This is an actual problem that I think the Taiwanese government is intentionally trying to confuse people with. An international family looking for a bilingual school is looking for a school that provides support for both English language learners and Chinese language learners. They are not looking for a school that teaches “How many apples?” “They are five green apples”, carefully establishing grammatically incorrect English as early as third grade. I took many linguistics classes in college (university) and it was very clearly defined in every course:
bilingual education refers to 51% or more of ACADEMIC COURSES (math, science, social studies, history) taught in the target language and not the local one. At best, 99% of schools in Taiwan claiming to be bilingual offer English as a FOREIGN language 3x/week. Of the public schools that are offering non-English classes in English, it’s always extracurricular (on top of the Chinese classes that students already must attend) in art, music, and maybe STEM/science in English. They almost always have a Chinese speaking teacher on the side translating everything.
ESL (English as a second language) is for English learners in an English speaking country. Their motivation to learn English along with their opportunities to interact with the language are vastly different from EFL students
EFL (English as a foreign language) is what Taiwan’s schools provide. Often, even schools claiming to be “international” at best provide an EFL education
International schools usually use a curriculum from another country and hire highly qualified teachers from abroad. Be aware that in Taiwan many private schools slap “international” on their name or have an “international class” while using Taiwanese teachers that aren’t even trained in teaching and a revolving door of foreigners who rarely stay for more than a few months at a time. Tuition for these schools can be 400-800k/year, so they’re not even that much cheaper than legitimate international schools (like TAS and TES, which, by the way, are still primarily made up of wealthy Taiwanese families, not international families from abroad) while providing almost none of the resources or quality of teacher.
It is absolutely critical that OP knows that what is understood as “bilingual” and “international” in the rest of the world is not known that way in Taiwan.
As for schools in Kaoshuing, just be aware of what I said above. Ask the schools what they mean when they say “bilingual” and find out what kind of legitimate support your children will receive. I worked in a school where the foreign parents were very clear they wanted their child to only speak Chinese but even the “Chinese only” teacher would speak to the kid in English. The child basically became the native English expert, despite being Polish. The Chinese speaking children became masters of English and the Polish child continued to only be able to communicate in English, despite being in a 90% Chinese environment all day.
Thank you for your thoughtful response. So glad you responded to my message as you seem to be very knowledgeable about the school system in Taiwan. Lots to consider for sure.
I’ve been a teacher here for nearly a decade. I find that even other foreign teachers with qualifications don’t think much about the misuse of terminology here. That’s not to say it isn’t a problem elsewhere, but I do find it to be a significantly greater problem here.
I feel like I’ve been responsible in the past because I didn’t immediately tell an international family “hey, so this is actually just a really expensive school for super rich locals!” when they came to see the “international” school I worked at. Yeah, they required a foreign passport, but none of the children there had any ties to another country other than the passport (usually American, cuz mommy flew there to give birth to their child in order to get them citizenship). There’s too much to consider from moving to another country, schooling is just one more thing for that list.
I’m sorry I can’t be of more help, as I know little about Kaohsiung. I will just say ask questions. If something seems off about a school, it probably is. Talk to other parents at the school. Talk to the teachers (in the actual classrooms). Read whatever limited reviews are available. Also consider any reviews written by former foreign teachers. Remember that private schools here are almost always for-profit, which often means, sadly, that they care more about getting you in the door and paying your $$ than delivering on their promises. Also that the administration will often make promises that teachers do not have the resources to deliver on. Again, that’s not to say all schools are like that. I just mean that you need to be very thorough when asking questions and be willing to put your foot down when there’s a legit problem.
People on here seem to really like the local public schools for their children. Or at least accept them, up to the end of elementary school. You didn’t mention if your kids know Chinese or not. If they don’t, absolutely find an English immersion school (one where only English is used as the language of instruction). If they do know Chinese, they’re going to get a much more authentic experience in a public school. (Private schools here exist to keep groups of children segregated from others, ie, rich children don’t have to rub shoulders with average income or poor people’s children, Christians don’t have to interact with non Christians. Again, not to say its not a problem in other places, but I know a lot of Muslims that went to Catholic schools in the US but I could not imagine anyone but the most devout Christians opting to go to Morrison unless it really is the only English option. Also, I’ve never heard of scholarships to private schools here, so if you can’t fork over the tuition money, you’re not going.)