Has anyone heard of Pioneer?

Language Learning Chinese
1

Hi,

I’m considering signing up for Chinese classes and am wondering about the reputation of Pioneer Language Institute. Has anyone heard anything good or bad about them?

Thanks!

2

Pioneer is where I studied, fresh off the plane. 15 years ago, it was a great place to study. Many of my friends who were serious about studying Chinese, studied there. It was a great environment and a great staff. Back in those days, we were all here to study Chinese. It’s probably still a good thing. I could be mistaken. Anybody else out there study at Pioneer?

3

I’d recommend one of the bigger places, but I’ve heard people say they like it there (but it depends on who your techer is I’m sure.) Go sit in a class and see for yourself.

4

If you need it for Visa reasons, check to make sure it is an approved school. It was my first choice of language schools for myself, but after this approved not approved law thing, I decided that their status was too ambiguous…so I opted ofr TLI instead. Pioneer does look like a good school though.

5

About seven years ago it was a school to get a visa without going to class, but now I’m sure things have changed. As miltownkid said, it all depends on your teacher.

6

I was there around seven years ago, and it wasn’t known as a visa mill. They gave legitimate classes (although I wasn’t relying on them for a visa so maybe it was different?).

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: there is really no principled, outstanding training of well-paid Chinese teachers in Taiwan, so choose the school that suits you best for geographical/cost/visa reasons and just try to get a good teacher from their available pool. The schools are, as they say in Chinese, “da tong, xiao yi” [mostly the same].

7

i studied at pioneer recently and left because i didn’t like the teacher.

i currently study at shi-da and it’s so much different, so much more thorough than the 2 teachers i had at pioneer.

a lot of my friends still go to pioneer and like it but they aren’t really studying - they’ll go to class and that’s it.

if you have the time then enrol at shi-da, it’s hard work but you’ll see your chinese improving so much more than at these language schools.

8

I’m at CLD and I am very happy with the quality of teachers.