Berlitz is a language instruction company, founded in 1878, headquartered in Princeton, New Jersey. Their mission is to help people feel confidence while communicating in a global environment.
Berlitz has a wide variety of modes for delivering instruction: face-to-face, virtual, online, mobile, and study abroad. They offer instruction to corporations, adults, students, and children. Berlitz will custom-design a program to address the specific needs of the client.
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In this review, I’m going to talk about a part-time virtual classroom instructor opportunity.
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Berlitz Requirements
To be an instructor for Berlitz, you must be fluent in a language and have a desire and passion for learning and teaching. You also need to be comfortable working in a diverse environment with a flexible schedule.
Technical requirements include:
- Eligible to work in the U.S.
- A Bachelor’s degree or equivalent
- Teaching experience is a plus
Berlitz is proud of being an Equal Opportunity Employer. If you are qualified for the position, your application will be considered! If you need accommodations for completing an alternative application due to a disability, or any other support in completing the application, you can email them directly at applicationaccommodation@berlitz.com.
How to Find a Virtual Position with Berlitz
Before you can apply to work for Berlitz, you’ll want to go to their website to search for available positions. It’s going to say Search Open Jobs. In the field for City, you’ll want to type: work from home. This will show you all of the virtual positions that are available at the time of your search. Without specifying “work from home,” 326 positions are found. But you’re looking for a virtual position, so typing “work from home” in the city field narrows the search down to 16 available positions.
Berlitz is currently looking for part-time language instructors for the following languages:
- Dutch
- Czech
- Spanish
- Malay
- Norwegian
- Cantonese
- Mandarin
- Russian
- Polish
- French
- Korean
- Italian
- Arabic
- Japanese
- English
- German
I selected English and was re-directed to a description of the position. Scroll to the bottom, and you can click on Apply On-Line.
Berlitz Application Process
When you click on “Apply On-Line” you are directed to a new page where you can either Log In or Create a New Account. When you create a new account, you are uploading your resume, or inputting your resume information. Creating your profile will allow you to quickly apply for other openings in the future. You can also receive email notifications if a new job is posted which matches your resume.
How Much does Berlitz Pay?
Glassdoor reviews of Berlitz indicate that the average instructor salary for Berlitz is $15 per hour. The range is $10-$21 per hour.
A current language instructor says that the pay is low; they are getting $13 per hour. They feel this is low since Berlitz charges approximately $2000 for 40 lessons. If a lesson is 1 hour, it comes out to be about 25% going to the instructor. If the lessons are less than an hour, this number changes.
What is the Schedule Like at Berlitz?
The benefit of working part-time from home is usually that you can set your own schedule and you don’t have to work a full day.
With Berlitz, you will mostly work early morning or evening hours, with mid-day open.
According to reviews, the hours are low, and the scheduling is “messy.” One review claimed that you don’t receive your schedule for the next day until 6:00 PM at night. So at 6:00 PM tonight, you learn about your schedule for the next day.
BUT, you can show as much or as little availability as you want! So even though you don’t get your schedule until the night before, you previously had the opportunity to say if you are available on certain days or at certain times.
Berlitz Feedback
There is a huge amount of feedback for Berlitz on Glassdoor! The feedback is OK, averaging out at 2.9 out of 5 stars. Almost 50% of the 544 reviews would recommend Berlitz to a friend.
Some of the reviews that caught my attention:
- A current employee claimed to do 20 hours of unpaid training. (That’s good information to know, but I would take it with a grain of salt, as they are still employed with Berlitz!)
- Outdated teaching methods
- Low pay
- Messy and unreliable schedule
- Low hours
- No advancement opportunities
Berlitz also received many positive reviews:
- Competitive pay
- Good place to start with little or no experience
The company pays the instructor even if the student cancels or doesn’t show for the scheduled lessons.
Is Working at Berlitz a Scam?
According to my research, the Part-Time Language Instruction positions for Berlitz are for real. Not a scam!
The consensus that I got is that Berlitz is a great place to work without much experience to start. The pay is low-ish, but it’s a contract/freelance position, and the flexibility and opportunity to help others makes up for it.
Here’s the link again if you want to apply for the Part-Time English Language Instructor Virtual Classroom position with Berlitz! If you decide to apply, let us know how it goes!
A similar company called SayABC is currently actively hiring and paying up to $28/HR! Make sure to check them out!
Make sure to check out over 35 Work From Home Education Jobs.
Don’t think that language instruction is for you?
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Carrie, you are wrong to doubt the claim of a teacher doing 20 hours of unpaid training.
I can confirm this and can ask any of my colleagues to corroborate this too. Just because we are desperate to find employment does not mean the claim is dubious. Not only did I (nor any prospective teacher) not get paid for our time, I was then made to feel it was in my best interests to train others for free in my own time. Be assured that Berlitz is too large and too differently franchised for you or I to give an accurate overview of it. I work in a South American branch but my days are numbered after I raised concerns over how badly it was being run and how those offered a contract weren’t allowed to read them before signing. I can back up everything I have stated here. To prospective teachers at Berlitz; the work is fantastic, but the pay and passive-aggresive bully tactics of the management are unacceptable.
Thank you for sharing Adrian and sorry to hear about some bad experiences.
Brok
This is sooo true and a million times more!
Hi! The thing I would want to know, both as a perspective virtual instructor and also as the parent seeking to receive language instruction for his/her child would be what exactly is the curriculum of this program called Berlitz?
I guess I would be quite skeptical as a parent to pay a lot of money for my child to receive language instruction when I would not know exactly what would be taught to my child regarding a language – and furthermore HOW it would be taught.
The pay, considering the fact that other online tutoring programs pay a minimum of between $25 on up to $35/hour for those people teaching students is quite low coming from Berlitz. At most $21/hour, and as you indicated in some cases going well below that average figure as testified by people who previously were employed by Berlitz would be a definite turn-off for a person seeking such a job.
How thorough is this company’s vetting process, especially as you indicated a perspective tutor need not have actually teaching experience? Again with other programs it is a definite requirement that a perspective tutor have years of experience as a teacher; and not just be some recent college grad who had zero experience in an actual classroom setting. Apparently, Berlitz would accept those individuals according to the info you presented in your review
One other thing which I found to be a turnoff was when you mentioned that quite often tutors employed with Berlitz do not receive their next-day schedules until well into the evening. That is frankly unacceptable, and does not allow enough time for preparation. After all, teaching an 8 year old child is not the same as providing tutoring services to a 17-year old high school student.
This program is not a scam, but neither is it even close to being the best online tutoring website either.
Jeff