Opening an English school in taiwan

Business Money
61

At my school, everything is in my name, however, the “Ban Ju Ren” must be Taiwanese. This Ban Ju Ren just has to be someone that agrees to have thier name and therefore, some liability attached to your bushiban. The only requirement I can think of is he/she must have a degree and be a Taiwan citizen.

Some other points I don’t think have been mentioned yet,

  1. Committment- don’t think you are going to break the bank, in the first year at least.

If it bothers you that your teaching hours will not be paid for at least the first six months, don’t open a legal bushiban, stay in your house, or a stable school and collect your salary.

  1. Don’t waiver at the first criticism from a parent about your a)teaching b)curriculum or c) teachers.

Stick to your guns, as long as you believe in what you are doing, take advice, sure, but if you take everything to heart you will spend the next ten years as a rudderless boat flipflopping between the whims of the “parent du jour”.

I am sure I have more than two cents but it’s a start.

Kindergartens regulated like mad, ask your gf/wife/friend to pick up a copy of the regulations at your local MOE.

Agreed a kindy is not worth all the expense/hassle etc…

62

If you don’t want to answer such a personal question, I understand -

What kind of profit margin are we looking at, once you get a school off and running? I’d like to get a rough idea what your take home pay amounts to. Running a school seems like a lot of hassle, so it had better be worth doing it financially speaking…or else sticking to being a hired gun English teacher with lots of free time and a flexible schedule makes more sense.

63

I heard about the law that English can’t be taught in kindergartens, but what about all those “bilingual” and “English immersion” kindergartens out there? Do they all have to close down? What’s the deal with this law? It seems like every kindergarten I’ve ever visited offers some kind of English instruction, so I’m really confused.

Also, I am in the process of applying for Taiwanese citizenship (my husband is a Taiwanese citizen, as are my parents), so would it be much easier when I finally do become a citizen, or is it still not worth the hassle?

64

nyteacher,

if you haven’t already worked at a kindy, you should. getting a job at one is not impossible, even though it is illegal. Take mental notes and decide for yourself if you want to open one.

Your situation, like many here, seems unique. Learn more from the MOE and see what happens.

65

[quote=“jdsmith”]nyteacher,

if you haven’t already worked at a kindy, you should. getting a job at one is not impossible, even though it is illegal. Take mental notes and decide for yourself if you want to open one.

Your situation, like many here, seems unique. Learn more from the MOE and see what happens.[/quote]

Opening a kindy is big…and I mean big money. My partner has opened a new one for the tune of $40,000,000 NT.

66

I don’t know if this belongs on a new thread, but as it is still related to having a school, I’ll go ahead…Do any of you have a good relationship with a local Chinese school, elementary or other? How did the relationship begin and what does it consist of?

I really want to get working with a local school, for more than the obvious reasons. One of the good reasons is that not all kids can afford it and it would be nice to give something back. Also, I enjoy brainstorming with teachers.

Anyway, anyone know the secret handshake to get in the door?

67

We have been involved with a local school. Our contact came through the PTA (one of my students parents is the chairman). Attend a meeting see what happens, a lot I would suspect, the attention you would garner would be invaluable.

68

PTA is a good idea. My wife is on the PTA in my son’s school, but that is way up in San Shia, 30 minutes away, although I do use his kindergarten classmates to test my new material.

I would like to work closer with locals teachers, and have in the past. One bought 100copies of my abcd book, but they still teach in a very traditional and mindnumbingly slow way. And some of them are not, shall we say, great at English.I walked into a class once and heard a teacher asking this questions again and again as she held up a flashcard of a smiling boy: “Do he happy? Do he happy?”

Not that I’m poking fun, but doing teacher training and working with local teachers is something I’ve wanted to do for a long time.

Anyway, thanks for the PTA reminder. I’ll give it a try.

69

There are people coming up from out of town for the first ‘Boiler Room’ meeting, 1pm Sunday 16 January, to talk about opening schools. I hope you’ll all come as this has been a very interesting and informative thread.

