Prof.Dr.David Ngin Sian Pau
- 2009-06-26
Signing a contract is one thing and obeying the contract is another thing to consider. You will not be able to obey and complete the contract unless the employer and recruiter agree with the whole process. There are some other things to take into consideration to complete the contract. Sometimes, the employer doesn't want to pay for recruitment fee or commission to the recruiter so the recruiter may ask the FT to leave the school or university in this case and offer another job in other province. Otherwise, the FT might be asked to pay for his or her recruitement fee or commission. But it's worth for me because I don't just teach but do some research on the teaching of English in China. So I like both the systems vice versa.
Don't expect the Foreign Teacher to obey the contract to complete it in full without knowing how the relation among recruiter, employer and the FT. Find out what is what so that you may be able to judge the situation properly. Hope it's useful.
Turino
- 2009-06-25
A fair contract necessarily has reasonable dismissal procedures and an independent arbitration option.If in the first place you'd signed such a contract you could have insisted on its clauses being adhered to.In the event of a stalemate,you could have reported your workplace to Beijing for arbitration.Of course,your employer wouldn't want that,so the breaches would have been rectified in a jiffy on the spot.
But your contract wasn't fair,so you were out on a limb.Even though your employer had broken his side of said contract,you were powerless to force him to rectify said breaches.
So you did a runner,a coward's way out,and you've been taken to task for that since.Your justification for doing a bunk is unacceptable.
What you had posted about being illegally employed is untrue,and you'd neglected to say you'd signed a contract before doing a runner.
By the way,if you knew the contract was illegal in the first place,why did you sign it?
I've been treated badly before too in China.But unlike you,I faced the other side,and tried to improve my lot by forcing the employer to obey what he had signed.It worked,mainly because my contract was fair,unlike yours.That was your cardinal error!
Prof.Dr.David Ngin Sian Pau
- 2009-06-25
No warning is neccessary here for a foreign teacher unless you want to cheat him or her. Just give a notice to them and it will do. Foreign Teachers know who they are and where they have to go for the next step. As for me, I am happy every time I leave China to go back home except the matter of cheating me in making less payment made by the university, school or institute. They should be black listed in fact. But after leaving those schools, we don't bother them any more.
dragonized
- 2009-06-25
Justin, I love it how people like you and the companies you work for want to focus on the contract. Apparently schools can abuse contract until there is no tomorrow yet when foreign teachers leave out of abuse, corruption, and crappy living conditions it's all their fault. I guess for people like you a runner is the ultimate conspiracy of ESL teachers to thwart and undermine poor, innocent, clean places like most of the ESL schools in China, right? Pardon me if I don't understand that.
Turino
- 2009-06-25
Blacklisting louwai seeking jobs in China without allowing said louwai to appeal first is a system of justice in operation similar to a kind of kangaroo court.
That said,every louwai here in China should understand that he (or she) is deemed an alien in official foreign office lingo,just like foreigners in their particular homelands.they shouldn't expect fair treatment under the law here.And probably they've no right of appeal either.
Mr Chris Johnson has a lot to answer for in the case of the louwai who chose not to sign a teaching contract.It doesn't say much for the company he works for,NETWORK ESL,that he is allowed to act illegally in such a way.The complainant should have had his (or her) grievance addressed promptly.But that didn't happen,so said complainant had no choice but to disgrace said recruiter in public.A thousand satisfied clients of said recruiter can post on here singing its praises.I don't care about that.The integrity of said recruiter has been lost because of one serious complaint that was ignored.
Justin
- 2009-06-25
Had you signed a teaching contract with that school before you embarked on your runner? If so, you've been dishonest, and are therefore not entitled to any sympathy re what's happened to you since.
Contracts should be obeyed by both parties. By doing a runner, you've broken your contract. Not what I would have done if I had been in your shoes. And now you must bear the consequences. What's there to complain about? As far as I can see, nothing.
dragonized
- 2009-06-25
I agree with you, it seems that once they "control" you they treat you like you're their property. I did a runner from this school and now this is their way of "showing" how much "power" they have.
We need to let the whole ESL community know that some schools not only see their foreign FT's as people with no rights, they take that for granted. Look what happened to me, I didn't want to take that crap that now THEY actually have the nerve to act like THEY have a right to pull this kind of crap!