Hi. I'm a starting ESL teacher who recently completed my CELTA and started looking for jobs in the various language schools in New York. I noticed rate goes from $10 (!!!!) to $25(in one inner-city community center in East New York).

I'm not completely inexperienced; I taught academic/remedial English and academic writing to ESL students in a college's writing center for nearly 2 yrs while I was working on my BA in English, which I earned this June.

I know English teaching in general (outside of K-12), especially ESL teaching, is not exactly a lucrative profession, and certainly have no delusion of getting rich doing it. Still, what's a fair rate to ask for? One language school (Zoni) wants expected pay rate before they even consider your job application. I don't want to rule my application out by virtue of pay-rate, yet I don't want to sell myself short either.

I'd love to hear from other ESL teachers working in the private sector in New York City.

Thanks in advance!

The $10 - $15 per hour rate is about right for working at a language school in NY with your background/experience. If I were you, I would put down $20 on Zoni's application and see what you get. Most people who work at these places are only doing it part-time (as a second job, usually).

With your BA and CELTA you could make a lot more money if you chose to leave NY and teach abroad in Japan or KoreaESL is lucrative there and you don't have to teach K-12 if you don't want to (just a thought)-you could do it for a year or two-save money and move back to NY.