is it normal

[Dave]

Hi folks

I have a question to put to all you teachers and ex-teachers.

Is it normal for a public Univ. to tell you to come on a turist visa and present you with these clauses in the contract that reads and I quote

"When either of the two parties fails to fulfill the contract or fails to fulfill the contract obligations according to the terms stipulated, that is, breaks the contract, it must pay a breach penalty of US$500 to 2,000 (or the equivalent in RMB)."

"Monetary salary RMB xxxx yuan per month. The salary will be paid monthly with RMB from the day of starting work to the expiration of the contract. In case the time is shorter than a whole month, the payment shall be counted by day. The daily wage shall be 1/30 of the monthly salary (the same with February). No more than 70% of the salary can be changed into foreign currencies monthly. The employed party shall pay the personal income tax in accord with the Personal Income Tax Law of The People's Republic of China.

and finally

"The employed party that is engaged through self-recommendation or others' introduction shall pay a certain amount of credit bail (600 $ to 1,000 $, or that set by the host institution) before entering China so as to prove his/her good faith for employment. The host institution shall handle the formalities for the employed party to enter China after receiving the bail. The bail shall be returned to the employed party as the employment ends.

Where the host institution provides the employed party with the international air ticket to China, the employed party may purchase the ticket by him/herself (with the traveling expenses as the credit bail), and the expenses will be reimbursed before the expiration of the contract."

I am buying my own ticket.

Please let me know your opinion.

I feel a little unsafe on signing this contract.

Thx

Dave

[roddy]

Seems to be more common for teachers to be told to come in on tourist visas, even by public universities. I wouldn't worry about that too much.

Everything else is a standard contract, apart from the 'bail' (nice choice of words) - never seen that before, but I've been out of the English teaching game for a couple of years.

Roddy

[kailin]

I was employed as a teacher four years ago, so, like Roddy, I might be out of the loop, but in my opinion, that "bail" clause is sketchy. I was provided with a working visa, and my boyfriend, who conducted his job search just this summer, is waiting for his working visa paperwork, so in our experience the schools have arranged for working visas.

Purchasing your own airfare and getting reimbursed is definitely standard.

Good luck.

Kailin

[phbriggs]

Also see this recent post

[phbriggs]

The bail clause is also new to me. As far as I know, the standard SAFEA contract does not have a "bail" provision and suggest that the school has added it because they have hhad past problems with a foreigner. If this is the case, I would want to know what problems the past foreigner has had and why the school all of a sudden decided that "bail" was needed.

[Jive Turkey]

I have never taught on the mainland, but that "bail" clause looks quite sketchy. Unless it's a well established university with a good reputation and it is crystal clear that I'd be working for the university rather than some organization that has a relationship to provide services to the university, I would give this one a miss. Could you tell us which university has given you this contract?

[Dave]

For those curious in knowing I applied using "Isabelle-Angelina's ESL Cafe" very nice people on the other side ready to give you a hand, they proposed me this position at

Linyi Normal University.

There is also this other matter, teaching hours 20h but want me to work 8h a day, 5 days a week....whats the deal?

[imron]

Although it is quite common for many schools and universities to ask foreign teachers to come in on a tourist visa (saying they will swap it for a working one when you arrive etc, etc), this is a good warning sign that the school quite possibly isn't legally allowed to employ foreigners. This means it's quite easy for them to not pay you, not give you your 'bail' back, not reimburse you for your air-ticket etc.

The bail clause in the contract is unusual, and would indicate to me that the school has had problems in the past with foreigners who have just skipped off before the end of the contract. You might want to ask yourself why that would have happened, because people usually don't just skip off without a reason.

Do a search on a couple of ESL teaching forums about problems other people have had with coming in on a tourist visa, and you will soon realise that the safest option when teaching in China is not to work at a school that can't get you a Z (working) visa before you leave your country of origin.

I would steer clear of some place like this. There are plenty of schools around that are able to get you a Z visa, and my advice would be to try and find one of them.

[JackP]

Well... it doesn´t look to good:

http://www.eslteachersboard.com/cgi-bin/forum/index.pl?noframes;read=2862

[phbriggs]

Dave,

It doesn't look good. Any school which breaks a contract can cause enormous stress to foreign teachers working there and is not worth taking the risk. Suggest that you search around for another university/school which is not infamous. There are heaps of schools and universities as alternatives for you, and to me I would chose another rather than take a risk with the Linyi Normal University.

20h but want me to work 8h a day, 5 days a week

This also sounds a little excessive. It could possibly assumed that the contact hours (direct teaching) with students is 20 hours per week, but the university may require you to be available for students 5 days per week for at least 8 hours per day. If this is the case it is unreasonable unless they are paying you extra for every extra hour above the 20 hours you will work. If they are not, to me it is expliotation.

For a SAFEA contract, usually an average of about 16 hour per week contact hours is required by the school/university. We were fortunate to only have to work 11.25-12 hours per week (contact hours) + an extra 2 hour English Corner (extra curricular activity). Any thing over this we were paid extra. Only one exception to this overtime.....we did meet for about 2-3 hours each week with some of the students at lunch time/free classes or as punishment to the students who misbehaved, and were not remunerated for this. We were not really worried about remuneration for this as it gave us a chance to develop relationships with the students and also learn more about student life, China, their values etc.

[phbriggs]

Something else to know is you may have to work on weekends to make up for classes lost due to examination periods or public holidays. This will not be the norm.

[Dave]

To all who participated with their opinions and councling, I thank you from the bottom of my heart.

I let Linyi Univ. drop and will probably be taking a position at Petroleum University Shengli College.

I will probably be posting again asking for good advice.

Take care and best of luck to all

Dave