u/notlikeinthemovies

hello! working in shenzhen, china as a kindy teacher, one of my students is graduating and i’ve heard through another teacher that this students parents want to reach out to me to tutor her once she’s graduated. i haven’t accepted the parents friend request yet, so he hasn’t formally asked me but im hired by an agency of which it states in my contract that any part time work outside of my post is forbidden. i need to actually review the details before i consider this further and see if it’s a ‘fine’ they serve me with or end my contract with them all together.

i know there’s a lot of intimidation tactics in my contract with them, i guess i just want to know if anyone has found themselves in a similar position if they were found out to be working outside of their contract what happened? im considering tutoring this student for free because i really like her, and wouldn’t mind the additional experience but i think my agency would still think im being paid and punish me, they aren’t the nicest haha.

thank you in advance!

hi! I’m an ESL teacher in China, and started work in February this year with a kindy school. I’m from England so native English speaker, and yes im white and have the ‘typical’ appearance Chinese schools would look for.

I am contracted by an agency for a year, and i have been thinking about my options when my contract is up. I enjoy the job, i’ve already had really great feedback from not only the school but my fellow teachers and students parents. The head teacher has already expressed how she would love for me to stay, and i’ve heard from one of the chinese teachers i’ve befriended that i’m spoken well of by the other teachers. I work hard, love the kids, and have often stayed late off my own back to do a good job.

All this in mind, my pay is on the lower end (17k after tax) due to having had no experience before coming out here, but after a year i know my worth goes up a lot in the eyes of the employer. I can’t work for my current school independently once my contract ends, as the agency have put that in the contract as a breach. So i want to know, is it possible to negotiate with the agency for a higher salary to sign on for another year or even 6 months to finish out next years semester? If i could get another 5k, that would be enough for me to stay. I just don’t know how possible this is, how the agencies work with budgets and how i would best to go about this.

I know i could go to another school and get more money, but i love my school. The kids are great, the workload is reasonable and i love my co teachers. Teaching isn’t a long term goal here, i want to save money to come back home so if i can do another year in somewhere i enjoy and that I’m settled thats my perfect scenario.

Anyone had experience with this? Thank you!

i am fully aware that animals have little to no rights here on the whole and i moved here knowing that, but there’s a few tortoises that are literally in glass containers with barely any water and now there’s a hamster in my class in a tiny cage with little to no bedding to burrow in. if i pay out of my pocket to make their lives a little bit better, will the school see this as me suggesting they’re negligent? i just don’t want to get myself into trouble, but i really just want to make these little creatures lives a little bit better if i can. i’ve owned hamsters so i know what i can do for the little guy, but what can i buy/do to make the tortoises life a little better without being too obvious im like ‘hey these animals aren’t getting what they need?’

hi! i moved here in february to teach and i live in Shenzhen. i really enjoy and love my job (as exhausting as it can be) teaching kindergarten but it’s settling in to China in general i’m finding difficult. i’m not a shy person and usually quite adaptable, and i love how safe it is here but i’m still getting my head around living here. Anyone who’s lived here a while have any tips on how to best adjust yourself? I’m honestly exhausted and don’t have a crazy amount of energy to research what’s good to do on the weekends but i don’t want to just stay inside my apartment and rot all the time haha.

edit: thank you so much everyone for the advice! i’m going to read through it all and definitely give it a try