I've taught at every NDI center in Shanghai as a PT teacher. The Chinese staff on the academic side, work very, very, very hard. You can tell most of the Chinese that the foreign teachers interact with, are trying very hard, but they are worked to death, with very little pay. Turnover is unbelievable.

The problem is the Chinese management. NDI is a Chinese owned and managed school/business. Chinese managers just haven't figured it out yet. The Western-minded managers are caught between a Western approach and making the Communist party happy or at least being forced to suck up to the heavy hand of government. Then there are the Chinese managers that just have no clue and are allowed to run the school into the ground.

NDI has a very poor reputation among the Chinese students. They are last on the list of private institutes for a reason.

My Mandarin is good, and as an older, financially independent, PT teacher, I was able to question the Chinese business managers pretty directly. You can tell quickly that they are just caught up in a poorly managed business, and that NDI is likely only still "in business" due to government assistance.

The teaching resources are really bad.

Good teachers do not stay at NDI. Average teachers do not stay at NDI.

I will say that each individual center seems to be able to create some autonomy, so some centers are better than others. A foreign teacher can find a good situation depending on the center, but that good situation will likely change due to turnover.