If you’re coming then please confirm in this thread - [The Boiler Room - so big bad Bob knows how much free beer to supply.

70

Gosh, do you thinks that’s a good idea? lol A bunch of school owner’s talking about the hellish crapola involved in opening a school? That’ll be enough to dissuade the faint of heart for sure!

But for the ones who stick around, have a thick skin and a slightly black heart, it may be just the push needed to get started.

71

You may not have noticed this yet, but in Taiwan making something illegal often doesn’t stop it from happening. Any school that teaches English to those under six years old is illegal according to MOE regulations.

From what we’ve been able to determine in other discussions, the regulations prohibit the teaching of english, not the teaching of english by foreigners. A school which is doing so can be fined by the MOE. If you are teaching under a work permit, the MOE can terminate the work permit and send you packing. If you are illegally working without a permit, they can send you packing. If you are on a JFRV ARC/APRC or have an APRC and OWP, or are a citizen, there does not appear to be anyway for the MOE to fine you or get you deported, they can just fine the school.

Here are some other discussions on this topic:
[Work rights for foreign spouses with a JFRV ARC
[Labor Standards Act & MOE regulations

There are many other discussions on the topic over in the legal forums.

72

This thread seems to have run its course.

Thanks all. Nice to be here, even though my wife says she’s an internet widow now.

Peace

73

I’d like to welcome all those watching this thread over to a little thread I just started about my own experience. I haven’t continued here because it is about the issue of partnership. I briefly tell my story, share some key points, and give advice that I have learnt the hard way.

Come on over and share my trials, embarrassment, and some successes.

[forumosa.com/taiwan/viewtopic.ph … highlight=](Learn from experience - partnership

74

We just had our first outdoor public presentation, in the cold rain, at about 9pm. The kids did a Chinese Zodiac Song and Dance. Of course, the kids could hardly be heard over the music and they were cold and wet from waiting for 20 minutes on the sidelines. But they were hepped up on chocolate, so …

But it got me thinking who are these presentations for anyway? The kids or the public watching? And are audiences different? This one I’d say was for the kids, as the rain kept lots of people at home. So, I didn’t care much whether they could be heard or if the people watching understood. The kids had a ball and so did I.

But, when the audience is well-informed, and is actually shopping for a school, the presentation must go beyond a cute song and dance routine. This could be an in-house presentation for curious parents or public group of well-informed people: like ETA or a publishing company’s roadshow.

So, what do you do in these kinds of situations? For me, I’d teach them the first lesson (an ABC rhyming TPR thing) and show them how fast they CAN learn English if it’s done right, by the best teachers the school has to offer. Then, I’d show them how we teach reading in a brief, effective demonstration. You have to be able to show your best skills and teachers within a five minute framework.

I think a certain shock value is important for the serious onlookers… something that says WOW, these guys know what they’re doing.

I remember how Hess did their in house presentations years ago. A A a a apple and just getting the kids to chant along with them. It was a joke. But I can get kids in 10 minutes to actually memorize and learn word meanings, via TPR gestures, and then mix up the TPR gestures to create new sentences, which the kids UNDERSTAND. So why not? This sets our school apart from the rest from the git go.

So, I hope this kicks starts this thread again…what do you think…owners and teachers? (I’d love to hear what teachers have to say about these kind of presentations.)

75

[quote=“jdsmith”]
So, what do you do in these kinds of situations? For me, I’d teach them the first lesson (an ABC rhyming TPR thing) and show them how fast they CAN learn English if it’s done right, by the best teachers the school has to offer. Then, I’d show them how we teach reading in a brief, effective demonstration. You have to be able to show your best skills and teachers within a five minute framework.[/quote]
As a teacher, I would refuse to do a demonstration for the parents of potential students. Why? Because a demo class like this is not natural, so the kids probably won’t act naturally – they may freeze, not pay attention, spend all their time looking at their parents, or whatever. They won’t react and learn they way the students do in a real class. For me, trying to deal with this was just too stressful. If you’ve got teachers who are willing to do a demo in front of parents, fine, but I don’t think they usually do show how good a class/teacher/school can be. You’d be better off just putting your most attractive teacher on show – eye candy will pull in the parents more than teaching skills, sadly.

