Warning About Working With Dewey

The problem is that eventually, for this sort of thing to stop, someone has to stand up and say something. Dewey and organizations like them want you to believe that doing that would be your immediate downfall. HC is right – they might (might!) cause short-term inconvenience, but in the end she will make her way in the world. She has a US passport, a Master’s degree, a teaching certificate in the States, and a great son. What do they have, other than massive karmic payback waiting to happen?

Some people believe it’s not their problem to stand up and be heard. That’s fine; it’s the right option for them. I don’t happen to fit into that group. If I believe something is wrong, I say so. I’ve met Housecat and she doesn’t do things without considering all the possible repercussions. If Dewey is sending along letters and contract terms that are illegal, why should she stay quiet, suck it up and just fade away, only to let the next person, who might have fewer options or less resistance, be made to do the same or worse?

[quote=“ironlady”]The problem is that eventually, for this sort of thing to stop, someone has to stand up and say something. Dewey and organizations like them want you to believe that doing that would be your immediate downfall. HC is right – they might (might!) cause short-term inconvenience, but in the end she will make her way in the world. She has a US passport, a Master’s degree, a teaching certificate in the States, and a great son. What do they have, other than massive karmic payback waiting to happen?

Some people believe it’s not their problem to stand up and be heard. That’s fine; it’s the right option for them. I don’t happen to fit into that group. If I believe something is wrong, I say so. I’ve met Housecat and she doesn’t do things without considering all the possible repercussions. If Dewey is sending along letters and contract terms that are illegal, why should she stay quiet, suck it up and just fade away, only to let the next person, who might have fewer options or less resistance, be made to do the same or worse?[/quote]

Did I say sit back and do nothing?

It is an inconvenience to me that that Dewey exists in the first place and a special irritation in particular that they have so much market coverage in the South, where I’d rather be. But if I want to work in a public school next year, I do still have other options.

I can talk with my current school, and current county government. I can use another recruiter. I can move north. Or I can do something else for a living next year, or I can go home or to another country. I can even take them to court/labor council and fight them, if I want.

You see, when Dewey decided to insist that I should pay fees for whatever school I work for (if that school doesn’t pay instead), they pretty much decided the call. One way or another, the one thing they’ve managed to do is cause me inconvenience. But once you HAVE to move again, then all bets are off and you may as well consider all your options and look at the good in things, no? Wherever I’ll be next year, I won’t have to work with Dewey!

There are other reasons, too, why this is not such a big deal for me at this time, one being the simple fact that I loathe my apartment and plan to move anyway. Also, like I said, I always have a plan B. I’m a single mom with little family or support. My eggs are rarely all in one basket![/quote]

Forget about your options for next year, my concern is that you might not make it to next month.

what does your Chinese contract say about this clause? I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s different than the one you previously signed. And they claim translation error.

I agree that you shouldn’t sign the contract but your first phone call escalated to verbal threats. And then you publicly slammed them on a popular forum that you know they read. There are better ways that this could have been handled imo.[/quote]

Dewey can’t fire me. I have no contract with Dewey. The school has a contract with Dewey to find teachers. Dewey wanted me to sign a contract with them which was backdated to match the contract with the school. These are two completely different contracts with two completely different entities (the school and Dewey). Dewey can’t cancel my contract with the school.

The phone call didn’t “escalate.” I just sat there listening to the guy. I didn’t speak. The more I didn’t say, the more agitated he got. As he was ranting at me over the phone, I posted here.

That’s not “slamming” them, it’s just stating reality. They’ve slammed themselves.

The reason I posted about this is because it’s just insulting, IMO, to ask a teacher to sign something like this. It’s utter and sheer disrespect for me as a client, and personally it’s disrespectful of my intelligence to think I’d just sign anything they asked, especially something like this.

And this illustrates pretty clearly what it’s been like to work with them from day one. I felt it was an excellent example of why I feel a teacher should go out of his/her way to avoid working with these people, if possible.

Why don’t we just pitch in for our own Filipino spammers to out spam the spammers. SPAM!

No it’s the equivalent of telling a woman she has to show a little bit of skin in the office, even tho we’re in the ‘effin’ 21st century.

There are an endless number of certified teachers with Master’s degrees in Education and teaching experience? That’s news to me, and I’ve been here since August of 2002.

I thought Dewey made the threat.

It sounds as if you’re saying that she shouldn’t have informed us about this. It sounds as if you’re saying she should have censored herself.

It’s irrelevant whether Dewey is brought down. She’s been giving us information. People have the right to give information to others in order to help them make decisions.

