Just curious if anybody has taught for Kaplan and what your opinion of it was. I’m up for a GMAT instructor position. If flexible enough, I think it might be a constructive way to spend downtime. I wouldn’t mind being an adjunct down the road sometime, too, and it might be good experience for that.
What’s the pay for a position like that? Lower than an adjunct professor role, I assume?
I used to teach for Stalla, which got acquired by Becker, which is owned by Kaplan. I think they paid about $750 per 3-hour lecture, which sounds good except for the fact that you aren’t paid for all the time it takes to prep, which can easliy be longer than the lecture itself, especially with new material.
As with most teaching, once you’ve taught the same material over and over, it gets easier because the prep time gets reduced (but not by as much as people who haven’t done it think it does). There are also special issues with teaching a curriculum like CFA or other professional exams, because you really have to be done with the material when time’s up. You can’t just say “we’ll pick up where we left off next class,” the way you can in a university classroom where you’re in control of the schedule and grading.
The other problem is that every year, they add new material to the curriculum, but they don’t [or almost never] add more time to the teaching schedule. As a result, you’re basically stuck choosing two items at most out of the following three: 1) explain clearly, 2) explain completely, 3) finish on time. Generally, students can tell when you’ve missed 1 or 3, so leaving out #2 gets you better reviews from students, who tend to blame themselves if you go fast enough and act like you’ve actually covered everything.
What is the qualification to become a GMAT instructor? Do you need like a 800 GMAT?
I used to teach for Kaplan.
I have no idea whether their CFA and GMAT instructor positions are even comparable.
When did you teach for Stalla?
I was the Level III curriculum manager there in '08-'09, and taught for them until 6 months before Kaplan bought them from Becker.
I taught from 2008-2010 or 2011 or whenever they were bought by Becker. They tended to have me teach L1 and L2 stuff, esp quant and econ, but also Equities, FI, CorpFin and PM whenever Peter Olinto wasn’t available.
It was tough to compete with Peter Olinto, who can make the process of kneading bread sound riveting, but they told me I was the second favorite after him, according to the reviews. David Heatherington was also good, but he tended to do just the L3.
They always gave me the Econ. Someone told me that Peter Olinto hated dong the Econ lectures so always arranged to be out of town for them.
I never worked as CFA prep teacher (Since I just passed level 1) but I took a presential course and most of the teachers are big guys in their areas or have a lot of knowledge, to pick a guy who is almost MD from a bank and put him in a class it probably pays well or he doesn’t want to come home early.
I have this curiosity too, how much a CFA prep teacher makes, I think it’s an interesting job (part-time in some locations or even full in others) and much better than teaching time value of money to bored undergraduates, probably if the guy or gal is taking the exam he is somewhat interested in finance.
I don’t think it’s underpaid, you probably need more knowledge to teach some guys who already work in financial markets and put some good questions in the table than a college class.
You’d think that I’d remember you; being second only to Peter Olinto is pretty awesome.
My brain must be getting mushy.
Well, everyone sounds crappy compared to P.O… I apparently just sounded less crappy than the others. 
It was nice to meet a few people at NYSSA who said I really helped them on the material I presented. That is one of the nicer parts about teaching.
At least I compared favorably vs Bob Stalla. 
What a small world. Dave Hetherington is the man. And he’s a great guy away from the lectern too.
Yes, I liked Dave a lot when I was studying. I didn’t encounter him much when I was teaching. It was all a very tele-connected gig-type world then.
How did you get these jobs? I imagine they’re pretty tough to get.
For me, after I passed L3, I showed up one day before class and asked Peter Olinto if they had a need for additional instructors, and mentioned that I already was an experienced teacher. He recognized me from when I took his live classes and then presented me to the appropriate people.
I imagine it went more smoothly because I already had teaching experience in a classroom. They had me to do a trial lecture with some of the easier material and gave me the thumbs up. I should say that the environment is subtly different than a traditional classroom, and adapting to it did require some important adjustments: the biggest one being that you don’t really have time to answer any questions, unless they are simple clarifications.
VirginCFAHooker (for those who remember him) also taught for Stalla. I think he continued a bit with Becker - not sure what he’s up to these days.
^so youre saying your goood looks and smoothness had nothing to do with it?
My one regret is not getting in on the teaching side of the CFA. It’s a lot easier to get rich selling pans than it is panning for gold.