76

Demonstrations - something I love - am I crazy?

I’ve done a number of demonstrations a number of different ways, all of them fruitful. Let me share a few with you all.

  1. When we started our new system we had a speaker come in from Singapore to do a presentation to the parents of Da Ban kids in a kindergarten who were due to graduate over the next few months. The parents responded well to an outside “expert” - however, this is not practical for a small school. We have a network of 3 kindergarten’s and 1 buxiban.

  2. We did a couple of demo nights in the kindergarten. Filled up our big classroom with parents and kids, did a teaching demo which showed what we would be teaching and how we would do it. Then we introduced our school and system followed by Q and A. Good results, but I suspect that they came for the cookies and coffee :laughing:

  3. We did a similar night as above, but we didn’t have the parents in the same room as the kids as we didn’t want to cramp the kids style. We set up a powerpoint display on the first floor, hooked up a camera in the class to a projector on the first floor. In the middle of the powerpoint demo we took a break to show how a local and foreign teacher would teach their children. That worked very well as the parents were able to ask questions about the class while watching and not disrupt the teacher. - I will use this method again. Plus it looked great from outside, people going past could see a crowd of parents, a big screen, powerpoint, and people being interested in what was going on. Of course it was at the same time as parents were picking up their children from the buxiban next-door.

  4. We did a teaching demo in the kindergarten that showed kids able to use natural phonics, read, and use conversations with the teacher. We showed clearly how the kindergarten program would carry on in our buxiban and that there was no need to change systems with another buxiban, because if they did their children would have to start several levels back and waste over one year or more before they would get back to their current level.

77

I agree. I do my parental demos to the parents only, not to the kids. The kids get thrown into a class they seem to fit, after an interview.

78

3[quote]. We did a similar night as above, but we didn’t have the parents in the same room as the kids as we didn’t want to cramp the kids style. We set up a powerpoint display on the first floor, hooked up a camera in the class to a projector on the first floor. In the middle of the powerpoint demo we took a break to show how a local and foreign teacher would teach their children. That worked very well as the parents were able to ask questions about the class while watching and not disrupt the teacher. - I will use this method again. Plus it looked great from outside, people going past could see a crowd of parents, a big screen, powerpoint, and people being interested in what was going on. Of course it was at the same time as parents were picking up their children from the buxiban next-door.[/quote]

This I like. I hate when the parents see a demo with kids and ask, “What do you think?” to the kid.

or “Do you want to study?”

or after class, “Was it any fun?” :fume:

79

I agree. I do my parental demos to the parents only, not to the kids. The kids get thrown into a class they seem to fit, after an interview.[/quote]

Let me clarify a little here. I also didn’t do these demos with new students. The students came from our existing students, and those that had already been in our Xian Xiu class over the summer vaccation. Actually, we didn’t teach them anything “new”, just demonstrated what they had already been taught.

It is a little pointless to do a demo with fresh kids who are going to be so scared of a new place that they will look stupid. Buxiban suicide.

I should have been more clear.

New students are interviewed and given a placement evaluation.

80

This I like. I hate when the parents see a demo with kids and ask, “What do you think?” to the kid.

or “Do you want to study?”

or after class, “Was it any fun?” :fume:[/quote]

Remember, everyone’s favorite radio show is W.I.I.F.M (What’s in it for me?) and the same applies to kids. You have one chance to win the kids and the parents. There’s no point in getting too noble about education at the demo night, although that is important, it is a sales pitch. I used to kid myself that it isn’t, but it is, there is plenty of time to educate later, but you have to get them in the door first. After all, it’s a business, and a business needs to make money. How you make money is by providing a quality service, but if you don’t sell yourself correctly, you won’t be providing a service or making money.