Dewey has exclusive contracts with a significant number of public schools. If you’re going to work at one of those schools then you’re going to work with Dewey. Does Dewey have any problems filling those positions? Sure, but it’s not going to change at all because of a few forum posts.

It doesn’t matter who made the threat, the first contact about this situation escalated to threats.

She should tell us but only when she is out of the grasp of Dewey. Personally I think she’s vulnerable as long as she works at a school that Dewey has an exclusive contract with. I don’t want to read another thread like last year’s thread.

@ Abacus

There’s a story I heard many years ago I think applies well to this situation

The Starfish Story
Original Story by: Loren Eisley

One day a man was walking along the beach when he noticed
a boy picking something up and gently throwing it into the ocean.
Approaching the boy, he asked, What are you doing?
The youth replied, Throwing starfish back into the ocean.
The surf is up and the tide is going out. If I don’t throw them back, they’ll die.
Son, the man said, don’t you realize there are miles and miles of beach and hundreds of starfish?
You can’t make a difference!
After listening politely, the boy bent down, picked up another starfish,
and threw it back into the surf. Then, smiling at the man, he said,
I made a difference for that one.

You can’t save all the potential teachers from getting into bad situations with recruiters, especially with a huge corporation like Dewey that has a monopoly on school contracts. However, if housecat’s warning manages to prevent even one poor sap from getting locked into a nasty situation then her actions were not in vain.

[quote=“upandover”]
You can’t save all the potential teachers from getting into bad situations with recruiters, especially with a huge corporation like Dewey that has a monopoly on school contracts. However, if housecat’s warning manages to prevent even one poor sap from getting locked into a nasty situation then her actions were not in vain.[/quote]

Bravo. :bravo:

Hopefully housecat’s story doesn’t end with her being fired at an inconvenient time.

So in your view it doesn’t matter whether Dewey said the above, or whether housecat said whatever her equivalent to it would have been.

We’re of considerably contrary minds on that issue.

[quote=“Abacus”][quote=“upandover”]
You can’t save all the potential teachers from getting into bad situations with recruiters, especially with a huge corporation like Dewey that has a monopoly on school contracts. However, if housecat’s warning manages to prevent even one poor sap from getting locked into a nasty situation then her actions were not in vain.[/quote]

Bravo. :bravo:

Hopefully housecat’s story doesn’t end with her being fired at an inconvenient time.[/quote]

Abacus, thank you for your concern. I believe you are being genuine.

But I am not a foolish person. Dewey can refuse to place me in other schools, or I can refuse to work for other schools that use Dewey. That’s it. I have no contract with Dewey. They tried to get me to sign one that said I can’t work with any school they contract with unless they get paid. But I didn’t sign it. So that’s that.

I may not be able to work at schools where they have a stake, but there are other schools. Besides that, I really do not enjoy having to have anything to do with them.

In one instance only have I had anything other than completely negative dealings with them. A new kid, Bryan, was very respectful and very kind, when he was assigned the job of handling my ARC renewal. I went with him though every step, and he was very professional. He didn’t know much about what he was doing, as he’d been with them for about two weeks, but he wasn’t condescending or disrespectful, and didn’t act hassled that I insisted on going along for the process–which I did because I wasn’t leaving it up to Dewey to get it right.

That is the kindest thing I have to say about the entire outfit. A new guy was not condescending. The worst things I could say about them, I am actually not bothering to say here. I don’t mind though, if you want to PM.

Erh is that an oxymoron. He was professional but didnt have a clue what he was doing? I’m sorry I don’t see how someone can be called professional when they havent got a clue about the job they are meant to be doing.

Good on you for telling Dewey to get stuffed and tell them to stick their contract up their shredder. They sound like shysters.

Erh is that an oxymoron. He was professional but didnt have a clue what he was doing? I’m sorry I don’t see how someone can be called professional when they havent got a clue about the job they are meant to be doing.

Good on you for telling Dewey to get stuffed and tell them to stick their contract up their shredder. They sound like shysters.[/quote]

Sorry, I mean that he was profession in manor and grace. He did not treat me like a trained monkey that he was leading about on a leash. He was respectful to me as a fellow human being. In this way, he was professional and a great contrast to his work mates.

Well lets hope he leaves for a better organization before they turn him.

First of all, you do not have to work for any agency.

I am here since 1997 and I have never worked for an Agent. You are definitely better qualified than I am.
Maybe the pressure of finding work before your ARC expires makes you feel more insecure, but you can always register for some Chinese classes, go to Hong Kong for the weekend and come back good to go for another six month.

