Worried Parent

[bruceboy]

A teacher at my daughters rural school has been caught with fake qualifications. He has been given two weeks to leave the country. However I am worried that other teachers at the school are working illegally and have not been though any of the checks now demanded by the Thai government. What can a concerned step father do to ensure no more criminal teachers find work at my daughters school? I have met with the Kru Yai to discuss this issue beofre but she seemed not to understand the laws and regulations that apply to foreign teachers.

[polecat]

I don't know, but get rid of them.

I used to be a teacher and had to work like mad to save money to take the certificate, study like crazy and then, when I got here, jump through hoops for immigration and the work permit office. Cost a fortune in time, money and effort. I hate it when people cheat like this. I say demand your school satisfies parents all teachers are legit. Have they done backround checks? I wouldn't like my kids to be in the care of someone with fake/no documents, and has lied to get the job.

[RueFang]

Unfortunately it's easy to get fake ESL qualifications (have a look around Khao San Road) and rural schools are so desperate for native (or white) english teachers that they'll take anyone on compared to city schools. Is it possible for her to change to a bigger school in town? How did they discover the fraud???

[toasted]

Presumably this was a foreign teacher, of which there are many who shouldn't be let loose in a classroom. Not because they're a physical danger to any child, but because they simply can't teach and may well put students off learning English. However, most of these types (who are here for the wrong reasons) are in Bangkok or other more bustling areas and not in a rural area. It's more than likely that the guy who's leaving is a better teacher than his replacement, who will most likely be Thai as not many qualified teachers can afford to take the sort of salary they'd get at a rural school, and even fewer would want to live in that environment. And when it comes to a physical threat you can be sure that it's the Thai teachers you need to worry about - did you see the report a few months back about the Thai headmaster who drew a gun on some students to make a point? This kind of thing is far from an isolated event.

At the end of the day, if you live in a rural area, you're going to be very lucky to get your child anything resembling a decent education.

[bruceboy]

Have they done backround checks? I wouldn't like my kids to be in the care of someone with fake/no documents, and has lied to get the job.

Exactly. Thanks for the support. I initially posted this thread in the teacher's sub-forum and while some posters were very helpful others were hostile and abusive.

Edited July 4, 2007 by bruceboy

[think_too_mut]

A teacher at my daughters rural school has been caught with fake qualifications. He has been given two weeks to leave the country. However I am worried that other teachers at the school are working illegally and have not been though any of the checks now demanded by the Thai government. What can a concerned step father do to ensure no more criminal teachers find work at my daughters school? I have met with the Kru Yai to discuss this issue beofre but she seemed not to understand the laws and regulations that apply to foreign teachers.

Who caught him? How? What did he do?

A plenty of English teachers upcountry are like that.

How could a school ask him to leave the country? Revoking their visa permit, maybe.

Are there hundreds of English teachers in that school that make you worry "other teachers" may be on a fake?

Thailand needs 80,000 English teachers at any time, most stay in big or attractive places. What's left for a provincial school? To employ people who can speak English, even people like you or me.

I knew of 1 Dutch man who was a teacher although he was a baker in his previous life. They could not get anyone else into the sticks, he happened to be there and happy to teach for 8000B per month.

[bruceboy]

A teacher at my daughters rural school has been caught with fake qualifications. He has been given two weeks to leave the country. However I am worried that other teachers at the school are working illegally and have not been though any of the checks now demanded by the Thai government. What can a concerned step father do to ensure no more criminal teachers find work at my daughters school? I have met with the Kru Yai to discuss this issue beofre but she seemed not to understand the laws and regulations that apply to foreign teachers.

Who caught him? How? What did he do?

A plenty of English teachers upcountry are like that.

How could a school ask him to leave the country? Revoking their visa permit, maybe.

Are there hundreds of English teachers in that school that make you worry "other teachers" may be on a fake?

Thailand needs 80,000 English teachers at any time, most stay in big or attractive places. What's left for a provincial school? To employ people who can speak English, even people like you or me.

I knew of 1 Dutch man who was a teacher although he was a baker in his previous life. They could not get anyone else into the sticks, he happened to be there and happy to teach for 8000B per month.

This has been a major embarassment for the school, and it's been difficult to get details of what happened. Two police officers came to the school and took the guy to the station. He was released the same day, which indicates to me that money changed hands.

There was no incident which caused this, I guess it was part of the ministry of educations new policy of checking submitted qualifications, maybe he did not hand in fake documents but just lied and his story didn't check, otherwise he would be in prison now I'd think.

I didn't take much interest in who the teacher was, I trusted the school as anyone would.

Now this has come to light, I wonder what else unqualified foreign teachers might hide - who nows why some of them left their country and came over here, becoming a teacher in Thailand isn't exactly a choice career.

And, with the amount of trust in an educational establishment, some kids also spent time at their teachers' houses after school, something which would be very unusual where I come from. This incident has raised my suspicions, I am quite new here and still finding out all the ins and outs of Thai society.

[Ijustwannateach]

This is a duplicate thread. Those who are interested may read the version that was posted in the Teacher's Forum.