Kickstart Your TEFL Career in Vibrant Hong Kong-Asia's World City
13th November 2024
Hong Kong is one of the popular destinations of China that offers a bustling city full of mouthwatering Asian dishes, breathtaking cityscapes with neon lights at night, and a vibrant fusion of both east and west culture.
Hong Kong is not only popular for tourism but it also offers plenty of opportunities for creating a rewarding TEFL teaching career.
So, if you have made up your mind to experience the rich and exciting lifestyle of Hong Kong and looking to get hired to teach English in Hong Kong to build a successful TEFL teaching career, then buckle up!
In this blog post, we will be sharing a complete guide on how you can secure an English teaching job in Hong Kong and lead a fulfilling life in Hong Kong as well.
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Basic Requirements To Teach English In Hong Kong
The basic requirements to teach English in Hong Kong are-
- Should be a native English speaker
- Experience teaching English to children
- Having a minimum of 120 hours of TEFL certification
- Having a Bachelor’s degree
However, if you aim to teach in universities or are willing to secure high-paying English teaching jobs in Hong Kong then you must have a master's degree or post-graduate certification and have at least 2 years of experience.
Visa Requirement To Teach in Hong Kong
If you want to legally teach in Hong Kong then you need a working visa from the government called Z-Visa. Before you apply for the visa you need to have an employment letter from your employer or school. Your employers will take care of the visa process, but there are a few things that need to be done from your end before leaving your home country.
You will need to have all the below-mentioned documents to ensure a smooth process for getting your Z-visa.
- Scanned Copies of your photograph
- Scanned Copies of your passport
- Scanned Copies of your job letter from the employer
- TEFL certificate
- Any relevant experience (letter of recommendation from previous organization)
Once you have all the documents in order, you need to visit the nearest Chinese Embassy/Consulate and submit all the required documents. You can expect to receive your Z-visa in around 7 days or earlier.
The z-visa process might cost you around $90 to $140.
Different Types Of Teaching English In Hong Kong Opportunities
Source: researchgate.net
In the above image, you can witness there’s only 23.90% of people have a good command over their spoken English skills and 23.60% of the people have good written English skills. To improve these stats, Hong Kong is offering various teaching English opportunities for capable candidates from around the world. Let’s get to know different types of teaching English in Hong Kong opportunities lies for you to consider:
Local Schools
You can get plenty of opportunities to teach in government schools in Hong Kong, as there’s a huge demand for TEFL teachers around the globe. You will get to work hand in hand with local teachers who will also help you adapt to the local government school environment. You can expect a good salary compared to kindergarten and learning centers.
You can find government English teaching opportunities through NET scheme and other job portals available online.
Additionally, don’t forget to ask every doubt and queries related to teaching like-
- What will be your net salary?
- Is there any responsibility after school hours, like-parents-teacher meetings (because these meetings are generally held in the Cantonese language)
- What will be the working hours?
International Schools
There are plenty of teaching opportunities in international schools in Hong Kong. You can expect a very good salary package and easy-to-manage working hours.
However, the competition is huge to teach in international schools, because the students you will find here are mostly from different countries who have already a high English language proficiency.
To stand a good chance to teach in one of the international schools, you need to have a teaching degree, a teaching license from your home country, Native English-speaking proficiency and you need to have a master’s degree.
Kindergarten
If you love to teach preschoolers or children of 3-5 years old then teaching in Kindergarten is the perfect choice for you. You can expect to work with local school teaching staff to plan out instruction lessons and activities for the young learners.
However, teaching in kindergarten can be exhaustive sometimes, because other than teaching and planning you are also expected to compile the progress of each student and share it with parents’ time-to-time which can be consuming.
Moreover, on the bright side, you will get to teach adorable children who will be full of enthusiasm and it will reward you handsomely on a paycheck basis too.
Learning Centers
In learning centers, you will find mostly adult students who are looking to learn the English language to progress in their respective careers or for higher studies. If you have decided to teach in learning centers in Hong Kong then you can expect to work on Saturday too.
However, on the bright side, you can expect to get two days off each week. Generally, in most of the learning centers, you can expect days off on Sunday and one on any of the weekdays, but you can be certain that you will not get 2 days in a row week off.
Talking about paychecks, it varies with different learning centers. We suggest you do your own research about the learning centers before joining to see how well you will get paid and about the work culture.
Earning Potential For Teaching English in Hong Kong
Hong Kong is one of the top TEFL destinations which offers very generous paychecks to qualified TEFL teachers. If you have bagged a full-time TEFL teaching job, you can expect to earn around HK$16,000 to HK$65,000 ( $2,000 – $8,380) monthly.
On top of that, if you want to earn extra money by offering private classes then you can charge around HK$100 – $550 ($13 – $70) per hour.
However, if you are a complete fresher and you come across a question from your employer: What is your salary expectation? Then, you should know the average salary of TEFL teaching in Hong Kong is around $2,600.
Cost of Living in Hong Kong
Let’s get to know what cost you are going to bear while you teach in Hong Kong below:
1-Bedroom Apartment: Around 18,800 HK$ ($ 2,399.07)
Utilities (Electricity, Gas, Water): Around 1,626 HK$ ($ 207)
City bus Fare: 10 HK$ ($ 1.27)
Taxi rate per km: Around 8.50 HK$ (start fare ~ 24 HK$)
Internet (60 Mbps): Around 202.98 HK$ ( $25.86)
Metro Ride: 10 HK$ ($ 1.27) one way.
Metro Ride Monthly Pass: 500HK$ ( $63.69)
Gym, Cinema, Clubbing: Around HK 1,500 – HK$ 2,300 ($200 – $300)
On average, you can expect your cost of living should be around $1000 or 8000 HK$.
Begin Your TEFL Teaching Journey In Hong Kong With Confidence
Hong Kong is referred to as China Lite, which offers the culture of both East and West with an abundance of possibilities for both living life happily and for securing good English teaching jobs in Hong Kong. Go through our complete guide and embark on your TEFL teaching journey in Hong Kong with confidence.
So, what are you waiting for, pursue courses like Online TEFL Course in Hong Kong and get hired to teach English in Hong Kong in the coming days.
Written By : Sanjana
