I was directed to this board by a friend a while ago, after he noticed a review of our centre on here by an ex-employee. The post was full of lies and made the school out to be avoided at all costs. The truth was, he was fired for being rubbish at his job and rude to the faculty. He was racially offensive on a weekly basis and struggled to teach a class of intermediate level students without TA assistance. He was not a good teacher and yet his review on here made him sound like he was completely without fault.

I have seen this time and time again, you attack the character of a teacher and expect us to take your words at face value. Why should we believe your word compared to his? I have real life experience working in china, or else I wouldn’t even bother replying to you in the first place. You never bothered to list the conditions of your company. You say he was racist, and was rude. Why? What did he say exactly? Did you ever think about the possible faults on your end? The local Chinese can be just as racist/rude towards foreigners. What about the living conditions that you gave him? How about getting him past the culture shock? Just saying something like “he was not a good teacher” doesn’t make you or your company sound credible at all, as you guys were the ones who recruited him!

The messages of support, agreeing with him about the 'lying, cheating, money-grabbers' flowed in... All from people who have never been to the school, know anybody who has actually worked there, but are all too ready to believe anything negative about any school review that appears on this board.

You don’t need to actually go somewhere to know about some things. I wouldn’t go to the countries of Sudan or Yemen, each respectively right now due to the political unrest and wars being fought there. Your argument is and unfair one in that you continuously “raise the standards” in a debate. If you haven’t been to the country then you don’t know what it’s like to work there, if you haven been there you haven’t worked at our company, if you have worked at our company then it’s your fault entirely for being rude, etc. Others and I who are “all to ready” to believe the negative stuff believe for a reason, and that reason is that there are way too many companies that rip people off for money in china and hire underqualified folks to run them.

I posted a rebuttal of the original post; attempting to clear up some of the lies and be objective about the school. I am in no way it's biggest fan, but that's not to say flagrant lies about it on a teacher forum is helpful to anybody.

If you are indeed not its “biggest fan” why do you sound so defensive and act like you have a stake in this whole thing? If I worked for a company which didn’t treat it’s employees like decent human beings and instead like commodities(which is what the original review sounded like) I wouldn’t ever feel like I had a right to speak out for it, even if I wasn’t treated like that.

Straight away, the same people who couldn't wait to support the original negative post, jumped on my objective review... Accusing me of having been 'bought-off' by the school, or conned in to thinking it was a good place. All because I didn't jump on their bandwagon of mindless, unhelpful negativity. I have seen the same thing happen to anybody who dares to offer a positive review of a school and even those that are objective and list all pitfalls and positives.

Your company doesn’t qualify as a school. I also have yet to see a “positive review that lists all of the pitfalls” of any private or public institution on this forum. If you bothered to do proper research and look at the old threads from back in 07/08 then you’ll find that whenever there was a review leaning towards the negative side of any company/school the response threads that did a rebuttal always and without exception had an attack which included some form of character insults. You have just joined that with how you are talking.

What I have realised is that this board is unfortunately mostly full of miserable, bitter people, who have (probably quite rightly) been dismissed by their employers and feel the need to share their biased, self-pitying, tripe with the world, warning everyone away from the horrible school they just left. Any positive comments are denounced as bought-off (God forbid anybody have something positive to say! That simply doesn't happen!) or subjected to insults.

What you have “realized” for all of us is your shallow, incompetent ways of thinking and a lack of intelligence in communicating with others. To label all of the people who go against your opinion in the way you have done shows just how abusive and uncaring you really are as a person. No wonder your “school” is so glad to have you. Just stick your head in the sand and pretend you don’t see anything. By the way I believe both me and others on this board can’t be “bought-off” since there are folks who post on here who have ethics, not that you would understand.

I am in no way biased to my school or the country. I have been in China long enough to know I do not like its attitude toward education, its people, foreigners. I do not like the food, the weather or customs. I cannot wait to get back to Europe in a couple of months. I am not somebody who mindlessly thinks China is great. I readily accept that some schools are bad and deserve a bad review. However, I also recognise that there are places that do not deserve a bad review, and a bad opinion of a school on here is most likely due (at least in part) to the poster themselves and their behaviour/ability... And that anybody who tries to balance the opinion or be objective is ignored or insulted.

