English Teaching Jobs in China

April 8, 2016 - PRLog -- I am recently working on a project that involves in recruiting for ESL Foreign English Teachers in China. So just want to share some tips for those jobs seekers who are looking to start their career as ESL English teachers in China.

When you are reading this article I assume that you have already had your own research on China culture and living style etc and you have your own reason why you are looking to come to China, so I am not going to cover those lifestyle matters.

Salary for foreign English teacher tends to range from 10k to 25k per month depending on how complete you have your documents ready. (Yes, your experience matter, but more importantly it is how complete you have your documents ready).

If you are getting paid around the 10k mark, most probably it is because you don't have your documents ready and therefore the insitution that chose to employ you are actually taking some legal risk therefore they have to reduce your salary to counter with the potential risks associated. Currently if a insitution got caught in employing a non Zvisa qualified foreign teacher the fine is 10,000 RMB.

Insitutions will only pay you the higher salary, if you are a Z Visa qualified English teacher and the below are what you need.

1.) Offer Letter (from a insitution that have enough quota to employ for foreign teachers.)

2.) Foreign Expert Certificate (English Teaching)

a.) Bachelor degree

b.) a TESOL/TEFL/CELTA Certificate (with 120 hours written on the cert)

c.) 2 years English Teaching work experience from a business/ insitution

d.) Your passport must be from UK, USA, Canada, New Zealand, Australia

3.) Non-Criminal Record

4.) Health Check

Details

1.) Offer Letter (from a insitution that have enough quota to employ for foreign teachers, these quota are being assigned to different insitutions by the government)

At the moment, China is short of qualified English Teachers, so as long as you qualify for the below, you will easily get your offer letter. This shouldn't be a concern.

2.) Foreign Expert Certificate (English Teaching)

a.) Bachelor degree of any subject: No needs to explain.

b.) a TESOL/TEFL/CELTA Certificate: This one is a little bit crazy, in most cities in China they would require you to have 120 hours written on the cert, so which means even if you have attended a 120 hours TESOL course, as long as you don't have the wordings "120 hours" written on your cert, the expert bureau will reject your application. (side note: I have come across with some agencies that make up their own 120 hours cert for their candidates, but it is not without a cost they will charge you about 2000 RMB for just doing the simple Photoshop trick, again the officers only care whether you have the documents, they don't really check the authenticity, anyway so I would recommend you to chase up your own TESOL cert issuer to either reprint your cert or issue you with a formal letter to state that you have attended a 120 hours course.)

c.) 2 years English Teaching work experience from a business/ insitution: If your past English teaching experience are gained in China without an expert cert and Z Visa or through private tutorial, the chances are the expert bureau won't count them as real experience. Also, if your previous employer cease to exist or dont want to give you a release letter, sorry the expert bureau won't be able to accept your application too.

For this to work, it is better that your 2 years experience are gained from overseas, at least the officers wouldn't be able to challenge you for working without a Z visa. So what you need is a formal letter (with a letter head and company chop) stating that you have work under them from this time to this time and there is an office number for the expert bureau to call to verify. Yes that's all you need. I would like to give you an example here, let's say if you have been doing private tutoring in your home country for more than 2 years, you can easily turn them into countable experience by making up a letterhead and getting your friend to help you to answer the call from the expert bureau to state that you have worked as an English teacher from this time to this time (afterall servicing one student client can still be a business right.) I know it is just superficial, but this is what the expert bureau needs and your new employer wants to see, so make your private tutoring looks more like a formal business you co-run with a partner please.

d.) Your passport must be from UK, USA, Canada, New Zealand, Australia. (South Africa is only considered as a native English speaking country in some provinces in China, if you are coming from South Africa your will need to check with your agent, but even if the province of your choice accepts South Africa as a Native Speaking country, you bar will typically be higher, for instance they would require you to have 5 years experience instead of 2. Unfortunately it is not a company decision, so if you want to complain about it you will need to take it up with the Chinese government.)

Also passport is the only thing that defines your nationality. For example, you could be born in UK, educated all your life in UK, but without a UK passport, they still wouldn't recognise you as a UK native. This doesn't make sense right?! Yes, welcome to China.

3.) Non-Criminal Record, you need to be criminally clean.

4.) Health Check, you don't carry any disease.

Big Congratualation, if you have all the above checked you should be able to get your Z Visa. your new employer will assign you an agent along the way to help you to obtain the Foreign expert cert and Z visa. but most agencies wouldn't help you to come up with your health check, criminal check record, TESOL cert, Bachelor degree, proof of previous employment etc, so you will need to have those ready for them to proceed.


I am always in need of English Teachers, please feel free to drop me a CV if you are qualified for the above. eugene.yao@asaventure.com