I agree with this which makes me feel even more annoyed. I just got word from her that she won’t give it to parents. This basically means that she wishes she hadn’t told me and she will just do what she wants without letting me know.
Make sure she knows that you’re going to sue her if she leak your personal information. I wish the gov would give those laobans mandatory legal lessons before they could start a company.
What do you see happening in the new semester? Will the pay be lower than last semester?
I was told that if the classes go back online all of the grading etc will be unpaid time.
I talked to an owner and he said that demand for classes is way down.
I really believe this is going to turn out to be a major reset of how things are done for many industries including teaching.
I doubt having a teacher in a classroom will remain the norm. Video screens in classrooms with teachers in different rooms or countries.
I am going back on to teach face to face Monday. Back to a normal schedule mid August. Demand is down, but it will change fast if the numbers stay low.
I think enrollment will continue to slump because no one’s really in a rush to send their kids back if they can avoid it. I also think it highlighted the problems schools already had: demands for lower tuition, pickier parents, market saturation, failure to innovate, toxic work environments, authoritarian bosses that ruin their own products, low birthrates. Perhaps, if anything, we’ll see parents start to make more demands and schools use this as an excuse to drop pay. I just had a class with 28 students. The prep work involved and the amount of energy I had to use to keep it going wasn’t worth the money they paid me for it. What worries me the most is that we’ll see more butts in seats, more demands and more schools trying to cater to every customers demands. Many of us lived on shaky ground before the lock down. Judging by the number of posts I see from people moving home, the lack of support and how crappy the work culture is here has sent many people packing. Fortunately, I’m blowing this joint soon too.
This was a big problem I felt started a few years ago before the pandemic and is probably getting worse today. Schools sitting 30 students, with varying age ranges, and varying study goals into one room. It’s a recipe for disaster since some complain there is too much conversation, some complain they don’t get enough grammar practice, and some don’t want to be there in the first place. And the school tries to accommodate them all in one class.
Where are you seeing or hearing about people leaving?
I could not recommend anyone move to Taiwan to teach.
I can’t leave Taiwan because of my daughter but if it were not for that I’d have to leave.
These schools are so nasty to teachers because they are used to a constant supply.
Really so much bullshit from these operations it is really sickening.
I understand all schools are not so miserable to work for but I’ve seen enough examples of toxic environments to know they are not uncommon.
Feel you, I’ve gotten messages that have asked me to work with weak students more. When I do that, I get messages asking me to work with stronger students more. Then, when I find a balance, I’m asked to blow though four pages of useless book work that I then have to mark for each student. When I manage to do all of those things, I’m rewarded with more asses in seats and more kids that shouldn’t be there but are because the school needs money. The funny thing is that we have a lot of near fluent kids that suffer because we never get a chance to do any actual learning between marking, managing twenty kids and trying to figure out what to do about that weeks complaint.
Of course, when I complain to my many bosses about the lack of organization, the unqualified managers and the truckloads of work that I have no time to finish, they nod and don’t do anything about it as per usual. So, I’m often left choosing between helping the kids that I know can make it to the next level and trying to manage the crap storm that is caused by having zero control and zero input into what would make the program tolerable.
I really feel like cram schools think that teaching is an unskilled job that can only be profitable if they hire less and less skilled people to play games to larger and larger rooms full of poorly behaved students that are used to white dudes entertaining them.
Yeah, I’m leaving and I will never come back. After working in a Taiwanese IT firm, half a dozen schools and dealing with all of the crap here, I can honestly say that Taiwan is beautiful at times, but it has the worst work culture in Asia.
I did a short stint at a big, well known school like this. It was absolutely awful: 150 minute classes (!!), 20+ mixed ability kids crammed in one shabby classroom, the expectation that they write one paragraph every lesson (which you have to mark in-class, 2 separate drafts), the gimmick that they used a “real American grade school system” so no games, no standing up, no talking, no moving, the use of wholly inappropriate textbooks not meant for ESL learners, spelling tests that don’t check comprehension, etc…
Shocking. I’m New Taipei City but I guess it will be the same. Ridiculous.
It seems to me like they think teachers are a danger. Why?
If it were for our protection, it wouldn’t need to be displayed.
If there is an outbreak, teachers need to be tested, but kids don’t? Do they believe that kids can’t catch covid?
I predict you’re going to see some contact tracing shutting down schools for 14 days. So basically get vaccinated and then you don’t need to do a PCR despite the fact that you MIGHT still have covid and spreading it freely, but nobody will blame you because you are vaccinated with a single dose. Does anybody else see the insanity in this?
I read it as all staff, regardless of vaccination status, need a negative PCR test before classes can resume.
that would make more sense. Imagine if it was the other way around…but then again, are the bosses and parents so stupid that they actually believe if the teacher is vaccinated they cannot spread covid? surely the people running these schools aren’t this lost in the sauce, but then again, most of them are money hungry businessmen and women with 0 education experience, so I got no doubt they would probably jab you with a bootleg sinovac to get operation and cash flow back to normal.
Wow. This immediately prevents a large number of classrooms from being used. Many classrooms will need to be sealed off. No classes in rooms without windows which would allow fresh air.
These operators are so angry now. No wonder there is no teacher shortage. Half of the classrooms can’t be used !!!
This is a good policy by the way.
I talked to a school owner earlier. We talked about vaccination. He said he wasn’t doing it. As long as his staff were all vaccinated he didn’t have any plans on getting jabbed.
Where’s the sanitizing regulation? They’re just gonna leave the classroom as it is after being used? And this is only after one jab for just the teachers! This whole thing is just for show. I get that people have needs to find someone to take care of the little kids, but the gov is basically giving a green light for G7-12 to go back to school. Is it really necessary?
I don’t think this cram school thing is going to be stable , public schools will be pissed if the kids go to cram schools bring it back into the public school.
But I don’t have a crystal ball and it really depends how well controlled this is . Any Delta variant and it doesn’t seem feasible . Race vs vaccination I guess. Good luck everybody .
With only one jab, I don’t think we need delta to bring chaos. Any variation will do.
good news is, you won’t get blamed for it. They will blame the 0 dose folks.
I think that’s how Taiwan works, deflect blame.
" Not my FAULT I WENT TO SEXY TEA! I WAS VACCINATED. JASON IS THE ASSHOLE HE HAD 0 doses. "