THIS IS A WARNING TO ANYONE WHO IS CONSIDERING TAKING UP AN ESL OR EFL TEACHING POSITION AT THE LONGMAN BACKPACK TRAINING CENTER IN BAOJI CITY, SHAANXI PROVINCE, CHINA

First, I will explain why I have put the name of the school in italics. There is no such school called the Longman Backpack Training Center anywhere in Baoji, or probably in all of China for that matter. One of the ways in which our employer (I came to China with my girlfriend who is also employed by the school) duped us into coming to the school was by refusing to mention that the school was actually a public kindergarten, which for all of you foreign teachers in the know, can be a far cry from a respectable, professional, private English school.

The working conditions at the school are horrible and the complete antithesis of a productive learning environment. Each class has, on average, 40-50 students, and the sole method of keeping that many students interested and behaved for as long as possible is by physical and verbal abuse, which the Chinese teachers working at the school are happy to do, but under no circumstances, would any foreign teacher ever consider. For this reason, teaching the children English is almost impossible

Although the employers of the school followed the agreed-upon contract throughout the year of employment, they were extremely difficult and frustrating to deal with for many reasons. Their unprofessional methods of communicating, scheduling and all of the other day-to-day tasks that one would expect to be carried out properly by any functional employer were unbearable. Specifically speaking, the head master of the school, who in all likelihood will remain with the school for some time, is an arrogant, foolish, sexist, incompetent, manipulative, primitive individual who would be better suited as a street sweeper. How or why he was given the position of head master is beyond comprehension. I am talking about a man who threatened to withhold his Chinese employees salary if they could not recruit new students for English lessons. I am talking about a man who degrades his employees by fear and intimidation. Although this factor did not have a direct affect on myself or my girlfriend, no one, neither foreign nor Chinese should ever consider working for a person like this.

In closing, our experience at the BAOCHENG KINDERGARTEN (real name of school) has been a miserable and depressing time, and I must state for the last time, under no circumstances should anyone consider working for this school.