Dear fellow teachers,

Is there a current 'updated list' of troubled-schools in China? This would be helpful for us to look at before taking a September contract.

Also, I can verify just two schools others have commented negatively for:

1. Walton English School - I only did evening work for them at Nissan, but met brieftly a couple full-time teachers. A year later, 3 or so of them walled out on the school and China; largely due to the conditions and unfulfilled contractual understandings. Walton was apart of a bribe (red envelope) process through which they kept a Canadian-Teachers group and their good Chinese partner from gaining z-visa classification, and later pushed the school out of Huadu all together. Too bad, the Canadian group were some fairly friendly people from my experience.

2. Dalian "New Century". I can fully verify some of those actions that have continuously occurred for over 8 years now. Our experience was with sending over 8 documents and gaining a contract and offer from them to be a Director at 16,000 RMB a month. After we spent 12K RMB to fly to Dalian, after 3 days of delays, they simply had no contract to formally sign face-to-face. We left with great financial loss, and realized some current teachers had related to us a desire to 'get out of Dodge' for say without giving details.

Possibly, it would be most helpful to create a 3-tier list of China Schools:

1. The Hall of Shame list, as is presently used
2. A 'Notice of Caution' list, were we can see problems, and therefore ask verified answers before contracting with someone on this list.
3. Hall of Honors, a short list of schools which have followed the 5 basic principles for good TESOL employment (see below)

Basic Principles of Practice for a Good College in China:

1. Visas are processed within the law, usually within 2-4 weeks max.

2. Location and class schedules are 'set in stone' largely, week to week per term.

3. Paid on-time, for correct amount, no hassels and no confusion.

4. Safe, reasonably clean and equipped 'apartment'. Not a school-prison environment.

5. Enough support to enhance quality teaching, enough privacy to live one's life/freetime.