Open Work Rights

[housecat]

Okay. Open work rights. I need ideas. What CAN I do? What would YOU do? I know I can still teach. I want to make more money than that, if possible. If not, can I make similar money doing something else?

My Mandarin isn't up to snuff. I'm thinking of offering cooking classes and board game classes. I'd like to write or edit, or . . . ?

I need some fresh ideas. There's got to be lots of stuff I'm missing.

BA English, MA Teaching. Single mom.

What do you say?

[Okami]

First, must not troll comment and I want to appreciate all that have the willpower to not troll. I personally know how hard it is.

I'd suggest 104.com.tw or whatever catches your fancy. Work the various job boards for each city.

[housecat]

First, must not troll comment and I want to appreciate all that have the willpower to not troll. I personally know how hard it is.

I'd suggest 104.com.tw or whatever catches your fancy. Work the various job boards for each city.

Okami, thaks for the website. NO thanks for the snarkiness. Just looking for NEW ideas. Maybe there are none. I just thought I might not hurt to ask!

[Icon]

Join the club, dear, I am on the same boat (see my woe is me thread I lost my spark...). BTW, they mentioned you there.

So, once you have OPW, you could open your own business -if you have the capital, savoir faire, fire- or work in a different field not relate dto whatever you do now -which is teaching for you. And maybe you do not have to work so many hours. And in a better location, like your home.

When I started working here, it was because I needed a job that had a fixed schedule to fit my MBA classes. Ask yourself: what do I need right now? Do you want a better paying job or one with a late schedule? What is more important to you, location or salary or schedule or potential to get ahead in an organization?

I was looking into the colleges, not as an instructor, but many need like on campus advisors to manage their international programs. Sounds interesting. I've also looked into interpreter/driver gigs, but have to polish my driving skills. Materials development and editing are always popular, and can be done from home. Currently, I am leaning into setting up a pupusa stand in Bitan on weekends, for starters.

Problem with too much freedom is not knowing what to do with it once you got it.

[housecat]

Thanks for the great post, Icon. I'll have to check out your woe thread.

I need morning/flexble hours because my son is in school in the morning/afternoons. The problem with teaching is that it must be formal teaching to match this schedule, or I have to work in the evenings and never see my kiddo. Formal teaching is fine. I was even offered a job last month at a great school here, but couldn't accept it because my son was in hospital. They've offered me a position in September, but that's a long time from now.

Work that I could do from home sounds fabulous, actually, and I was talking to Tsuki a few months ago about doing some English to Spanish translation. I might still give that a go, but I kinda feel like a sham when I actually consider it. I did it in Arkansas, informally, for the Department of Human Services, though, and interpretation, too. I guess I just need to build up some confidence in a language I haven't used much in a long time.

[bigduke6]

Thanks for the great post, Icon. I'll have to check out your woe thread.

I need morning/flexble hours because my son is in school in the morning/afternoons. The problem with teaching is that it must be formal teaching to match this schedule, or I have to work in the evenings and never see my kiddo. Formal teaching is fine. I was even offered a job last month at a great school here, but couldn't accept it because my son was in hospital. They've offered me a position in September, but that's a long time from now.

Work that I could do from home sounds fabulous, actually, and I was talking to Tsuki a few months ago about doing some English to Spanish translation. I might still give that a go, but I kinda feel like a sham when I actually consider it. I did it in Arkansas, informally, for the Department of Human Services, though, and interpretation, too. I guess I just need to build up some confidence in a language I haven't used much in a long time.

Whatever you decide to do, you should work for yourself/start your own business. The problem is if you apply for a job locally, such as on 104, you will earn the same as a local would. Many people look at trading companies. These companies probably pay around 30 000-40 000 NT a month for such a position. They are not going to offer a foreigner more, even is they spoke perfect Chinese. They can get a local to do the job at the going rate. I did some consulting for some trading companies before, and suggested they look at foreign management for certain departments due to the inefficiency of local management practices. The usual response "How much? and then "Too expensive".
You are better off teaching as the money is a lot better.

So you need to look at your own business. This will start off small unless you have huge capital, so you will need to teach on the side. Do not ask me what to do though. If you have a business mind, import/export is the best bet IMHO.

[Dragonbones]

I think the idea of teaching cooking at home sounds fun. You could do small classes, and consider whether to treat it as a hands-on English class (so you teach them the relevant vocabulary in advance, then use it during the cooking lessons) or as a straight-up cooking class, taught in whatever language you can handle it in.

[housecat]

I think the idea of teaching cooking at home sounds fun. You could do small classes, and consider whether to treat it as a hands-on English class (so you teach them the relevant vocabulary in advance, then use it during the cooking lessons) or as a straight-up cooking class, taught in whatever language you can handle it in.

I was thinking of teaching the vocabulary first, then having fun in the kitchen. Way back when, there used to be a pretty good, mostly untapped market of lonley house wives in these parts. I can teach them how to cook the things they pay a killing for at places like Smokey Joes, or Friday's. They can tell their husbands the class will SAVE them money! Ha. Maybe. Cooking is something I really enjoy, but have very little time for.

[tsukinodeynatsu]

You know, the cooking's not a bad idea. You can hook up with some of the local temple associations (Tiandijiao does a lot of classes) or the Aiguo group to publicise.

If I were you, I would probably be looking at:

- Material/Curriculum development as a mainstay (once you get it started, cut your teaching hours so you can keep up)
- Online tutoring (ESL or English)
- Spanish - English translation (don't go the other way if it's written - www.onehourtranslation.com pays low, but it's good for some pocket money)
- Holding one or two group cooking classes a week. You're not going to get people to pay more than $200 or $300nt/hour for a group class, so try to get at least 5 people in a class. Then you make at least $1,000 per hour. If you set it up so you have one vocab prep class and one cooking class a week, that's at least $2,000 a week right there. More if you can run more than one class.

Something which I always thought might be interesting would be like an all-English after school care service. You know, instead of sending kid off to Anqinban or whatever after school they send the kid to you one or two days a week, maybe $1,000/day. You feed, look after and have fun with them in English - so maybe like Mondays and Fridays, so twice a week, $1,000/day, four kids a day. Take them home, feed them, take them to the park or arrange a game or watch a movie or something similar (something that your son would enjoy as well). Just all English. Some parents wouldn't like it because there wouldn't be time to do their homework (apart from English homework), but some parents would like it (I'm thinking parents of kids at international schools or bilingual schools would be interested). And for you it's only two days a week, and as my aunt said - she can either get a job and pay someone to look after her kid, or look after other people's kids and spend more time with her own.

If you can just set up the 4 kid twice-weekly daycare and one cooking class a week, that's $40,000/month there (albeit unstable income). Then add in a bit of translation and editing/curriculum design and you can make around $50,000/month. (Or you could add more kids or more classes.)

It's all unstable income (as in people will be sick or need the day off or whatever, and that comes out of your pocket) so don't quit at least one stable teaching gig until you have enough savings to fall back on just in case you make a particularly low amount whatever month, but it would be more fun.

[tsukinodeynatsu]

double post..