Job Discussion Forums

[Bookworm]

See:

http://www.englishfirst.com/partnersinfo/what.asp

for the connection between MacDonalds and EF!

[johnslat]

Dear Bookworm,
Hmm, pretty blatant, isn't it? Well, it IS a business and I suppose the king of the franchise operations IS McDonalds. So, in a sense I can understand their following Kroc's lead. Still though, it bothers me:

"Want an order of gerunds with that Big Mac?"

"Shall I supersize your capital letters?"

Regards,
John

[Wolf]

Perhaps it makes sense if you're one of the franchise owners who stands to actually be able to make a living from the deal. Sadly, when we carry the alalogy further, EFL teachers become of course the hair netted ones. Hardly a flattering description of someone who (probably) has a degree and (possibly) has teaching experience and (just might) want to teach for a career.

EF gets a lot of bad press on this board and elsewhere. But I never expected such an unflattering comparison to appear on their own website. Perahps the website designer was a friend of a disgruntled teacher . . . .

[Bookworm]

"Today McDonald's has over 14,000 restaurants all over the world. And McDonald's success shows how right ray Kroc was. At EF English First, proudly we honor [sic] this same ideal."


Well, there it is, straight from the horse's mouth, so to speak. At least they are honest I suppose (on this point). I wouldn't like to be one of those poor s o d s who has to work for them though. Imagine being compared to a member of MacDonalds counter staff selling fries, geezzzz......

Also, to see the extent to which EF will go to hide their assets, see:

http://www.infoanalys.com/Projekt/EF.pdf

It's in Swedish but if you have a bit of German and/or Dutch, then along with your English you can decipher most of it. The most important pages are those that outline all the 'EF' "companies". (I'm willing to bet that even top managers with this organisation are unaware of most of these sister companies.)

P.S. Don't ask how I got that PDF link!

[kattie72]

Have a look at www.e-l-c.it/Staff.htm It's in Italian, but the gist is:

"we employ only young British English speakers" (!)

".... a turnover which guarantees that only English will be spoken in class" (what do the teachers think about this "turnover"?!)

"The school prefers not to employ teachers from other English-speaking countries" (!)

...it's the "young" bit that really gets me!

[SueH]