Job Discussion Forums

[robotmonkey]

I worked for Web for more than four years between 2005 and 2010. As reported elsewhere on these forums, yes, the pay isn�t bad, but the conditions are terrible, and the way they treat their teachers and students is utterly appalling. Dear reader, please don�t think this is all sour grapes, it isn�t. I now work freelance, and am much happier than ever I was toiling for a private language mill. My only intention here is to warn any prospective teachers to keep well away from this joke of a setup.

Last year, I fell very ill and had to leave Web suddenly. When I left, I was told it would be fine to go back to my old centre when I returned after recovering. However, the supervisor at my old centre, where I was the most popular teacher, did everything he could to damage my reputation, telling everyone I had just walked out with no reason or notice, and trying to make sure I couldn�t work at the company again.

Even so, due to the goodwill of the company�s education director, I was given a new post, although in Baoshan, in the far northern suburbs of Shanghai. I started this job, and once more quickly became the most popular teacher at the school. Two months later though, my father died unexpectedly, at which I was told by the supervisor at Baoshan that I shouldn�t let it affect me, and if I did, I would lose my job. This continued before and after Christmas, to the point that I was eventually fired, for nothing more than arriving just six minutes late for office hours one day when I had warned the school I was stuck on a bus in a traffic jam, along with taking a student to Starbucks one afternoon, at her request. Many people in the company also feel that I have been treated very unfairly, from the education director to the teacher trainers, but I have never received a proper explanation or an apology.

The educational values of the company are also almost non-existent. They use proprietary materials written in the early 1990s, which are now painfully out-of-date. Teachers are impotent to change them though, given the company�s education is purely based on their CALL system, from DynEd, which has been updated many times since. Web is too mean to pay for the updates though. The company�s teachers are often willing to write new materials and improve the teaching system, but Web refuses, saying the present situation is quite sufficient, which they know it perfectly well not to be. This only serves to bore the teachers yet further, having to repeat the same badly-put-together materials over and over again. Incidentally, those same materials were written in 2003, by an ex-nurse with no formal training in education whatsoever. Some of them have been revised, but many remain exactly the same, despite numerous complaints from both students and teachers.

The students are also treated extremely badly. They are told by the salesgirls, many of whom run the centres as their own private hegemonies, that they will receive a host of exciting benefits and perks from signing up, almost none of which ever materialise. They will also tell prospective students they can only take 2 classes per week, which is sensible in pedagogical terms, but actually those students can take up to 1 class a day, so they can be pushed through the system as quick as possible, totally regardless of any progress they are or aren�t making. Certain education supervisors do not allow their teachers to fail students in class, for the same reason. Those same students are told they will receive regular and constructive advice. However, the tutors at Web are usually new graduates with very limited commands of English, regularly teaching incorrect usage. It has been heard of that some tutors are also purposefully demotivating students, an example being when one student went to his tutor asking for an explanation of a word, only to be told that if he didn�t know, he shouldn�t be taking classes. How can this sort of behaviour be helpful in any way to anyone�s confidence, let alone their education?

Web also cares nothing for recruitment and retention of teachers. There has not been a pay rise since 2004, despite the rapidly rising living costs in Shanghai. No insurance is offered, the company withholds all benefits as much as legally possible, and even beyond that. The HR director regularly individually invents additions to the contracts, which do not have to be approved by anyone, even if they are against the law, which often they are.

If you care about education at all, value your sanity, or your spare time, given Web will now require you to be there for 40 or more hours per week, for most of the weekend, and until 9pm every evening you work, along with the fact that it is extremely difficult to get holidays at any time, and completely impossible in July, August and December, avoid it like the plague.

[askiptochina]

I don't have as much experience as the OP, but I did have a face to face interview with them in April. They made it sound like a paradise job. I was interviewed by 2 people, and I questioned them both on things like curriculum and reimbursement. All I got from them was the runaround.

Unfortunately, they aren't the only rotten apples in the bunch. Most of Shanghai has presented itself as a slave driven industry.

I asked about transportation reimbursement (3,000 RMB). They said I could get my flight airfare I paid reimbursed if I submitted my boarding pass, but that wouldn't show how much I paid. When I questioned them on this, they said they wouldn't accept an E-Ticket. So, basically I can't get reimbursed.

But then they said, "Oh, don't worry, you can save the money and get twice as much reimbursement at the end of the year (6,000)"

So I asked again, "Why do teachers leave the 3,000 with you to get 6,000 at the end?"

They said, "Oh, because the teachers just don't need the money".

That's when I knew they were full of it and I stopped asking questions.

Just walk down Fuzhou Road near People's Square. You will see I think an EF (English First) photo of a guy's arm roped around and "chained" to some Asian looking woman.

Maybe this is supposed to spell unity or something, but I get a different feel.

You'll have to teach like 25 classes and be in the office for 15 more (that's where the rope comes in). That means while I am working my 22 hour classes and doing privates in another city (starting next week, whoohoo!!), you'll be stuck in the office if you choose to take job offers like this Web International school, which for the record will have nothing to do with the web as it relates to you.

You will NOT be teaching online with them. That I am sure of.

[mnguy29]

I AGREE WITH EVERYTHING HE HAS SAID IN THIS POST. I TOO HAD A BAD EXPERIENCE WITH WEB WHEN I FIRST CAME TO CHINA TWO YEARS AGO. I WOULD NEVER SUGGEST THEM TO ANYONE UNLESS YOU COME TO CHINA JUST TO WORK AND DONT MIND BEING TREATED VERY BADLY.