Asking university to give me private classes?

[Xander]

Hi,

half a year ago, I took one semester of Mandarin at BLCU. This time I am planning to go to Harbin. I am thinking about asking Heilongjiang University or Harbin Institute of Technology to provide me with a teacher and a place to study for four hours every day. I am planning to go there from mid July to October, maybe even to January 2007.

My questions are:

1)Do you think this is a good idea?

2) Considering that I want this kind of course is Heilongjiang University or HIT the right place to study?

3)Can you guys recommend any other universities near Harbin? I want to go to Harbin, due to the pure dialect, less English speaking people and fewer foreigners than in Beijing.

4) I am thinking of paying them 100 RMB an hour, which should cover the teacher’s salary and rent for the classroom + electricity. Is that sufficient ?

5) Do you thing they will fool me? How? I am thinking that the university makes far more money having 16 people in a classroom paying 10RMB and hour, than just having me paying 100 RMB. I am afraid they will, if they are able to fill all their classes, just tell me that there is no classroom available. What to do then?

Thank you for all the advice, you hopefully are providing me with!

Xander

[roddy]

I think you are on the right track. Some thoughts.

If you've already been to China, and you can sort a visa out one way or another, you might just want to do it all independently. You can hang around outside the classrooms at one of the universities and make contact with the teachers independently, for example. Obviously, there are visa and accomodation issues if not going through a university.

I think 100RMB an hour is more than enough, I'd be looking to pay a lot less. I'd also scratch the idea of using a classroom, and either have them visit you or work in the teachers office. Likely to be a lot less cold and empty. Alternatively, use a local cafe.

I'm pretty sure the university will provide this service, the question is what they will ask you to pay for it and what quality they get. If they don't have experience of running one-to-one lessons, you might just get stuck with the teacher they didn't have any other work for and classroom-style teaching instead of one-to-one tuition.

[Xander]

I think getting the visa or accommodation is no big problem. My experience is that renting an apartment is far better and cheaper than staying at the dorms.

Hanging around at the university asking the teachers might work. At BLCU most teachers worked from 8 – 12 and from 14.00 – 16.00, so it might be hard to find one kou yu and one zhong wen teacher, who is willing to teach me 20 hours a week each. Also I don’t necessarily want to have my classes from 16.00 – 20.00 every day. Another thing that would bother me is that learning in the morning is said to be more effective than learing in the evening.

One the other hand a friend of mine started out with four hours of private teaching, and said it was to exhausting. So I might just take classes from 16.00 – 19.00. I guess if you talk to the teachers at the university they have some friends they can recommend. These friends might turn out to be great retired teachers, or just regular guys with no teaching experience. Call me picky, guess I am, but I don’t like to sit and learn in a room (teacher’s office or café) with too much noise and distraction.

Quote:

I'm pretty sure the university will provide this service, the question is what they will ask you to pay for it and what quality they get. If they don't have experience of running one-to-one lessons, you might just get stuck with the teacher they didn't have any other work for and classroom-style teaching instead of one-to-one tuition.

That is exactly my problem. But is it such a big difference of having a class of 15 or just one person. I think it depends more one the teacher and you can always get stuck with a bad one whether you are in a normal class, or having one to one tuition. If the school is smart they put their worst teacher with the smallest class, me, so that damage is as small as possible. But I doubt they have any ranking when it comes to their teacher’s quality. At BLCU the teachers rotated from level to level, so that they got to teach a different class every semester.

I think going through a university would formalize the entire thing, and I would have some sort of contract. That would make me feel better, than just turning up at the university.

Of course contracts are not worth a lot in China, and there is no way I can make them teach me if they don’t want to. China is all over the news, and learing Chinese seems very popular these days. What are my chances that the university has an empty classroom meaning that teaching me is more profitably to them than teaching a class of 16 people.

Look at the math.

I am paying for one month: 100RMB/hour * 4 four hours a day * 5 five times a week * 4 four weeks in a month = 8000

HIT is asking for 300$/ 2 315 RMB a month per student. One class 2315 * 15 = 34725

Any comment is appreciated, thanks to everybody who is helping me out. Please excuse my english

[mlomker]

Four hours per day with private lessons would probably be too much. With a private tutor (and no other students asking 'stupid' questions) you could accomplish in three hours what a class would cover in four.

