Job Discussion Forums

[edwinagirl]

Struelle,

I think your suggestion is in the right direction, but it sounds slightly naive. No-one should try to 'prevent' the closure of a business that is not performing. Nor do these things happen suddenly - we've all known about Canilx for at least a year. (In the same vein, I maintain we will see more bloodshed in this category before too long.)
And far too many schools in China lack any hiring criteria - apart from the requirement that the teacher is actually white and breathing.

Having said that, of course, it would be very revealing to see surveys that represented all of this in an objective way. The problem is that TEFL, the world over, is run like a cottage industry. There are over 1,000 providers in the UK alone. There's very little data available from there, so I imagine it would be near impossible to compile it here.

Perhaps someone could commission proper market research into the whole thing. I just can't see who would be willing to pay for that and share it with the rest of us!

[Roger]

I am a total outsider to this topic, having never worked in any of the outfits named, but I think we can spread culpability more evenly across the nation: let's not single out Canlix and Wallstreet for criticisms as this is a bit unfair.
Let's question the Engloish mania kicked off by the government of this country. Look what people are willing to DO (rather than just willing to PAY) to see whether they have realistic hopes and expectations. And, more importantly: why do people INVEST their own money in English lessons in the first place?
That woman edwinagirl mentioned comes to mind: why is she so stupid as to waste 60'000 kuai on English classes? Let's me honest: a person with that kind of money can easily afford to live abroad and learn the lingo there - Singapore for example, perhaps Australia or Canada. Maybe she wouldn't qualify as an immigrant - but then again: why does she study it in the first place? Boredom? Snobbishness? Surely NOT to get more education!

Thus, the government policies are producing market tendencies - some good, some dubious. The English craze is a double-edged sword - I doubt the relevant authorities are of one mind about it - some want this nation to acquire English, many are opposed to it ("cultural pollution", "ideological" problems, foreign domination etc.).

I have over the years seen that training centres have had to address different segments of the student market: first it was self-paying adults; those were the most honest learners; next came corporate classes - you had to traipse from your training centre office to a company and do in-house lessons; my experiences with those classes were overwhelmingly negative due to very low self-motivation on the part of "students"; over the last 3 or so years, training centres have been loaning their FTs to public schools. Ever fewer adults pay for their English classes by themselves, and fewer companies are enlisting TC's services. What's going to be next?

Why these changes? Because no one really takes learning English seriously. Neither students nor company heads who hire you. You have to please those childish adults who "sacrifice" their spare time after office hours. They do it because the company pays.

What changes can FTs bring about or introduce here? None! And where there is no innovation there is no gain. The English learning scene in China has for decades suffered from this malaise. Chiense minds are conservative and they are equally mistrustful of FTs and their newfangled methods of teaching.