showed my students that if there were ever a transportation strike, we would still have class.

All in all your situation is different since you have a car and my question to you is, are you remimbursed for providing your own transportation? It's good that you can talk about having your own car, but I know of VERY FEW academies that reimburse you for mileage.

quote:

I love teaching, I feel like at times I'm getting paid to talk to people, beats real work.

But teaching is real work. You make it seem like it's nothing at all to teach a person. If you are not planning and just making stuff up as you go along, of course it isn't real work. It's playtime, but I can tell you this much right now, if the students are not getting what they want, you will loose that class so fast that it makes your head swim and you'll probably never know why.

So, be please be careful with making that statement. We already have enough backpackers flooding the market.

Shawn

We also might not want to buy cars or scooters so as not to contribute to the pollution and noise already maxed out here in Madrid.



As far as getting paid decently, Candy is right, it's all out there, but you just can't have it when you first arrive (unless you've got a super connection!). Several years in, you'll have a network of people that know you and you can find private classes for 20 and up. I only have one class right now for 35/hour, and it's a medical english class. But I wouldn't have any of it without the history and reputation I had to build over years here.

At the same time, I don't think anyone should accept less than 16/hour at this point; it's just not necessary and it doesn't help our situation as a whole.