Yuteh Bilingual School located in Tucheng

“Yuteh has been growing quickly and the highschool has an international program linked to Australia. The staff is diverse too. There are teachers hired to teach Spanish, German, English, Math, Science, Geography, Art, PE, etc. The Spanish teachers are from Spanish speaking countries, which I think is really cool in Taiwan. The foreign teaching staff hail from all over the world. There is no racial discrimination at all. Diversity is encouraged and celebrated at Yuteh.”

The language teachers are Taiwanese what are you talking about? There are no Spanish speaking teachers

Yes, there are.
Maybe you have not met them.
Do you teach in the elementary or junior/senior high?

I know that’s obvious it was like a propaganda post from North Korea. I don’t know what is true or not and no offense as I don’t know you. My post was just to get some actual facts. As for doctoring scores I was going to tell you before the school said they don’t do it, that it is extremely common here and there are ways around it. For example if they say an 80.is the lowest then think of it on a scale of roughly 1 to 20.points with 1 being 80 and 20 being 100. Most parents talk with each other so if one student is getting constant 80s and another mostly over 95s they figure it out.
When you said they doctored scores or changed scores that’s highly believable. And when they said they don’t my bullsh.t detector went off.
And if the ydoctored your pay it’s often illegal so report it, never mind what’s in the contract. If you don’t show up to teach or are late they can take it off but not fine you, that’s illegal. Many schools get around that by using a bonus system.

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Thank you for being sensible, crusher. People would think you’re crazy here. Thank you that you have some experiences of working in Taiwan.

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Wow.
My honest opinion and my honest experience is comparable to North Korean propaganda?

I’m not admin.
I’m just a teacher who has been there a while. Long enough to have a solid feel for the school.

Nobody asked or told me to post here. I did it on my own to help the OP and also give a balanced view of the school.

Is it a perfect place? No place is. There are always areas that can and need to improve. Everyone I know works their tail ends off to give the best possible education they can to the kids there and help each other out.

I have no dog in this fight, but I did a search for ‘Yuteh’ and this is all I came up with. A thread linking to another now-dead thread, but whatever was there seemed bad enough to scare off the one poster from ever applying for it.

The Yuteh website looks impressive tho.

There really isn’t anything terrible about the school. I have been with the school for quite a while; long enough to see it grow and plenty of people come and go.

A lot stay and work hard to make it a good place. I’m a strong believer in things are what you make of them.

People who leave do so for many different reasons. Some never intended to teach in Taiwan longer than a year or two, others move around schools, others leave because they discovered they weren’t cut out for a genuine teaching job and then others leave because they feel they got burned for whatever reason.

Most of the people who feel they got burned made poor choices or were not doing their job well, then they turn on everyone saying crazy stuff.

Admin are not there trying to mess with people. When the teachers are happy, it makes their job so much easier. Why make trouble? The pay for foreign teachers is actually very, very good.

I used to teach in a public school program in Taiwan and the pay was liveable, but barely. There were no benefits really. But at Yuteh, I’m making enough to pay a mortgage, take care of my family and save. The bonuses are decent and they only deduct if you are habitually late or don’t show up. Performance bonuses are almost never touched. Everyone I know there has always been given the full bonus. There are other schools who will gnaw away at your bonuses for the slightest infractions. Yuteh is not one of those places.

Foreign teachers have it made there compared to their Taiwanese counterparts. Foreign teachers get to clock out an hour earlier, don’t have to deal with answering parent phone calls, get more bonuses and higher pay, don’t have to attend evening field trips, are off the clock during nap time, and they get their own offices if subject teachers or their own desk and computer if a homeroom teacher. Taiwanese teachers get none of that except the desk and computer for homeroom teachers. But they work later and have to do way, way more paper work and parent communication.

If you clock in on time, teach, manage your students, grade things on time, cooperate, help when needed and do the job they are paying you to do, then the place is really a good place to be.

The website hasn’t changed much since the school first opened. Many of those pictures date back to the first couple of years. I think it could be better, but it’s fine.

The programs they have going on and the curriculum is pretty solid.

As I said before and as I say to my students…nobody and no place is perfect, there is always room to improve. Which is another thing I like about Yuteh. They listen to teachers about changes to curriculum to help make it better. They are open to suggestions and discussions about improving where things need improvement.

