No doubt. I work at a university, so the cram school teachers I know are my students.
It is my observation that private schools find foreigners in general quite threatening as they upset the hierarchy protocols. This was something mentioned above–being really good at what you do is actually a threat. So, a lot of these schools on Tealit deliberately have a high turnover of foreign teachers, but not of local staff. If you work somewhere for less than a year you are a complete disposable nobody and never mind the great work you did; in other words, you are not a threat.
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Wait a sec. Can you elaborate??? I’ve met some helicopter parents in my time. But are you fucking serious? Outside of medical conditions, disabled people etc of course.
Specifically, how old? I get maybe kindy for some. But…?
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Your question may have been a rhetorical one, if so kindly clarify. Your response could be seen to be slightly rude.
Wasn’t trying to be.
I quoted @nz , reponded to her point and was asking her.
I guess what i should have wrote was
That question was aimed at @nz, but good answer.
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4 to 5.
Forget about the 3 year olds. The teachers spend half their day changing diapers.
Used to be that they asked them to be toilet trained before going to school. Now, we are willing to change diapers is a selling point.
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sounds about right.
@nz What is the connection between Fulbright and FPG?
By FPG I’m assuming you’re talking about Formosa Plastic? They are the only reason the Fulbright ETA program was able to expand into Taitung and Hualien — they funded the whole thing as far as I understand. So this “world peace” organization is off collecting dough from a corporation that seeks to destroy the planet.
yes, FPG = Formosa Plastics Group. I did not know that they were involved with funding Fulbright. Any particular reason for this? It’s an easy tax write off? Some kind of connection? Something sinister?
Or do what we did and keep moving South.
If we move any further South we will end up in the Philippines.
Unfortunately food cost while cheaper here ain’t THAT much cheaper. Rent and property on the other hand is way cheaper than Taipei metro area.
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I didn’t dig deeper into the why but there’s no way they do so simply to benefit society, since they are a freaking plastic company! I just met a few ETAs from Taitung a few years back and they were all saying that they don’t know how they feel about their Fulbright Award coming from a massive polluter. I just went over to the Fulbright website and it looks like they’re not bragging about their sponsors anymore, so I wonder if more people complained (though I’m confident the money is still flowing in)
My first kindy job I had in this country I was also wiping asses and changing diapers wen shit happened. That was 20 ish years ago. I peed my bed til I was 10. I think there is a range. I get your meaning, I had crazy as all phuck parents as well. But I have some forgiveness for 4 year olds that shit their pants. I have friends in their 20s that do so. We should focus on diet more, me thinks 
meaning parents should reflect more on themselves before getting too batshit on others.
Formosa plastics is a good example of everything wrong with taiwans current state of short term profit above any other kind of exponential growth. Probably a few threads on just them alone. If the devil existed and wore Prada, they are that.
Same issue, the consumer not only allow them, they embrace them.
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I hope you were paid well. I have never heard of foreign teachers doing that.
Anyway, the point is that more and more kids are going to school without basic skills that they had in the past.
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Indeed. 400/hour. It was a weird time and place.
Either way, I do want to hear more about this. I’m sure many do. It’s a worth while evolution that should be discussed in detail 
More info please, my past experiences aren’t important. Other than 4 years in diapers isn’t exactly new, nor unique to Taiwan.
No worries. We’re all just talking…
I taught adults. I don’t spend a lot of money so the benefit of the job was a lot of free time and low stress in my life. I only needed to work 4 days a week. As the cost of living went up, my stress came back. Eventually the costs became to great to keep it up.
But your point stands, it’s to the point where pretty much any random person on the street makes more money than cram school teachers.
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I didn’t read all the replies, but no one mentioned this fact so…
I don’t know about Tree House, but the other schools you mentioned are not typical EFL schools, most of which are cram schools providing child storage with some English classes. VIS and Kang Chiao provide a full school curriculum but with some EFL classes, and the latter has some affiliated cram schools (kindys, I think), though those may advertise separately.
As to Tealit, I know from an former employer who advertised there that they have a contract with the site to keep their ads up. So the schools aren’t constantly posting ads. Tealit is regularly bumping the same ads to the top. Apparently, schools pay to either have a listing only or also additional ads on the site pointing to that listing (sometimes with broken links). Schools can update their listings when they have an actual vacancy listing the positions that are vacant. When they are full, they are just collecting resumes and sometimes hiring for the next year. The OP may be getting dysfunctional or no communication because they aren’t hiring right then.
From what I’ve seen, the schools that advertise there are mostly lower-tier international schools, private bilingual schools, and a few large cram school chains. Tealit isn’t what it used to be when it was the go-to place to find a teaching job, an apartment, a girlfriend, used furniture, etc. Once, even one room cram schools ran ads, it’s main competition was the China Post, and few people blinked when the ad started “caucasian only”.
Also, people are having fewer children, so the schools are closing, contracting, or moving into different fields.
If the OP is still looking for a job, Facebook groups are the place to go. There’s one big one and a few smaller ones.
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Around that time, I met a Chinese- or Taiwanese-something else man who said he thought his school made him change diapers because he spoke Chinese so they didn’t treat him like other foreigners. I’ve also known of foreigners having to help new students in the bathroom who were never taught to manage themselves.
The problem is caused by Taipei arrogance and stubbornness, both from parents and the buxiban managers.
You have four groups of people:
- Students.
- Teachers.
- Parents.
- School managers.
You would think groups 3 and 4 would get out of the way, and let sincere students connect with sincere teachers, within a minimal framework.
But instead they meddle.
Why?
Because they are utterly convinced they are superior to ‘foreign loser’ and need to tell him how to do his job.
Scratch the surface, and you realize many of the Taipei middle to upper classes are profoundly classist and racist… they just know how to hide it behind those self-effacing smiles.
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That’s an interesting comment HenHaoChi. When I first came here over 30 years ago, Taiwanese people were quite nice and schools were pretty laid back. However, my first boss was a schizophrenic. Lol. I guess some things never change. The other thing, I was thinking today, was that foreign teachers were given a pretty wide latitude back in the day. There again, a friend of mind was fired from a cram school job at that time because he spent a lot of time just talking to his students. I thought this was a good approach. The school didn’t. Anyway, it’s my observation that school managers/directors here are more insecure than ever and that English is being taught the same way as Chinese, which is to say not very well. A couple of years back I was teaching young adults IELTS. They could not write a simple paragraph in English, and these were English majors apparently! Their essays were fascinating for their lack of any clear ideas or expression. It was such a joke. I helped one spoiled young woman solve her college project (outside of my remit) basically telling her exactly what to do without actually doing it for her. Got no thanks for that.
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