You have already shown your bias and contempt and quite frankly I don’t think your dislike of the things in china has translated to any meaningful or real action which can be of benefit to others. You just keep on trudging along with your narcissistic attitude and your own lack of balance is what keeps you from seeing the underlying reasons of why there are so many who post negative things about china. If it’s common sense that is needed to think some things over, then by golly you won’t use it because you believe your own perspective is so much better than that of the others who speak against you. How easy it is to merely label.

If you come to this board to look at reviews for the school you are thinking of going to, take any you find with a pinch of salt. The review of my school was complete fabrication, yet was given more weight by other posters due to its negative content than an actual objective review was. Don't assume the posters on here know these schools, they don't. They just enjoy being negative. Unfortunately some posters on here do not realise they do more harm than good with this attitude, those schools that actually merit a bad review and should really be avoided get lost in the quagmire of bile about every private school in China

Actually, the bad “schools” that are famously know for their incompetence repeatedly come up on these boards over and over again throughout the years. Being that there are over 30,000 of these types of companies that masquerade as “schools”, if you don’t do your research you can get lost anyway. Considering how china as a country does business there will be only more bad reviews of many more of these places in the future. Your logic is flawed and you’re just trying to win the argument without giving any grounded reasons. What's even more damaging is that you are giving anyone who will listen an excuse to ignore any negative posts, which means you show no real sympathy or empathy with others who have something truthful to say in terms of being critical.

Do not let a review on here make you turn down an offer from a school, it is most likely that the original reviewer lied or omitted a lot of reasons for their 'bad treatment', do more research. Or better still, ask to speak to teachers currently at the school, a decent school will have no problems letting you talk to their current staff. Remember, if these schools were as bad as people make out, they would have no foreign teachers there at all. Just because one person has a bad time, does not mean that is the case for all staff. There is always more than one side to a story.

Wrong again, these “schools” will continue to hire newbies who have no experience working in china and will be successful due to the heaving marketing that china has put out overseas. As for speaking with teachers who have worked at any company/school I am applying to that isn’t always a good way of finding out either as there are plenty of folks who will grovel and give you what you want to hear in order for you to come over. I have tried this myself in the past and I almost always found it difficult for the opposite party to comply and help me with this. One reason could be since they have many applications they will just take anyone who doesn’t actually do the research in the first place. You are the one doing the lying and omitting since you obviously either never actually applied to too many places or you are just covering up for the crooked practices of these companies, such as the one you are working for right now.

If a review particularly concerns you, ask the school about it. Their reaction to the question will tell you more than the posts on here will.

This statement made by you makes me wonder if you actually put any thought into your words first before typing them down. If a sheep is afraid of being eaten would it ask a wolf how not to be eaten? Why would any teacher blindly trust any company or school that he/she doesn’t know?

Remember that teaching in China is not like teaching in the West. Private schools in China will always value profit over the education of the students at the school, if you are serious about teaching this can be soul-destroying and you are likely to have a bad time at any private school. If you want a serious teaching position, avoid China completely.

Although this last statement seems objective, your previous statements destroyed any credibility of what you just said. Your own attitude towards others who’ve had a bad experience should warn anybody away from you and wherever you are working at. If you know it’s bad to work in china as a real teacher why would you call your company a “school” when it’s not a real school? Why would you feel like you have the right to call others who have experiences to share “bitter”, “who have(probably quite rightly)…”, etc.? If you know it’s bad then you know there will be many angry folks who want to warn others off out of goodwill. To acknowledge something as bad means you know the consequences that this bad situation that is the ESL World of Education in China can produce, and you just ignored it completely with your attitude on this forum, period. The name of this thread can be just as applicable to trusting anything you and whom you perceive to be protecting as it is towards me and others who speak negatively.