Class100

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• Class100 is a small company with a ambitious set of targets, trying to compete in a market with much bigger fish. This has it's pros and cons. One the one hand, the company is - in my experience after one year with them - much easier to communicate with. Nothing is automated and everything is done manually, so you can engage with them in the face of issues or emergencies and with me they have always been completely understanding. This has applied to illnesses, time off, last minute cancellations due to power cuts or internet drops. No penalties have ever been applied for these situations.
  The materials have had mistakes in the past, but the company is acutely aware of this nad puts a lot of pressure on it's staff to mitigate the problem - too much in fact, in my opinion, with fines to content makers as well as lesson guide writers for mistakes unnoticed.
  Local teachers are present in the class always. Whenever this has not been the case, I have told the staff in class 100 and they have inmediatelly communicated with the school to prevent that from happening again. To put it more clearly, for class100 it is unacceptable that you are alone in class with no local teacher. Naturally it would be mayhem. That said, the class is yours alone. Local teachers, support and keep order, but are asked not to intervine. In fact, some teachers tend to translate what the online teacher says nad class100 consistently communicates with the local school to prevent that from happening. As an experienced teacher with class100, I do not expect anything from the local teacher other than that he/she is there to keep order, and remains quiet if things are going well.
  They way the payment works is that you make yourself available for X amount of hours, and the class guaranteed payment of a number of classes, whether or not they manage to actually schedle any classes for you. In my case, I am available from -BJT- 8.30 am to 4.30 pm, for which they guarantee payment of 7 classes - 3.5h. Yes, there are times between classes that in which I don't do anything, but I know exactly how much money I'm getting at the end of the month without fault. Plus, I think these breaks are good to breathe some air, prepare the next lesson properly, have a snack, etc.

  As for the application process, it was straightforward and quick in my case, with clases starting shortly after my internview process whihc i did not attempt to reschedule. In all fairness, if as a candidate for a job has bigger fish to fry, as an employer I wouldn't be to bothered to make things easy for him. Since I have had this experience, I can't comment negatively on the selection process, but I will say that they company is overstaffed. They teach public schools, ang getting more clients in this sense is much more challenging, with local staff often flying all around clients and having several day meetings with schools. What this means is that if you apply, you might want to be prepared for a long waiting time as theyre might simply not be enough classes for everyone.

  • Hi Tony, can you tell me how long did it take them to respond to your application? Also, if you don't mind sharing, how much do they pay per class? Thank you!

• I'm afraid Class100 is misrepresenting themselves when they talk about "co-teaching" and "dual teacher classrooms." After applying, I was sent materials for the interview that stated that the "co-teacher" may even leave the room when you are teaching. When I asked further about this, I was told that it is "your classroom" when you're co-teaching, which is not co-teaching.

  Also, just for information: the way Class100 works is that the teacher signs up to be open for a few hours at a time, and the company guarantees work for only a certain proportion of those hours. Thus, there is some time that you have to be available and ready that you may not be paid for. This is my understanding, but the materials they send are full of English errors that can make the meanings of policies unclear.

  Full disclosure, in case Class100 tries to discredit me: I did have to reschedule my interview twice, because I was still working a full-time job in a different time zone and had meetings that changed times. Class100 contacted me only via Skype, and were very understanding about having to reschedule. On reviewing the information I discussed above, I wrote outlining my concerns and suggesting it may be best I withdraw my application. I never received an email back. I thus assumed that my rescheduled interview was still on, prepared accordingly, and logged in. I waited ten minutes before contacting them. They said they thought I wanted to cancel, and offered to reschedule again. I said that, not having heard back, I assumed nothing was cancelled. I outlined my concerns, and pointed out that what they said in their job information materials and what they were telling me now was different. I was then abruptly told that my rescheduling clearly meant I was not preparing well for the job, and they wanted nothing further to do with me--an about face from the understanding attitude they had shown before. I regret the interview rescheduling due to my job, and I am not without fault in the entire matter, but the fact remains that Class100 was ready to interview me and presumably continue onward even after I had to reschedule twice, and only reacted negatively when I began to ask questions about how they are representing themselves. This does not speak well for how they treat their employees.