Here is just on of dewey’s ads I took from my site.

[quote]NT$60,000/month Performance
Bonus NT$3,000/month Housing
Allowance NT3,000/month Attendance
bonus NT 2,000/month Winter
paid vacation Other
Paid national holidays (according to the school’s calendar.) Nation
laborer and health insurance provided Contract
period: 12 months Working
week: Mondays to Fridays Working
hours: AM 08:00 ~ PM 16:50 Student’s
age: 6~16 (Elementary/Junior high level) Size of
class: 25~40 kids. Work
permit & alien resident visa (ARC): school will help you apply
for it. [/quote]

Someone please explain; AM 08:00 ~ PM 16:50 are those 6,7 or eight teaching hours a day.
At 6 hours a day, this would be 500 NT$ per hour.
At 7 hours a day 428NT$ per hour
and if you take it for 5 teaching hours a day it would be 600NT$ per hour.
This is for a month with 28 days of course!

I know that the hourly pay for elementary and high schools is no less than 800 NT$ per hour.
So what happened to the difference?

Plus 25 - 40 kids. If you teach at some crappy buxiban, you could make 700 per hour and have less kids. Maybe 8 to 20 kids per class.

They always claim that the teacher does not have to pay them, but you obviously do lose quite a lot of money working for/with them.

Another thing I’d consider is to ask the school you are working at, to do business without Dewey. This might be the reason why he insists soo much for you to sign this modern slavery paper.

[quote=“Hamletintaiwan”]First of all, you do not have to work for any agency.

I am here since 1997 and I have never worked for an Agent. You are definitely better qualified than I am.
Maybe the pressure of finding work before your ARC expires makes you feel more insecure, but you can always register for some Chinese classes, go to Hong Kong for the weekend and come back good to go for another six month.

Here is just on of dewey’s ads I took from my site.

[quote]NT$60,000/month Performance
Bonus NT$3,000/month Housing
Allowance NT3,000/month Attendance
bonus NT 2,000/month Winter
paid vacation Other
Paid national holidays (according to the school’s calendar.) Nation
laborer and health insurance provided Contract
period: 12 months Working
week: Mondays to Fridays Working
hours: AM 08:00 ~ PM 16:50 Student’s
age: 6~16 (Elementary/Junior high level) Size of
class: 25~40 kids. Work
permit & alien resident visa (ARC): school will help you apply
for it. [/quote]

Someone please explain; AM 08:00 ~ PM 16:50 are those 6,7 or eight teaching hours a day.
At 6 hours a day, this would be 500 NT$ per hour.
At 7 hours a day 428NT$ per hour
and if you take it for 5 teaching hours a day it would be 600NT$ per hour.
This is for a month with 28 days of course!

I know that the hourly pay for elementary and high schools is no less than 800 NT$ per hour.
So what happened to the difference?

Plus 25 - 40 kids. If you teach at some crappy buxiban, you could make 700 per hour and have less kids. Maybe 8 to 20 kids per class.

They always claim that the teacher does not have to pay them, but you obviously do lose quite a lot of money working for/with them.

Another thing I’d consider is to ask the school you are working at, to do business without Dewey. This might be the reason why he insists soo much for you to sign this modern slavery paper.[/quote]

Those are just numbers, Hamlet. It doesn’t look like an MOE contract, either.

There are other considerations. One of the biggest for me is that I have a school aged son. Working in some crappy buxiban would mean that I never saw him. People have their reasons. Sometimes others on this site get very judgemental without realizing that they don’t know the whole story.

As one who’'s been living here now over 12 yrs, I’ve seen & I’ve heard all the Horror Stories about Recruiters & Taiwanese Employers . That’s why you make sure the contract you make has a specific clause in it for your benefit. It should be stating that if current Recruiter/ Employer isn’t performing up to her/his job duties/capabilities to the Recuitee’s 100% satisfaction said Recuitee can self-terminate contract at ANY time without proper notice ( if so desired) & without any reprercussions." You then have sign & Date it & stamp it as well . Then you’ve got them by the perverbial balls. Don’t take the old BS line they feed you "Oh,we’re Sorry, but its not part of our usual contract procedures " , just tell them it may NOT be for your Taiwanese Employees, BUT it is for foreign Employess. "This way they dont hold back on your month Salary if you decide to leave them.

Whenever I get a spam email from some shady recruiter I have fun telling them all the different ways they can go fuck themselves.

Wait, do you actually do that in your contracts?