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The yearly cycle for English teachers

The formal academic school year starts on September 1st, without fail. So, we will use this as our starting point. In addition, the teaching cycle is irrespective of a student's age, which means that adult students will also be looking to start at around this time and will almost exactly follow the academic school year.

Big ESL schools like BKC or Language Link or English First start to hire in early to mid-summer. The contracts they offer are for 3, 6 or 9 months, although depending upon the hiring manager, it could be possible that you negotiate a non-standard contract.

A few weeks after September begins, usually in the first weeks of October, the first wave of teachers will wash out. This puts the hiring manager into a delicate situation. It might be too risky to take the time to hire from abroad, so it's time to look local. At first, schools will be more selective, but as the days go by without a "native English speaker" onboard, the selectivity starts to die down. (Native English speakers are part and parcel to their sales pitch.) Students will study hard for about 3 months, but come December, they will start to drop out. The reason is because of the length of the January holidays in Russia. Officially, the Federal holidays begin on Dec 31 and last until January 9. You read that correctly; the citizens of Russia get nearly 10 straight days off for winter holidays. Some people use some of their 28 paid vacation days (28!) in the last part of December to take really long vacations to visit friends, relatives or go on extended holidays in places like Europe or the Maldives. Another reason people start to drop out is simply due to the festive corporate events and the copious amounts of alcohol consumed. In addition, the end of December is the end of the Fiscal Year for companies as well as the Federal Government, so budgets have to be made, yearly reports finished, etc. In short, this is a very busy, festive time.