Teaching at an International School

Not nearly what you're worth for starters..... teachers of any subject are notoriously underpaid all over Brazil. With any luck you will make enough to get by on, pay your rent, buy food, pay the bills and not much else. Sorry to rain on your parade, but that's just the way it is. Even if you are great at cutting costs and live in austerity you probably won't be able to save money. That's probably they didn't give you all the gory details about salary at the time they made the job offer. If I were you I'd come right out and ask them point blank just how much they are willing to pay.

Cheers,
William James Woodward - Brazil Animator, Expat-blog

EConnH3 wrote:

Hello Everyone!

I just got offered a job as an elementary school teacher in Sao Paulo at an American/International School. What should I expect to get paid per year?

Congrats! Hope you get a decent enough salary. Please do let us know too what they end up paying you and how was your experience.

I have a question for you. Do you have any teaching diploma/experience  what you feel helped in getting a job as a teacher? Or just being a native speaker is good enough. I  have teaching experience, which I am hopeful will come in handy if I end  up living in Brazil. But I also wanted to know if I need to get some sort of verification of my degrees also from my home country. I am from asia btw.

My basic interest in applying for a teaching job would be to be closer to my kids and make some money alongside too to help pay their private schooling fee which I believe would be in the line of approx 300-500 USD. I would have three kids going to school so it kind of adds up

Any and all helpfull comments are welcome pls.

Soie5,

The earning potential for a language teacher, especially Enlgish, depend solely on WHERE one is teaching and whether they are teaching in a school or private classes.

For example, in São Paulo a teacher who works in a private language school can expect to earn around R$25,00 per hour of classroom teaching. Preparation time is unpaid work. Very few schools offer a salary unless they are private institutions and the teacher is working full-time. In São Paulo if you are giving "in-company" classes you can expect to earn anywhere between R$28 - R$35 per hour of teaching time, bus fare may or may not be included.

In smaller cities the pay scale would be lower still.

Teaching private "in-company" students in São Paulo a teacher can  earn around R$40 per hour and upwards quite easily. The problem is taking the time to build a student base. What I always suggest is that one start in one or more of the language schools and let them fill the hours you want filled. Begin recruiting private students through ads, personal website, leaflets, word of mouth and as you build your own student base reduce the number of classes with the school(s). You won't get rich teaching here, but you can get by and you can tailor your work to your lifestyle.

Cheers,
William James Woodward - Brazil Animator, Expat-blog Team