Education after 12

Taiwan Parenting
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Local owned. I wasn’t talking about TAS and KAS.

I know the teachers and the parents and I’ve met some students from the local owned international schools. I said I heard because that’s what happened. I’m not gonna lie and say I studied or taught there.

Imagine seeing only asian teachers doing the assistant job and white people doing the teaching and tell me that you won’t have any idea. Doesn’t matter what diploma you have what country you grew up in, what your mother tongue is, the only thing matter is the color of your skin. The schools told me that they also said the same thing to the asian teachers from decent schools in USA and UK.

And I know how many parents try to get their kids in those schools, and that’s what makes me laugh. Asian parents spending loads of money on a school that believes that if you’re asian you could never be as fluent as a white native speaker. Tell me that’s not funny.

Don’t say you’ve never noticed that form local schools, whether they have “international” in their names or not.

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Plus, the majority of “international schools” here are local owned.

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Yes. I worked in a private school. I know a lot of other foreign teaches who have worked at what are described on here as “tier 3 international schools”. If the parents really knew how little education their children were getting…actually, they don’t really care. They care about the reputation of the school so they can brag to their friends and relatives about how much money they are paying and how amazing their child’s educational opportunities are and the other ultra-wealthy children they are surrounded by. They do expect everyone in the school to be at their beck and call though – they expect homeroom teachers to answer their phone during class time and also at 11 pm on a Saturday night, ready to listen to their problems, as if everyone they are paying are their therapist.
And going off what @MadamBroccoli just said, my last school tried to convince me not to take funeral leave for an immediate family member because the funeral was “inconveniently” “planned” on a day that perspective parents would be coming and they needed the white teacher in the room. They cared so much about the appearance of white people that they didn’t consider their white prop might need two whole days off for bereavement leave. Absolute :poop: s who are only after rich people’s $$$

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Oh, and some of the things I’ve mentioned is in the news. You could google.

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The majority of “international” schools here are not just locally owned, they’re locally occupied. The children who go there have international passports, but the sole connection they have to the country of the passport is the passport itself. Hardly developing any level of diversity among the children, considering the fact that diversity comes from experience and language, not a piece of paper

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Exactly. The local international schools basically only got Taiwanese students. And I “heard” there’s more and more local Taiwanese students in the American schools now. I said I “heard” because, again, I’m not teaching or studying in the schools now, and the students that told me this were even older than me, they also heard this from their classmate or something.

The reason I could only say “I hear” is precisely because they suck so bad I can’t even think of it.

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And many local students go to international schools because they can’t get into decent local high schools and they got rich daddy and mommy. You’d be surprised at how many international schools we have in Taiwan.

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I’m curious. Do you have any asian college that’s doing the teaching job, not the assistant job, and get paid as much as you do? 中師 is usually only assisting the English teacher, although they’re called 老師. 中師 doesn’t count unless they’re allowed to do the real teaching and get paid as much.

Some bushiban told me they can’t inteoduce me as 英師, and could only introduce me as 中師, because an English teacher can’t be Asian, but they do pay the teachers based on their ability and not the race. Less racist I’d say.

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A very interesting analysis about kang chiao. Though I don’t agree with everything wirtten there, it is very close to how local people think about those schools: “西式教育 中式管理”. Also applies to other local international schools, many of which provide poorer education than kang chiao.

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Geez, you two took over the Kang Chiao Hsinchu thread despite (1) having no experience teaching there and (2) having no children there. You may have had bad experiences with X, Y, and Z private schools with an international program. Then can you stick to bashing X, Y, and Z? How does it make sense for you to now bash ALL the private schools with an international program on this island?

Let’s talk about the news. Posters joke about the quality of Taiwanese journalism when it suits them, and then use it to defend their position when it suits them. The Chairman of Kang Hsuan skipping quarantine or something else? Do you think any of this type of development actually affects a 15-year-old studying for a test on Friday, or a teacher preparing their lesson plans? Everyone’s busy with their own lives and ordeals. What exactly is the news scandal that is affecting day-to-day life in the classroom?

Something that does affect day-to-day life in the classroom that’s not COVID is… teacher quality. First, it’s wrong if you didn’t get hired solely because of your race. And it’s unfortunate you didn’t get leave to deal with a death. But again… why are you bashing schools where this did not take place? What you both speak of doesn’t happen at EVERY local private school.

But back to teacher quality… There are not enough stellar teachers to meet education demand (in many places). You yourselves write about the lack of learning going on. Well, when someone tells me they “heard” how terrible a school is… I wonder if the source is a teacher whose contract was not renewed.

TLDR: Irresponsible to bash A-W so much, based on experiences with X, Y, Z.

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We’re not allowed to discuss salary and compensation, but I’m certain I make more than my Asian colleagues, though they are also in the proper teacher position

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@chaitea, I invite you to prove either of us wrong. Find one English-speaking individual who has worked in any “international” school in Taiwan who doesn’t have their head on the sand who also has anything good to say about their school. I don’t even know of any white women who worked at TAS and KAS who weren’t treated like garbage

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TLDR. The sources were teachers and students that were currently teaching/studying/about to study international schools at the time. I should add parents, too.

Is this what people called reputation monitoring? Do I have to be the president to comment on politics? Do I have to participant in a war to comment on wars? I guess I shouldn’t have said murder is bad too since I’ve never done it.

If there’s something I’ve said that’s not true, why don’t you point it out?

I think Taiwanese management in school is a nightmare and I have a right to say that. Or is Kang chiao not Taiwanese at all but very… say, American? Interesting how you isolated kang chiao from other schools.

