In response to Re: Aston (Midna)

Ah, Midna, you've fallen into using one of the lowest "logical fallacies" = attacking the opponent. You've labeled me a "troll," a "loonie" (loony?) and "stupid," in which case, I can't possible be correct about anything because I'm an idiot attacking intelligent people like yourself for no good reason. However, since you're logical fallacy is inadmissible and incorrect, it just makes you look like a very shabby debater. On to your other "points"

Forgive me almighty troll, for I've made a few typos on a forum full of grammar/spelling Nazis.

It's not such a problem if you aren't deriding other people's intelligence, in which case yours is more likely to be challenged in turn. Grammar/spelling Nazis? That's a bit over-the-top, isn't it?

You still have yet to address why you're coming into a review topic about a specific thing and talking about very general things.

It's the underlying policies and philosophy that creature the surface trivia.

I also can't seem to picture your version of a well informed/educated person. You can easily find this site outside of China (before you ever set foot here). If these people really did exist they'd probably be scared off of private schools because of this site alone.

It sometimes seems that information we have should be known by everyone, but most teachers I know don't know about this site. I would also add that most teachers I know are reasonably intelligent and informed irrespective of where they work.

You're a looney if you think that these recruiters are good enough to trick anyone and everyone they encounter, regardless of how smart they (the future English teacher) are.

This is a "straw man" argument, and also an inadmissible logical fallacy (not to mention the other fallacy of attacking the opponent). You attribute a bogus argument to me and then defeat it in the hopes of defeating my real argument. It's not that they can trick "anyone and everyone they encounter," but that it's their job to lure in people, and they take advantage of people's trust and decency to lure in a lot of intelligent and well-intentioned teachers. Currently there is a lot more information on small cities that might be undesirable than there was even a few years ago.

Some months ago I received a lot of job offers and researched the cities as best I could. There were still some I could find scant little about, while others I could only find out about what crops were raised, what minerals were available, and luckily some studies about things like the particulate pollution level in the city in question. But a Google search might not turn up specific school reviews at all for most schools, and there might be very little for smaller cities as well.

So either you can prove my point by admitting you were stupid and got stuck at a bad school, or you can prove my point that you did enough research to avoid private schools. You can even say you made a dumb choice and later rectified it by actually researching the new place you'd be going to. Regardless, I win.

This isn't about winning or losing, but rather about informing would-be teachers about problem schools and general problems with private schools (in this thread). The rubric you've provided is too erroneous for me to engage. It's impossible that I am or ever was "stupid," for example.

How do you honestly compare moving to an unfamiliar country with getting into a taxi and going for a drive around the block?

You compared working for a private school in China to getting in a taxi in a bad neighborhood at 2 in the morning, or something along those lines. You're analogy was too extreme and I toned it down.

Well, according to your logic, if you worked for Aston, than you didn't do those extremely simple "things".

That's your "logic," or rather your unfounded conclusion. I know of a crap school that there's nothing you can find bad about on the internet, for example. The city is interesting and a tourist destination, but the school sucks. You'd really have a difficult time finding that out, and the recruiters wouldn't tell you, and current employees wouldn't tell you because you'd only get the email of a manager or someone else in an administrative or supportive position.

Aww, poor guy. According to my logic, I did the simple things and so I found a good Aston to work at. Which is where I work, not where I worked. Nice try though.

Well then, you have less than a quarter of the vacation I have, and you share your apartment, and you get half the bonus, and you teach little children with their parents watching you, and maybe you have to hand out fliers, and you pay for your own electricity and internet. And you're telling me that I'm a poor, stupid, loony troll?

Army recruiters do a MUCH better job taking advantage of people/tricking them. To use your own example against you, if someone told me I'd be making as much money as a doctor I'd think he was either lying to me, or being a doctor in China doesn't say much for your income.

Someone recruited you to think sharing an apartment and paying for your own utilities and a measly 1 week of paid vacation per term is a good deal! You didn't fall for the "doctor's pay" bit, but you fell for thinking you were getting a decent deal one way or another. You're like a person working at Burger King saying that people at worse Burger King restaurants are dupes. You're still at Burger King!

"By your own logic" you must be a well, I don't need to repeat your epithets.

But, if you're enjoying working at the branch you're at, than you've kind of lucked out. I wouldn't condemn others who didn't have such luck and got a pr!ck of a franchisee or a power-abusing foreign manager or a heavily polluted city or incompetence all around or a crappy apartment or whatever else can go wrong, in whichever combination.

My whole gripe with you is that you are calling other people "stupid" for falling into well-placed traps, and for being insufficiently diligently cynical. Meanwhile you are stewing in your own trap.

Good luck anyways with your kiddies.