Four Proposals to Reform TEFL Part Two- the TEFL Legal Fund
I should perhaps start by pointing out again that although most of the stuff on this blog is trivial at best and I am not very good at sticking at something until it gets done, I am totally serious this time about helping set up something that can help change TEFL everywhere, and I’m willing to put a fair bit of cash into whatever ideas do happen. So here goes with idea number two:
The TEFL Legal Fund
If investigative journalism isn’t going to sort out dodgy TEFL courses, false advertising, borderline criminal school owners etc, then the only thing that can possibly save us is the courts. And if we are going to take them to court, we are going to need cash. The cash could come from anyone who would donate- people who wish there had been such a fund when they were in trouble, schools who do things right and so have nothing to lose, TEFL teachers who have won their cases, lottery winners… A group of volunteers, preferably connected to an existing body like IATEL, would then decide where the money would go each year. There would be a set maximum number of cases they could donate to each year, and a set total percentage of the money they could spend each year and on each case. Criteria for choosing which cases to pursue would include:
- Teachers having already started the process on their own
- The chance to give an example to the whole industry
- Tackling habitual offenders
And lots of other things which I can’t think of at the moment.
So, any thoughts? Like this better than Idea One- the prize for TEFL journalism? Any other ideas for criteria for the cases chosen? Any other proposals that are more worthwhile? Want to pledge some money to the cause already? Press the comments button and let us know:
May 18th, 2008 at 2:57 pm
Hi Alex,
Well, I could talk about this subject all day, the horor stories I get to hear when interviewing prospective teachers and taking on new clients is endless.
As the internet is more and more widely used I think the cowboys will gradually get weeded out. In the meantime, all us related to TEFL who are concerned about standards should make ourselves much more visble on the net to get the word out to students and teachers.
Here in Madrid a group of academy owners are getting togehter to promote best practices and do our bit to improve standards in the industry. We collaborate with a school who are dedicated exclusively to teacher training, Ttmadrid, and w’ve had the idea that an association could be formed where they would be the watch dog and could go into company classes to do independent observations for clients.
Well known schools in large cities would do well to be more vociferous about the problems the industry faces caused by the cowboys, and in that way educate prospective clients to question in more detail how their provider actually operates in respect to teacher contracts, training and legality issues.
Janice Haywood
Madrid
May 19th, 2008 at 11:02 am
When I worked in Bryon in Rome they were setting up exactly that kind of organisation, might be worth emailing them to hear their experience