I have experience with Columbia International College Taiwan.
Private message me if you wish.
In short: STAY AWAY
Well, it is hiring season for local private schools. I found out about a new private school in Linkou. Asia American International Academy. Here is a link to their website:
They are brand new, so they really donât have a reputation. There certainly are challenges to working with any new school, but if anyone has any solid info on the school, please post here. Thanks.
It doesnât look like AAIA is open for business yet⌠most probably the 2016-2017 school yearâŚ
Yes, youâre right. Now that I look more closely, November 2014 is when they were granted permission to create the school and that this coming school year (2016-17) will be the inaugural year.
Did a little research and found this:
tieonline.com/view_appointments.cfm
Here are the principal and vice principal, just need to scroll down a few. The principal has a pretty good looking resume, that is if he went from PAS to IBSH to KAS. If itâs the other way around, Iâm not at all impressed. The founder and executive director seem to be Taiwanese, I am guessing based on their names. Of course, one has to wonder how much they plan to meddle with the running of the school. Also funny that they say that âup until now there has been no international or American school available for the large population of New Taipei City.â They seem to forget that Kang Chiao is in NTC, albeit, on the opposite end.
Technically, they are correct in their statement, as Kang Chiao accepts local students as well as foreign-passport holding students. True international schools can only accept students with a foreign passport, and not students who only have local passports.
So students with a Taiwanese passport can enroll in the international program in the middle and high schools at KC? Anyway, the kids at this new school are likely to be almost entirely Taiwanese. They are trying to capture the wait listed students for TAS and TES. Even though this new school requires a foreign passport, we all know that the kids were either intentionally born in the US or that they have passports from cash strapped African countries. Not to say that it is wrong or bad, just being realistic about what the school will be like demographically and the reality that there arenât that many proper international students in Taiwan these days.
Technically, they are correct in their statement, as Kang Chiao accepts local students as well as foreign-passport holding students. True international schools can only accept students with a foreign passport, and not students who only have local passports.[/quote]
As a holder of the ROCâand only the ROCâpassport, as well as a former student of KC, I can attest to this.
(Though I transferred to Fuhsing after 8 years at KC and continued down the educational mainstream here.) Now a sad graduate of TFGHS I am bitterly preparing for my second attempt at medical school admission. Ugh.
Hey guys,
any info on:
-WAGOR (W.I.S.E)
-Washington High School
-Lizen High School
All based in Taichung. Just researching their reputation and feel of the place. Iâve been here 4 years and know the score (to a certain extent.)
Any info would be much appreciated,
cheers!
Rob
Iâve never even heard of Lizen High School. To be honest, I donât know much about any of these schools except they are Taiwanese run and you should expect all the typical crap that goes along with a Taiwanese run school.
[quote=âRob_Dâ]Hey guys,
any info on:
-WAGOR (W.I.S.E)
-Washington High School
-Lizen High School
All based in Taichung. Just researching their reputation and feel of the place. Iâve been here 4 years and know the score (to a certain extent.)
Any info would be much appreciated,
cheers!
Rob[/quote]
This website might have some info youâre looking for about those schools in Taichung:
After working here I can say that the management is very unprofessional. If you flirt with your Chinese teachers you have a good chance of getting in good with the organization as a whole. You are asked to sub for other teachers when they call in sick for no extra pay. You are asked to do many after school events, especially if you are a big class teacher. It works out to about 200nt per hour, but you are done at 4:00pm which is actually quite nice. The people who run the school are married to each other which allows for Executive Director to do whatever he/SHE wants with no recourse. Everyone speaks ill of the Executive director behind his/HER back and he/SHE is feared by all CTâs. If you are a good teacher it doesnât matter as it is a whole other criteria for having longevity here. There is a 7000nt evaluation bonus every three months but there is no âevaluationâ that takes place, it is essentially how they feel about you on that day and more of a popularity contest among foreign teachers. Teachers that have been with them a long time have climbed the popularity ladder and have it quite nice.
If you plan to work here be prepared for an easy gig with nonsensical expectations and zero guidance which can be a blessing and a curse. You get 25 vacation days which is nice, but you can only use them when there is no school and all teachers need to use them at the same time which leads to mass confusion, and a few teachers (first year) will get chopped(not resigned) to make room for new teachers who can actually work the summer.
You donât get full Chinese New Year bonus till year 2 if you make it that far.
Overall there are much better gigs out there where you can make more money for less time, but this job is likely the easiest (once you get in the good books with directors) which is a very difficult task.
Which school are you talking about? Iâm sorry, but there appears to be no context for the first statement âafter working hereâŚâ Where is âhere?â Some school, Taiwan in general? Please explain further.