I'm not sure why you are going with a public university. Why not go with a private language school that is accustomed to working by the hour? They may only be able to get you six-month F visa's, but having a break for a trip after six months of intensive study might not be a bad thing.

The Bridge School in Beijing charges 85-95/hr for private tuition and it should be cheaper in Harbin. At 100/hr it would be an awful deal if you weren't getting a good teacher.

[roddy]

You might also want to look at Harbin (or is it Heilongjiang, I always forget) Normal University - Hashida (or Heishida?). I've heard good things about it, albeit a long time ago.

In your case, I'd ditch the university, get my visa and accomodation and find a tutor / teacher one way or another. There are a few people on here up in Harbin, perhaps they could help you find someone? Or at the least, I'd keep the independent route as a handy Plan B - I think there's quite a lot that could go wrong with turning up and offering a Chinese department unexpected cash for a service they don't usually offer.

[trevelyan]

Why not just go to the university in question and ask if they know any professors interesting in taking on private students. I don't see any reason why the university would not want to pass along that information. And this way you stay in control of whom you hire and the quality of your classes.

Getting a six month F visa should not be that difficult -- assuming you want to do more than extend your tourist visa twice and have a 3 month stay. Two easy ways to get a longer visa are either going to Hong Kong or taking on a part-time teaching job somewhere.

[Xander]

Hi,

I agree that four hours of one to one tutoring is probably more than enough, my friend says so as well, she is currently at the TLI, Taipei Language Institute. But if I want to make a competitive offer to a university, I think I have to go with four hours, otherwise they loose money the last hour the classroom is not put to use. I will however ask them, if they also can do three hours.

I also agree that a private school is much better than any university, but I haven’t found a single one in Harbin yet. I am sure they have them though. I don’t know if I am willing to go to Harbin, without knowing which school I will be going to. I would really like to go to a private school like the TLI in Beijing, which I have heard great things about, so if anybody knows of a good and reasonably priced private school, please let me know!!!

I am a little bit afraid that if I turn up at a university, and ask them if they can recommend/know of any professors, who are interested in taking on private students two things will happen:

1) I might not find a good one, because they all work in regular universities or language schools. Or they are willing to teach me from 16.30 to 19.30 only, I don’t want that.

2) I am too stupid to know whether or not the guy in front of me is a good teacher, or if he/she is a proper teacher at all.

What do you guys think? Is anybody in Harbin right know, and knows what the situation is up there???

I am going to send three e-mail to universities in Harbin this weekend, I let you know what they come up with.

Thanks for all the help so far.

[woliveri]

Currently I'm at SISU and am finding that the "firehose" method of learning is not the best method for me. I will not continue here next semester.

Problems: Teachers all speak Chinese from start to finish. No English. Of course, it's understandable since the classes are made up of international students so they need to stick to Chinese as a base. However, I can't understand the teachers. I understand about 50 to 70 percent of the lecture.... maybe. So if I have a question I am guarded to ask because I won't understand the reply.

I have 4 classes with about 40 or so new words in each chapter PLUS the words I don't know that are in the Chapter Story. So, multiply that times 4 for each week and you get OVERLOAD and no absorbtion as I'm jumping from book to book trying to learn the new words and not getting any of them in my head.

No composition. We are not asked to compose paragraphs so our sentence structures are not challenged. I would like to see more composition.

After this semester ends I will save my money and look for a tutor, work on one book at a time and spend more time with each chapter so I can actually get absorbtion.

[niubi]

as one point of reference, one-on-one teaching at yunnan normal university is 50rmb/hour. one thing i particularly like about the individual teaching arrangement is that i can choose the teaching materials. right now one text i am using is classical chinese: a basic reader published by princeton.

i doubt you would be able to get a teacher from 8-12 everyday as has already been mentioned here. i have a mix of classes in the morning and afternoon - one day i have no classes.

[mrtoga]

I am one of the Harbiners that Roddy referred to. Just saw this thread.

There is a private school up here catering mainly to Koreans that is quite popular. Unfortunately they do not allow their teachers to do individual classes even if you offer them more money - they really are not very flexible!

I know a few teachers that would bite your arm off for the money you are suggesting. A bit hesitant to introduce them in case you do not like them though. Selecting a teacher is quite a personal decision.

As for Harbin Normal, their foreign students programme seems to have fallen backward a fair way.

I understand your issue, but as someone mentioned all the good teachers are working during the mornings. The only exception is July / August and January / February. Come during this time and you will find a solution to your problem!

