Job Discussion Forums

[tom1912]

I worked for Shane English in Wenzhou and would give those who are looking at working there (which includes Aojiang, Pingyang and Longgang schools) a little word of warning.

The teaching isn't bad, the place isn't say bad especially if you are not in Wenzhou city itself, which is where I was.
The main problem with the school is the owner who doesn't really care as long as he gets money.
The contract is a mess, I was supposed to get paid every time I had to travel more than 1/2 an hour but as I lived 1.5 hours from Aojiang where the centre is, that was quite a few times. When I asked for the money I was told Okay, it never came, when I went to the DoS he said I should get the money, the money never came. When I kicked up a fuss I was told that it was only if I went to teach, as they say this is what it says in Chinese as if I can read Chinese. So there is a two tier contract, the real contract in Chinese and the one you are given which is a waste of time in English (or some sort of sub-section of English that might well be Chinglish).

Two teachers at one school wanted to have one of their three weeks contract break off at the same time. The boss said no (because he has a major logic failure to see that it makes no difference if kids have no teacher one week or another week, as there aren't teachers to do cover work). They went for a meeting at which the boss simply sat looking at his phone on QQ and ignored them, so they are both leaving.

Chinese staff turn over rate is massive. I had FOUR welfare officers in one year and spend maybe 1/4 of the time without a welfare officer, I didn't even know the first welfare officer was a welfare officer because no one bothered to tell me.
We spent the whole year looking for a second TA, but the boss wouldn't pay them enough to actually live in Wenzhou, so no one ever took the job, and the one we had was at uni.
We had a secretary who would scream and shout at me, I went to my DoS and said there was a problem, I was told the school were looking at replacing her, but they never, ever looked for a new secretary.

My first DoS was so fed up with the boss he didn't really care, the second DoS came in all bright eyed about what he could do, three months in, does he care? No chance.

But, I think there are worse places to work. For me it was hell and I had to get out of there, the teacher that followed me wanted out the day before she actually started teaching.

[hippocampus]

I worked for Shane back in the day in Japan when The Eponymous Owner Himself was writing the material and having beers with the teachers on weekends. You're right; it does stink. All Shane English does is rent a house, stick in a Japanese woman for admin and bring in a different hapless white teacher every day of the week so no one would get too attached to one place or group of students and go private. Shane expanded into Taiwan, China, Korea, Vietnam and South Africa, I think, but it is still a mill run by cowboys, drunkards and backpackers, and I guess it always will be because its raison d'etre is to enrich The Eponymous Owner personally. They might pretend to be interested in the students' enlightenment and welfare, but, well, mostly they can't even manage that with any real sincerity.