While we recognise that this teacher had some issues we feel certain circumstances should be pointed out.

This teacher was reprimanded once in writing for refusing work as they had other work commitments - they were then given a face to face meeting with the owner & DOS (to help with translation) in which any misunderstandings were cleared up. There were a few occasions in which punctuality was an problem however nothing was said. Towards the end of their contract they were reprimanded again on the phone for refusing work. Apart from these occasions they had no contact with the owner. The day to day running of courses was dealt with by the DOS (Bi-lingual native speaker). Thus, any personal comments about the professionality of owner need to be seen in this light.

In addition, it is not true that the owner fell out with every member of the permanent staff. There is small group of permanent teachers who work well together with the owners & have been here many years.This school depends on these professional & reliable teachers who enjoy teaching. Unfortunately, in this case we feel that there may have been a large dose of cultural misunderstanding & a missmatch of personal & istitutional goals. At no time was this teacher insulted & there were always native English speakers available to help with any problems. However, help needs to be sought & this particular teacher kept their contact with DOS & other members of the management to a minimum. As to the atmosphere in the school the description is obviously subject to personal intrepretation & clearly this teacher was not happy & therefore found it difficult to fit in.

As to the comments about many teachers in Verona having left this school - the Cambridge school is perhaps the longest & most successful private language school (over 50 years) in Verona & as such it obvious that there are many teachers who have left for varying personal & professional reasons & not only due to dissatisfaction with the owner or school.

Payment was always made on time by the school. Unfortunately, banks all over the world are a law unto themselves (in this case we are talking about one of the largest European banks - not a local one) & we have no control over when exactly the transfer is made.While we understand our employees need to know when they will receive their salary we can only honour our obligations. In this case the employee was simply made aware of this problem but no help was requested - again a case of poor communications. We have always helped our employees when necessary.

Members of staff were always paided correctly & if there was a variation the reasons were given. All staff are on legal contracts & as such we have to follow the letter of the law. We cannot & do not manipulate the salaries.

In conclusion it is clear that this employee was not happy for various reasons however as outlined above the observation are not a fair representation of this school.