Another Job Possibility

On my second day in Luodong I began to meet the other foreigners in the area. Early on in every conversation, the question came up:
“Where do you work?”
My answer was met with a variety of reactions, none of them good. Flat out guffaws, head shakes and “Oh, that sucks...”

So under the circumstances you can imagine my response when a woman who owned a different kindergarten head-hunted me a week later.
I was at a local 'western-style' sports bar with some friends when a very chatty Taiwanese woman came to our table. Her English was excellent and she instantly took an extreme interest in me, asking where I was from, how I liked Taiwan and how I liked my job. I figured it was harmless to tell her the truth- that I loved my co-workers and the children, but I felt that it was unfair that we were only paid for the time we were actually standing in front of the class teaching when there was so much extra work to be done that we never got paid for. Only after about 30 minutes of chatting did it come out that she owned her own English kindergarten and was looking for another teacher. She gave me her card and I could tell she was excited, even though she tried not to be pushy. Before she left she bought our table two snack dishes and a round of drinks.
The job she was offering was salary- something I wasn't too pleased about until I spoke to the other foreign teachers who worked there. Their schedule was from 8:30 am until 4:30 pm, with a two hour break time in the middle. They were paid for meetings and class preparations, and though they were required to be there all day to work on other things (helping the kids get their lunches, helping to clean the classroom) they were only responsible for 3 actual in front of the class teaching hours per day. The salary was 60,000 a month- 30,000 taxed and 30,000 tax free that they would pay under the table (this is a common practice and helpful because tax for new foreign workers is 20% if you've been in the country for less than 183 days of the first year.) I was making about 57,000 per month at Hess, teaching 6.5 hours in front of the class per day. This other school was less by 3,000 nt after taxes, but the hours were so much better and it seemed much more chill. I'd also have some freedom to teach what I wanted to teach and slow down or speed up according to the children's level. I decided to go for it.

Part of what made the job so much more enticing than Hess was that we were paid for class planning and meetings. Like I said, when I was researching Hess I believed that I would be able to stay at Hess only the hours that I was teaching (4-6 hours a day) and the 20 minutes of unpaid preparation time before each class (which of course added up to another hour each day). What I wasn't prepared for was
a.) the meetings (at least one 1 hour meeting per week, scheduled a half hour after my class ended and in the middle of a break. The hour long meeting often stretched for longer than an hour, but sometimes would be less),
b.) homework and test grading – which was fine for my lower level classes but OH MY GOSH for my Step Ahead 12 class took at least an hour per class, 2 or 3 if there had been a test or quiz.
c.) 'communication books' in which I wrote a little blurb about each kid in my kindergarten class twice a month- Communication books were done for Jump every week, and the rest of the classes once every 3 months- which isn't so bad but really adds up – and always seemed to be due the day that you really wanted to get the heck out of there.
d.)Performance planning and preparation – more on this later.
e.) planning 'fun times' and art projects for kindy. There is a 45 minute 'fun time' every day- there is a 'fun time' book which outlines projects to do during this time, some of which are pretty great- only problem is my branch had decided that the 'fun time' materials were too expensive and refused to buy them. Of course they didn't tell us this outright- we just had to discover it for ourselves by requesting materials for a certain day and then...never receiving them, which could wreck havoc on class planning. Anyways I rarely looked at my fun time book after the first week- saved me the frustration of expecting materials that never came and of planning elaborate fun times in my free time.
if you wanted to do anything special for your kids (which if you're me you always want to do special things- those kids are great and when I had an idea that I thought would really help my class understand a new concept, it was nearly impossible for me to dismiss it- even if it took hours of my free time to prepare an activity or art project that I thought would help the kids.)
Planning REALLY helps classes run better. It just sucks to spend hours of blood, sweat and tears and never be compensated for them. I also often bought my own materials for the class if I had an idea that I couldn't resist doing. I never bothered to be reimbursed for buying these materials because my co-workers had tried and were met with the useful-in-every-awkward-situation taiwanese giggle.
“remember how I said I needed pipe cleaners for my kindy classes, and you kept saying you would buy them for me, and never did?”
“giggle giggle”
“And remember how I said I would go buy them myself, and you said I could and would be reimbursed?”
“Giggle giggle”
“Ummm, it was only 100 nt. Can I be reimbursed?”
“Giggle giggle giggle”
“I have the reciept right here.”
“Giggle...”
and so on.
the money never materialized.
I informed my manager at Hess that I wanted to leave, and he told me that I would be charged the 20,000 nt even though I was still in my first month of employment, because I was still staying in the country. Plus, I owed Hess 30,000 nt for the interest free loan I took out. I added up my meager funds and realized I could never make it. But I was so desperate to get out that I decided I would take a cash advance on my credit card to cover expenses.

Looking back, I absolutely wish i would have taken that other job. I had four friends who worked at that other school, and while they were often annoyed by their job, they never put up with the crazy crap that I put up with- and they always had more free time than I did and less stress.

It was my kindy kids. Those little rascals had been mine for 2 weeks and I was already completely in love with them. Also, my co-teacher was awesome. My friends kept telling me “Cami, the kids are cute everywhere- just go to the better job.” but I couldn't. As far as I could tell, all of my kids were brilliant and perfect and adorable, and though I only briefly met the kids at the other school, it was instantly clear that they were all average at best. I thought it over carefully and decided to ask James if they could go ahead and get a new NST, who could take most of my classes- And I would just continue to teach Kindy and maybe treehouse and jump. If I could just have a reduction of hours I knew I'd be okay, and it would benefit the branch because then they'd have less stress and another teacher available to sub. I was willing to give up as many hours as needed (I figured I could do some private tutoring on the side if I needed more money). I brought it up to James and he responded enthusiastically. I told the other school I wouldn't be working for them. James promised me that the new teacher would arrive in a month.