Hello, Martin!

I would have replied sooner, but I just now came upon your responding post to me, and others. Thank you for your thoughtful and measured words. I appreciate it.

I too, have nothing against you, and I sincerely wish you success and happiness at Nasdaken. I continue to receive e-mail messages from students asking me to come back and teach them again. I always enjoyed a fantastic relationship with the wonderful students there, and I miss them very much!

Yes, I have been bad-mouthing the school, but this is a very recent decision and action on my part, after having a close association with the school since it opened in early 2005. (I spent two months meeting with and advising them before it opened as well). The owner and Vice President and I worked in another school together (where the VP was one of two IT assistants) prior to Nasdaken, since 2003. Clearly, I have long and continuing history with them. The owner and I remain friends. Just two weeks ago, he invited me (much to my surprise) for lunch, and we enjoyed a wonderful time together.

He knows my true feelings about his school, so we avoided the subject at lunch. I always brought my grievances to him (and the Vice President) first, before sharing them with anyone else. The owner may not always like me, but I think he respects my honesty. He knows I never lied to him about anything, and always gave him plenty of chances to solve the problems before I lost my temper. (And for the record readers, Ive never become angry with my students, only management.)

I decided to bad-mouth Nasdaken because I had voiced ALL of my complaints to them over and over and over again privately (and without anger) since the place opened. (I was the first FT hired there.) I gave them so many chances to remedy situations before going public. All they did was ignore me.

I accept that the vice president is your good friend, but I have a LONG history with him and know some details about his true character that I have to assume he has not shared with you. Personally, I find the guy to be completely unqualified to be vice president (whatever that means in China!) of anything, especially an enterprise has something to do with English education and one that engages foreigners.

It sounds like you (and only you) have made some genuine improvements in the place and applaud you for that. I have a request for you also Martin I just checked the Nasdaken website, and a troubling problem still exists. The teaching staff page displays photos of ten foreign teachers (wheres yours?), eight of whom I know for a fact are no longer working there (some of them departed more then eight months ago). Will you please see that these photos are removed? This is a prime example of why I no longer allow training schools to take photos of me. Our faces are often used as a selling point long after our bodies have flown far away. Thanks! Ill check on that problem again in the future.

In the meantime, sincere best wishes to you and many of my colleagues (Chinese and foreign) who are still there (although the numbers are steadily dwindling).

Regards,

Frank