Getting a job—Agency vs. self-placement: Part II

Continued from February 26, 2007

Today I want to pick up where I left off and discuss the forum posts I found regarding Footprints Recruiting.

While Footprints had me at hello, it didn’t have me for long thanks to the earnesty of online discussion forums. In one post from TESall.com, the author discusses how Footprints placed her in horrible working conditions. She also points out something I previously hadn’t considered: Letting a recruiter place you with an employer that you haven’t talked to or investigated could potentially be much more risky than heading abroad and doing it yourself.

Recruiters will likely give you minimal input when negotiating your contract, and may place you in a school that suits their needs more than your own. I can’t help but wonder if schools are willing to pay recruiters a fee because they can negotiate low paying contracts that will end up compensating for fees paid.

The next post basically says that Footprints isn’t trustworthy and cares more about commissions than teachers. It offers the following advice, which I’ve heard from other experienced teachers abroad and am becoming increasingly convinced of:

I recommend contacting schools directly, talking to other teachers who are already in the country where you want to teach for job leads, sucking up the cost and flying out to the country and looking around yourself. Jobs are plentiful, don't get caught up in the recruiter trap.”

In fact, there is general distaste for recruiters among the TEFL community, mostly because they are assuming a middle man position where one not need exist.

From everything I’ve heard and read so far, it really sounds like you can negotiate a much better situation and salary if you take a do-it-yourself approach. Though it may require a lot more work at first, the experience you gain and the job itself will probably be worth it in the long run.