Btw the link I posted was very neutral, the writer didn’t even comment on Taiwanese management, but only mentioned the management is in Taiwanese style.

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You can comment, of course. And I can comment that I think you’re out of your depth. Why are you even bringing your bushiban experiences into this discussion about accredited schools?

On the topic of parents getting played? Um, if you’re concerned about a school, get their AP and IB results then. Show me how poorly the students are testing compared to their global peers. Show me how the students are not getting into respectable universities and feeling unprepared compared with their peers.

On the topic of no Asian teacher hiring? Um, do you want me to introduce you to Asian teachers teaching a variety of subjects, including English? (I’m not actually going to because I don’t know you.)

What exactly is your recommendation: “Hey parents, TAS, TES, KAS or some Japanese schools (that I probably know even less about).” You have any academic results to share? Blank stare.

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Sure. Why don’t you share some of the results if you think education is all about college admission.

You keep saying things yet didn’t even come up with a solid statement.

I didn’t recommend Japanese schools at all. I said it’s not for anyone. But they’re much more Japanese than local international schools, and TAS KAS more American, TES more european than local international schools, which correspond with my previous statement: local international schools have a very Taiwanese culture, and imo, in the bad kind of way.

Plus, the OP didn’t rule out the possibility of sending te daughter to local schools, which means they’re also considering local colleges. Those are different systems. If you want to go to US or european college, send your kids to TAS KAS TES, so that they learn the culture, send kids to local schools if you want them to go to local colleges. That’s my opinion.

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Actually if the kids are good at academy, 建北 would also be a very good option imo. Some of their students go to Ivy League too. Though most of them do choose to go to local colleges like 台大. In that case you need to send them to a local school. The entrance exam is in mandarin after all.

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The public high school I went to was considered to be one of the best in my state. We had a 97 percent college/university or military rate and over 90 percent of students took at least one and scored 4 or 5 on AP exams. It was a VERY good school based on academic performance and the colleges and universities we all went on to.
When I was in teacher education training myself, we learned that children of high social status parents perform well academically, regardless of the quality of the school, because their parents have modeled high achievement for them their whole lives. I thought back to my own high school education. Who were my classmates? Children of doctors, lawyers, engineers. A lot of CEO and upper level management, some old money. Less, but not no children of college dropouts or GED recipients working at K-Mart and McDonalds. Were my teachers actually top notch? In retrospect, most absolutely not. I had a physics teacher who would shout “it’s not my job to teach you physics!” when we asked too many questions and a calc teacher who write the problem on the board, say “you just…solve it”, then draw a vertical squiggly line and write the answer on the bottom, repeatedly giving us zero insight into how to actually solve the problem. How and why did we all do well in the end? We found someone in the class or who had taken the class who understood. We taught each other. Not in some utopian “teachers are here to guide you to help each other” sense but rather an “oh crap if I fail this my parents will kill me” sense. Thank god YouTube and Khan academy was just starting at that time and someone on the “interwebs” could help too. You add to that (excuse the stereotype but it was so true at my school) Asian parents screeching at their children in the parking lot for getting a 97% on one test, and you can see that the stakes were high. High parental expectation = children produce results, even if they crack in the process. So, where are the crappy test scores for all the fake international schools across Taiwan? My guess is there are very few because the parents have no issue hiring private tutors or just putting the mega load on their children to make sure they perform well. If they believe the school is great, they’re not going to blame the teachers or the school for poor performance, they’re going to blame the children.

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Thank you for everyone’s input. There’s a lot to think about.

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I wasn’t going to reply any more, but I appreciate this post of yours. I’m getting more of a good-hearted wanting to protect parents and children feel, which is making me feel better. Here’s what I would say:

I know the type of public high school you’re talking about. I’m a product of what’s arguably the top-ranked large, comprehensive public high school in my state (by Niche.com, by data from the state board of education, and just the common knowledge of the local populace).

I agree with you. A student’s success or failure isn’t just based on teachers. Is it even primarily based on teachers? That’s one of the head-scratchers in all of this. In a basic model, you’ve got the family / the student / the teachers all playing a role in the student’s success or failure. But is it even possible to divvy out contribution or blame to each party?

This is why basic political proposals linking teacher pay to performance quickly reveal to some a politician who is out of their depth. It’ll just cause even more teachers to flee for the suburbs. A great teacher who teaches to a large population of undocumented families where the children are working is going to have a tiny salary compared with a lazy teacher who teaches to a community with a country club.

When I read your post, to me it continues to make the case for private schools.

My parents paid more than they were comfortable with (borrowing from relatives, cutting budgets) to get the kids into the highly-ranked school district. They “invested” in our education. Private school parents are doing the same thing in an even more “turbocharged” way.

In the system of families / students / teachers, even if the teachers are the weak link, they’re paying for excellence from the other families and students. When the teachers were lacking at your top-ranked public school, you found excellent students to learn from. And the student population had computers and internet access and knew of the existence of Khan Academy. That’s part of the private school deal. There are so many supporting points of excellence, it’s less likely for a student to fall on their ass if one piece is lacking.

But on the teachers being the lacking/lagging piece. Each school is very much its own entity. In general, at a public high school (even top ranked ones), student ratings of teachers matter less. I mean, the parents and students are getting a deal: education included in taxes. What I’ve seen in the private school system is that student ratings matter much more. A teacher who cannot get their ratings up after a probationary period is not going to have their contract renewed, or there will be some explanation, such as there are simply too few teachers in the subject area and beggars can’t be choosers.

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didn’t you say Chinese proper teachers salary including bonus should be comparable?