Job Discussion Forums

[arioch36]

[Neilhrd]

I started this thread by raising some questions about Rebecca Tao following some disturbing events during her visit to my GAC centre.

There have been many useful contributions but no evidence has emerged of any involvement in previous scams or anything which might impugn her integrity. That is good to know.

I then raised some doubts about the GAC moderation system. It is only fair to tell everyone that I have today recieved evidence that the global moderation process to Sydney does exist and can produce reasoned and acceptable resolutions of disputed gradings.

It is obvious that there are many people out there who share my belief that GAC is the best available preparation for Chinese students wanting to study in western universities. However it is equally clear that widespread confusion exists about the ownership and direction of GAC and doubts remain about the consistency and fairness of the academic standards.

I hope that now I have blown these issues into the open they can be constructively resolved and GAC can become the force for opportunity and enlightenment among Chinese students that it should be.

[arioch36]

yes, I was somewhat happy to see them take moderation seriously. I wish I could tell you some of the things that are being ignored at my school, but I am not willing to do it publically

[GoPies]

Just caught up with this thread though I replied privately to the original poster in the Off-Topic forum.
I've taught GAC Maths, Computers and Science for 4 years in China. Overall I am happy with the program. I have been privileged to teach some wonderful students who I am still in touch with while they study in Oz, UK, US and Canada.
I attended a conference in Qingdao last year (?) where DOSs from China, Taiwan and Korea discussed issues related to GAC. It was conducted by Australian executives of the program. While the overall mood was positive, several suggestions were made which we were assured would be taken on board - but I was disappointed to see in the new editions of the Maths books that the same old errors appeared. This has had a benefit because my students are picking the errors up, e.g. "a figure with those angles cannot exist" or, "a quadrilateral inside another is not similar in the same way as triangles are". These two examples have been in the books for the 4 years I have been teaching here.
In my first year we were inspected by Gaye from Sydney. She expressed disappointment with the list of typos and wrong Maths that I showed her as she said they had paid three people a lot of money to proof-read the books. But several editions later they are still there.
I have had my wrists slapped for accepting poor work so they do take moderation seriously. The problem is when the work is due at the end of term, just before the kids go home. There is little opportunity for a re-write at that stage, and because the kids have to pass all units, you are tempted to accept an assignment you would reject mid-term.
We have dropped Science in favour of Social Science. My institution has no science labs so the course consisted of dull and boring learning of obscure English scientific jargon.
We also have no library or recreational facilities although these are mandated by GAC (I'm not a DOS, so not sure on this one).
On another note, I miss Emily's predecessor, a young English bloke who loved a beer. Whenever he visited we would be taken to dinner followed by a big session.

[arioch36]

A big problem is the ability to find research materials for the various research papers they must do. In the reading/writing Level book, they include the URL for the brisbane uni on line database. GAC really needs to pay for some online data bases

[Neilhrd]

I entirely agree about the databases. GAC have to get serious about requiring teaching centres to have proper academic resources for a research based course. The persistent errors of substance as well as proof reading in the books are a pain. My experience is that the students lose confidence in the books and therefore in the course pretty quickly. It takes a lot of creativity by the teachers to get round the problems and to keep them on task. I too have raised this issue with Gaye Pullen and felt that the answers were evasive as though she knew something she couldn't tell us.

The comments about dropping science are interesting. We have been told that science is compulsory but social science in Levels II and III is an elective. Searching the websites of other centres around the world reveals considerable inconsistency about this. For me this is a big issue because the research workload for Level III science is massive and this has a knock effect on the time students have for other subjects and therefor ethe standards that can be expected in their papers. Can anyone else shed light on what the requirements are in their centres.

It is a tribute to the students that many of them remain as commited and hard working as they do in the face of sub standard courses. They are the reason why I stick with the GAC programme and will continue trying to improve it.

[arioch36]

In the fake certificates at Newcastle thread, I give my reasons why GAC can be good. But the fact that they don't make their textbooks beter bother me. In the math book it isn't just the errors that have been the same "revision" after "revision" the fact that Sydney says these are revisions makes me lose respect. They can't even put the dots in the right plae. Decimal or multiplication. It makes the students lose respect. I give the first student to spot the mistake an extra point. But after the 10th mistake, the students wonder what's up. A rhombus with all sides equal 8 cm has a diagonal; that equals 8cm??? That would mean 4 squared plus 8 squared equals 8 squared???

Sydney must shell out the money to buy access to the research databases.

And I don't know who they are paying to fix these books, but it's a loss of face in the students perception

[englishgibson]

my bet's that they're paying the cheap labor in china to fix it all

how ironic it is that our "faces" lure the GAC students (their rich parents) into these expensive courses for abroad studies and after they pay they have to realize that foreign faces are not the back bone but front door mat of the program

just imagine parents meeting with the shanghai's head office and rebecca with her title of teachers leader (on her biz card in chinese although in english it's different-not to piss some off). i bet they'd have a lot to talk about and rebecca would sure tell'em how good she is in english

cheers and beers to our fine GAC program that's deluded to the taste of the chinese government