[Xander]

Hi again,

I will most likely arrive in late July, so I guess I can find a good teacher, and have him/her teacher me until his/her semester starts in September. I hope by September I have found a worthy replacement for her/him. That’s option number one, just going to a university in Harbin, and asking them if they can provide me with a good teacher.

I would still prefer to go to a proper university though, but no reply so far. I wrote to Heilongjiang University, Harbin Institute of Technology and Harbin Normal University. I asked them if they could give me private classes, so far no reply. Still some time till I am going.

I let you guys know, when the replies from the universities arrive.

Quote

as one point of reference, one-on-one teaching at yunnan normal university is 50rmb/hour

Hi Niubi, could you please answer the following questions?

How did you get Yunnan Normal University, to give you one-on-one teaching?

Did you choose the teacher yourself? How many teachers do you have?

How did you agree on the price?

Could you please describe your class schedule in more detail? How many hours do you have after four o clock, do you have classes on Saturday and/or Sunday?

Thanks again, to everybody you is providing helpful information on this forum.

[niubi]

one-on-one teaching is part of the program at yunnan normal (i think yunnan university also offers one-on-one teaching for about the same price) for those who are interested in paying more for it. 50rmb per hour is the set price (for reference: tuition for 1 semester taking small classes is 700usd - perhaps 20rmb/hour). i didn't choose my own teachers (i have 2), they were assigned to me based on availability and what i wanted to study i suppose. i think it is theoretically possible to choose your own teachers if they are available. i am taking 12 hours of class. i have no classes on the weekends (i think that would be rather unusual). 3 days a week i have 2 hours in the morning 8-10 (2x) and 10-12 (1x) and likewise 3 days a week i have 2 hours in the afternoon 1-3 (1x) and 3-5 (2x). i have one day without class during the week.

[Xander]

Thanks for the info.

Yunnan Normal looks really good, I checked out their website. Why did you choose Yunnan Normal, above Harbin universities or other universities/cities? Dialect, whether, living conditions, study environment ???

I found a lot on the forum about, Yunnan Normal and living in Kunming. I have however not found out what kind of dialect they speak there, which is really important to me. Is it somewhat like the one they speak in Beijing and Harbin???

Thanks for the reply, this is really helpful.

[niubi]

i chose yunnan normal from various reasons - recommendations and i decided i wanted to go to kunming to study because of climate, food, connections, etc. i studied in beijing many years ago, so i know what that is like. like northeastern china, sichuan, etc. people in kunming speak some variant of mandarin, though much less standard than what you will hear in harbin or beijing for that matter. it takes some getting used to, but you can easily adapt to the local sub-dialect of mandarin spoken here in kunming. perfect, standard mandarin doesn't exist in real life situations anyway - that is only a fiction of the academy and television/film. for the most part teachers are good about trying to speak in the most standard mandarin accent they can, but sometimes they can't help but slip in local pronounciations out of habit.

[mrtoga]

Because of the way university offices are operated here, office staff often will not give any response to e-mails unless the answer is very straightforward. The staff are worried that if they write something in an e-mail they are then bound to it, and if a future 领导 decides otherwise then they could be put in an awkward situation. The only option sometimes is to get a direct answer from a 领导, which is not possible by e-mail as a general rule.

Therefore there are quite a lot of students that are "left hanging" - waiting for a response that does not come. The question that the poster above asks would seem to fall into that category. This is one of the reasons students decide to use my company to handle applications on their behalf - they have either experienced these problems themselves or heard about them from friends.

There will undoubtedly be a lot of teachers happy to take 50RMB per hour to teach a one-on-one class. However I could not introduce a university teacher to you here in Harbin - I would be risking my relationship with the universities I work with. Private school teachers have time in the evenings, but it seems you prefer to study in the mornings right?

[thinlay]

niubi, thanks for your info! I am plannning on coming to Yunnan to study this Fall. But i plan on starting in Beijing and won't arrive at the beginning of the Fall semester. This is helpful to know i can arrange one-on-one teaching through YNNU.

Do i need to make advance arrangements, or is this possible just through visiting the administation when i arrive in Kunming? If i come mid-semester (i.e., October or November) do you know if it's possible for me to enroll in an existing class - if one suits my level (which will barely be above beginner, but at least 90 hours of classroom Chinese through Book 1 of New Practical Chinese Reader)? Or start a new small class, if others are also doing this?