I worked at EFDL for 12 months. When I arrived it was a good place to work, the DoS was trustworthy and respected, he ran a tight operation, his teachers were always well-informed and looked after and he was an excellent buffer between the money-making politics of EF owners and the front line teachers. He poached me and another teacher from an EF school in the south and we were both happy to relocate and work for him. He ensured we were paid on time and correctly, all bonuses were paid as promised and any additional hours were compensated.

He also negotiated us a much higher wage than is normal for an EF centre, namely because we were 'EF experienced' and both fully trained ESL teachers (fully trained teachers being somewhat of a rarity in China, I myself am a Cambridge certified examiner). I was happy and despite EF's reputation, I defended the school as a good place to work, purely on the basis that this particular DoS was a good person to work for. Yes, it was a language mill, yes it had it's faults (like any place, especially in China) but it paid on time and fairly and classes were scheduled correctly.

However this changed 6 months in to my contract when the DoS was forced to leave after one too many run-ins with EFBC about how he was running the centre; i.e: too focused on actual learning and not focused enough on money making.

He was replaced by a Chinese DoS who was impossible to work for, nobody liked her and she was woefully incapable of actually doing the job. It resulted in some very disgruntled employees, many, many clashes with her (admittedly mainly from myself as one of the only ones happy to stand up to her) and her eventual dismissal 5 moths later. By that point I had already found a job elsewhere and left when my contract ended, despite being offered quite a lot in that final month to stay, including being DoS at a fictional 3rd school they wanted to open the following year.

It is possible to teach well at an EF school; I am still in touch with many of my pupils from my time at EF and I know the difference I have made in their lives. It is possible to teach well *if* you can rise above the insane politics, the money-spinning immorality of putting students in levels too advanced in order to get their parents to pay for catch-up classes and (if you have a bad DoS) the infringements made to your salary at managements whim. If you are serious about teaching, then you can teach well there... I just wouldn't recommend it as if you are a serious teacher, then the policies in place to turn children in to dollar signs will break your heart.

Unfortunately, as EF is a franchise, each school is only as good as the DoS they have in place to look out for their teachers... And if the DoS is more concerned with pleasing the centre owner than with the education of the students, then life as an EF teacher is never going to be rosy and will be just one clash after another (if you care about your students, that is. If you don't give a toss, you'll be peachy)

Under the DoS I went to EFDL for, I would have stayed a lot longer as I honestly did enjoy my time working for him... Unfortunately he was an anomaly within the EF franchise and I wouldn't work for an EF school anywhere ever again after my last 6 months at EFDL.

That said, I wouldn't recommend working anywhere in China, schools/universities there are all much of a muchness when it comes to ESL teaching. Your best bet if you are serious about ESL teaching is get yourself trained properly and work in Europe. I went to China to experience the life and culture and was not impressed by either. The only thing I have taken from the experience is a couple of amazing friends who will always be a part of my life and some truly inspirational students who are fighting against the system in China to get a better life for themselves.

Just some examples of things that happened to me whilst working for EF (in two different schools)

FIRST YEAR
- Pimped out to state schools to show they had western white women working for them (they didn't, I had to leave after the parents had seen me 'teaching') at the centre owners personal profit.
- Made to work additional hours to my contract at no extra pay after colleagues called in sick and I was the only one in the office planning at the time. If I hadn't covered the class, I would have other perks suspended, such as consecutive days off when the next week's scheduling was done.
- Threatened with deportation when I told my first employer I wanted to leave if I didn't change my mind and stay with his school.
- Accommodation was provided, free of charge, but in such appalling standards that once me an d a colleague had to check in to a hotel as the apartment we had been given was dangerously still under construction with broken windows and furniture littering the place and still wet paint on the walls.
- Zero support from the 'DoS' a 25 year old mouth piece with zero experience of management or teaching.
- Days off that would change week by week, meaning cultivating a social life was next to impossible.
- Schedules that would come out barely 9 hours before they went 'Live' - meaning it was impossible to manage your personal or planning time effectively.
- Changes in bonus pay structures that were never communicated until they were paid (if they were paid at all, in the case of my room mate)

SECOND YEAR (last 6 months)
- Repeatedly lied to by management, repeatedly dragged before school owner and threatened with dismissal if I didn't start 'supporting' the changes made
- Schedules that would come out days in to the teaching week, meaning nobody had a clue what they were doing the first couple of days of a week (fine for regular classes, but finding out you have a demo 5 minutes before you're due to do it was really, really annoying)
- Hired people who were untrained and unsuitable to teach, but gave them no support.
- Changed the colour of the official photograph of one teacher to make them appear whiter (they had hired somebody of colour and the parents weren't pleased).
- Changed days off and classes with little to no notice.
- Asked me to write and deliver workshops to train the teachers on new EF products and teaching methodology at no extra remuneration.
- Asked me to attend EFBC national conferences (May the face be with you....) and get information for the school, but did't like it when I asked some glaringly obvious questions about product design flaws.
- Observation and teacher feedback stopped and monitoring of lesson standards given up.
- Good, hard working teachers forced out to be replaced with unqualified drones, happy to just have a job.

As I said, I wouldn't say that EF is alone in this, this is pretty much the same story for most people working in most language centres in China, focus is mainly money and not teaching standards. I wouldn't recommend anybody works for EFDL or any EF... But then I wouldn't recommend working in China full stop!