I’ve put a lot into the school, my students and my career being there and it has paid off.

Years ago I worked for the British Council and a teacher there left under a cloud sending an email to all employees describing the place as, among many other things, “malodorous”.

IIRC the package at the time was 90 something a month, 24 contact hours, 950 an hour OT, 30 days paid vacation, sick pay, paid typhoons days and public holidays. Smelt good to me and I would guess to most buxiban teachers.

My point is two individuals can have very different experiences in the same organisation. There are many variables involved - expectations, cultural differences, misunderstandings etc. Sometimes the teacher and the school just don’t fit and it’s best to look for somewhere else. However, be prepared to be disappointed elsewhere.

Sui Generis is a long term poster here and I have no reason to believe they are lying or are a stooge of this school’s management. It’s pretty offensive for Sui Generis to have this suggested about him/her IMO.

This looks like a case of teacher expectations not being matched by reality. It happens, move on. However, complete your teaching contract. The students needs should take priority.

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I remember at my former uni I worked at in Korea, a disgruntled ex-employee sent poison letters to the dean about a year after he left, making false accusations (teachers hooking up with students, teachers being drunk on the job, etc) against all the foreign instructors still there. The uni laughed it off, because they knew he was a nut and bitter about the fact he was let go. Then when he was ignored by the administration, he started slandering the school and everyone who worked there on all the ex-pat message boards. True nutter.

Thanks.

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Occasionally the school is 100% bad, sometimes it’s the teacher. Most often it’s six of one and half a dozen of the other.

This was really about the teacher. He didn’t have his contract renewed due to super-low evaluations and complaints from students about his teaching methods. His ego couldn’t accept that, I guess.

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This has nothing to do with a teacher can’t accepting that they’re not wanted bc they can’t perform. Performance and evaluations were never a problem in this case but you all are entitled to your opinions if you think that’s the reason teachers are venting. You’re not members of the school. I believe it’s wrong that you totally try to diminish someone’s experience bc you already have a perception in your mind that anything related to someone speaking negative about their workplace in Taiwan is just some bitter teacher that failed at performing. We understand that’s the case most of the time but you have no right to generalize every teacher when you are not personally in their shoes and going through their experience. Just because you find it to be a stretch doesn’t take away from the fact that You it can be reality.

Next, everything that glitters is not gold. That exactly how to describe yuteh, however they do an excellent job at covering all the unethical treatments that goes on there. Most teachers want to vent but since most need their jobs, they’re willing take whatever treatment and that’s their right. I had to laugh as I read about the admin being supportive and open to suggestions; some teachers must work at a different yuteh or maybe some teachers’ words hold more weight than others, I don’t know. There’s two sides to a story and before you try to group everyone as just whiny privileged teachers ask yourself if what they’re saying in fact can be plausible.

When did I mention your performance? I’ve not made any criticism of you.

When and how do they listen to teachers when meetings are one-sided information sessions, and mandatory to attend. People even lose their bonuses if they don’t attend these “meetings” where they have no input.

The weekly staff meeting is for admin to announce important dates, upcoming events and notices from other departments. If you have questions, anyone can raise their hand and ask.

Weekly grade level meetings are where you can discuss things for your grade. It’s in those meetings where there is more time to talk

Personal stuff pertaining to contracts and stuff, you can go straight to admin.

It’s pretty common in the working world to be required to attend meetings your employer schedules…no matter how mundane.

Having waded through most of this: thank you for all that!

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That’s true in any workplace. Be it school, office or factory. (replace teacher to anything that matches)

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I was about to apply to this school and ran across this interesting thread. I tend to believe Sui Generis, have to say. He/She has much better writing skills. Zero mistakes, solid grammar.

Expat123 maybe you should learn to write proper English before you try to teach it? The fact that your writing is rather crap, and that you can’t even take the time to proofread your own posts, makes me assume that general laziness and not being qualified was the real problem for you at this job. Not to mention your general vibe of negativity. Also, you whine about people trying to “diminish someone’s experience” right after you’ve just done that to Sui Generis. LOL. Whatever bro.

Conclusion: I’m going to go ahead and apply at this school. Thanks Sui Generis!