My teaching experience in Jiangxi
I came to Jiang Xi a few weeks ago to help a school down here start a new SAT and TOEFL training program for a small class of students. The school contacted us very suddenly with an immediate need for teachers. My first impression was one of excitement and enthusiasm. The school was one of the best in Jiang Xi and the students numbered over ten thousand. “This school might actually be somewhat organized” I thought, “This will be a great chance to reach out to students who have no exposure to anything outside China.”
After the first crazy week of getting things organized (hot water in the rooms, desks in the office, etc.) I began thinking about a greater picture of the course we had just started. We are only going to be here for a 168-class course, which I thought was just about right if the students were planning on taking the SAT on May 2nd.
Getting to the point, the students are only in their S1 year and do not need to take the SAT for another year. So after this course we will leave them with a whole lot of excitement about going to the USA and no one left to help them. In short, I learned that I should never trust a school knows the first thing about how to get students into universities abroad. I feel that being here might actually be detrimental to students in the end.
During my short time here I will do my best to give students the tools they need to get abroad as well as talk with the school about extending the program. Hopefully we can still bring the students something worthwhile.
Comments and suggestions are welcome. Remember, this is a small Chinese village so you can throw what you think might be logical, rational thinking out the window.