Job Discussion Forums

[mep3]

This thread seems to me to bring up a larger, overriding question: how to avoid bad schools with bad management.

The advice I was given in the past was to ask the schools for references from past or present foreign teachers there. But it doesn't necessarily seem to work; often they give you the ones who are partisan, and you get there and you find that 9 out of 10 foreign teachers there feel opposite to the contacts you were given.

Any other suggestions about how to simply get a list of schools where the administration treats the FT's decently/fairly?

The one idea that occurs to me is to just have the members of this forum compile a list together and have it be a running list that people can add schools to in the future. As with many ideas, it has problems. Two come to mind off-hand:

1. I know there is a polls feature on this site. But is there any feature like the one I'm talking about -- a running list rather than a thread? The problem with doing it as a thread is that after we begin it, it will get buried several pages back, and most people will never know it is there, so they won't know to simply pop on and add the name of a school they are at where the admin is good

2. People from the FAO offices at schools, if they know of the list, could add their schools to it, thus diluting it and rendering the list basically false?

All this is just meant as brainstorming, trying to work up an idea for how to better know what the decent schools are, and so not have to go through the process of unpleasant surprises and difficult situations after arriving. Finding a way to pool our resources and do that could make life a lot better/easier/more pleasant for all of us. Any thoughts on method?

M

[kev7161]

It's doable if the current poster would always copy and paste the immediate post prior and then adding their school critique to it. To make it simple, a poster could list the name of the school, it's location, and then rate it on a five-star system. If a reader wants to know more than simply is it a very bad school (one star), an excellent school (five stars) or somewhere in the middle, then they can PM the person who left the rating for more info. For example, my last school:

1. Song Cheng Hua Mei (SCHM), Hangzhou, 3 stars

. .. next person would copy/paste that line into their post and #2 their school, next person copy/paste one and two then #3 their school and so on. How do you know who to PM? The most recent number (the highest number) would be the most recent poster, just work your way back. If you are thinking of taking a job at this school, you could PM me and I'd tell you more of my experience and why I gave it the rating I did.

I'm sure someone could probably come up with a better method, this is just one idea.

[Areut]

That sounds great. A list would help a lot of people and would give the newbie�s(like me) something to follow.

[mep3]

Kevin, thanks for helping me try to work through this. I still think there's a problem though with doing it that way. Maybe I'm missing what you're saying. But my point is that if nobody responds to it for a week or two, it will fall farther back in the pages, and then nobody will see it anymore, and nobody will respond to it. Do you see what I mean? M

[tw]

[kev7161]

Thank you TW, exactly what I was thinking (I think we've actually requested a couple of times, to no avail). A sticky would keep it at the top of the first page.

[mep3]

You are right. That is the way to do it. I suspect they don't want to do it because they're concerned it may get too many universities p'd off at them. But we can pose it specifically as intended to be a list of GOOD unis to work at. Also, maybe if a bunch of us ask them, they'll do it. I think it's worth it.

[7969]

[7969]

[KarenB]

Nate's School Review (or something like that) provides a forum on his site for teachers to post thier review (good or bad) of their school in China. Of course, various teachers can contribute info about the same school, so that should balance what is written.

As to Simple Simon, I had a similar experience 4 years ago, when the school moved male students into the same building where the FTs (mostly female) lived. We weren't on the same floor, but while climbing the stairs up to the 3rd floor where we lived, we had to endure lots of young men running around in their underwear (and sometimes less), lots of cigarette smoke, and late night shinanegans.

One day, I decided to try Kevin's suggestion of tit for tat (no, I didn't go running around in my underwear). I decided to wake the students up during afternoon nap time. So I sent my male Chinese colleague and good friend into one room, only to see him come out very red faced as the boys had snuck in a couple prostitutes (and obviously weren't doing any sleeping anyway).

[kangaloo59]

Well I'll be Blowed - I've just found this post from 2006.
Lingnan Guangzhou were up to the same tricks then.
Now they are housing the F T s with Chinese Workers.
One previous contributor wrote "Lingnan is a private College,and one of the most crappy at that".
Well,I disagree - From all the reports I've heard,thet ARE the most crappy.
The problem seems to lie with the 2 goons running the f.t.s Dept,One is a previous teacher there,and the other is a previous student there.
BOTH seem to have a smouldering dislike of Foreigners'and don't want Foreigners to" have any special treatment".
Some say that their attitude is probably due to envy concerning the size of one part of their anatomy.

[jeffinflorida]

I think the issue can be solved easier by requesting the administration to make it FEMALE only student housing.

Ummm that would work for me at least...

[Areut]