I donât know who posted the last comments on the unknown school, but it sounds identical to the problems and experiences my co-workers and I have had with Kang Chiao Kindergarten School The management is completely unprofessional and it is bewildering how they manage to retain their students and their staff. I can only assume that the high school is so good that the parents are willing to put up with it.
If you are prepared to flirt with the management you might be able to get by ok, but if you see them for the vile mockery of human kind they really are then prepare to be disrespected, disregarded and disfranchised.
In 2015 it was written into the contracts that if substituting someone elseâs class would be paid extra, so for half the year no oneâs class got covered until they sat us down and spun some BS about how they werenât going to actually honour that.
The Exec Director is also the trophy wife of the much older owner of the company and she struts around like Celsi from Game of Thrones with her young heir to the throne except without her charm and niceties. No one speaks fondly of her because there is nothing good about her. Most of her contributions come at the last minute before she has seen what has been prepared and all the work has been done. For example this year the syllabus had been written in conjunction with the Chinese teachers so that we would all teach the same things and a month into the year she decided to have the teachers re-write a syllabus to correspond with a text book that made no sense because non of the corresponding materials were purchased. Exercises on stories that you canât read, references to web materials you can not access, teachers books would at least be useful to deciphering what itâs about, but apparently not useful enough to buy.
Evaluations appear to be decided on by spinning a wheel that arrives at a figure. Donât expect any constructive criticism and certainly no positive feedback ever, just hell fire if they donât like something. There have been a few times where me and my colleagues are told to do something a certain way, so the next time thatâs what we do and itâs now wrong, so be prepared to be left in the dark and confused by anything vaguely important.
The everyday is ok. As long as you donât work too hard and fade in to the background itâs an easy enough gig (which gets harder each year). Just donât expect much reason or logic to be abundant when interacting with the bosses.
Anyone have some information on American School Taichung or Mingdao High School (also in Taichung)?
If you want to know the scoop about working as a foreign teacher at Lizen High School here it is. You get reasonably good pay. Foreign full time teachers make about 60 K. Sure you could get a higher salary at Wagor but for Taiwan standards its fairly good. You either work Part time in High School Or Elementary OR both departments full time. Full time tends to be from 9-6 pm and it will pretty much take over your time. From what I understand, the work is not too over-demanding and the kids tend to be great. The downside of working at the high school is you will usually need to deal with a few bad apples in the class and how you deal with them will determine how you teach the rest of the class and whether you enjoy it or it becomes a living hell. You teach solo. The elementary department, the problem is the Taiwanese teacher, who is in class with you, who will no doubt pick you apart about the various things they think your doing wrong and how well you adapt to criticism and your relationship with co-teachers will determine if you enjoy working in that department.
The biggest problem with Lizen is the people who actually run the school. From what I have heard, the âbossesâwho deal with foreign teachers donât really call the shots. This was not always the case. Before the current management staff, the high school and elementary staff was run by a woman who had free rein from the principal and pretty much was the head honcho and could make unilateral decisions regarding pay, class schedules and so on. Sometime a few years ago, the position of the man directly below the principal at the school was replaced with another . Apparently this person is extremely strict and keeps the management staff on a short lease and basically they cant even wipe their ass without his approval. There are stories that this man and the Principal have told management , âlook these foreign teachers are just talking headsâand âif one gives you problems, replace them âand all they need is somebody with a pulse who listens and âitâs not important if they are a good teacher or notâ. This is sad that the school is now run with the standard cram school attitude towards foreigners because it apparently used to be different. So donât expect a flexible place. The pay has not changed for the last 10 years ago and is unlikely to change. There are superiors who you donâ't see, but rule the roost, with a mentality hostile towards foreigners, who they view as slave labor.
Sorry, but 60K for what is supposed to be a full time ânormalâ teaching job in Taiwan is absolute dog $*!# Obviously Taiwan standards are notoriously low. Even getting 100K and having to put up with the amount of work expected from you and having to work for Taiwanese people is hardly worth while. At 60K, youâre pretty much a slave. Better off working at a public school where you will make more money and have much less work to do.
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Thatâs hilarious! I am what one would call a âteacherâ, but feel as though I spend half my day chained to the desk wishing I could be more involved in the kidsâ learning, and the other half being⌠well, a dancing monkey.
Does anyone have any information on teaching at the Jun-Yi Steiner school, in Taidong? It got a mention earlier in this thread, a few years back, but no real information.
I donât know much about it. I think most of the info I know came from whatâs posted already. It is a Waldorf school, so they have their own type of educational philosophy. I believe the principal is South African. Perhaps someone who worked there could send you a PM if they donât want to post publicly or you could directly message the principal to ask any questions. anthony.cluver@junyi.tw
From what I heard, the school is very, ummmm⌠local, if you catch my drift.
Anyone working at a private/international school at the moment who are hiring in August/September 2019?