Topic: Rolling.....

[Uncle Che]

It looks like this board is rolling. Feels good to have this board going now, more power to the people.

[willie mays]

I am hoping to see great expansion quite quickly.  Trying to think of ways to promote the board in a positive fashion, because the potential is huge.

[Gonzo]

How about asking all current members to advise every teacher they know of the existence of teflwatch.org and to forward it on to every teacher they know ala chain letter style. The activation email message could ask this of new members. No need to ask me, it has already been done.
Further to this you could ask members to try and mention the site on teaching related forum boards. The transient nature of TEFL teachers would mean the message would travel around the world very quickly; self promotion through requested word of mouth or email. Once the site has picked up some steam the TEFL related websites should start banging on your door for advertising and cross promotion.
After all, the site is for the betterment of all. Even the schools that are listed may wake up to their own nepotistic greed and change themselves.

[admin]

Feel free to pass this site along to any teachers you know and you are free to let people know about this site in any way you want to.

I have changed my signature on ESL Cafe and other forums to include the teflwatch site and I am letting people who have had bad teaching experiences to visit our board. I am not doing as much promotion as I would like to at this stage because I think we need to get the board up and running and work out any kinks first.

 

[Mods-Rockers]

Its worth remembering that the admin of the previous TSW tried a little advertising on one of the japanese teachers boards and this led to a shedload of spam from their members.

[Rick_BKK]

The problem it seems to me is how to attract more posters, without attracting too many (none is unfortunately impossible) of the idiots/ wind up merchants which have plagued previous incarnations of this board.

[hero]

I think inevitably the idiots/trolls will find their own way here!

I for one, would like to see more of the schools represented in the debate.  Answering charges or offering their side of the story as appropriate.  Unfortunately, I think these guys will be put off by the inevitable idiots!  The result has been observed in the past incarnations of TSW, a snowball towards a forum for idiots

How to approach it?  Who knows - get tough with the idiots I suppose and try to stir those on the other side into responding!

[Sadly-confused]

Ah well here I have to make a small confession, I was one of the wind up merchants on the old board, sorry cant help it. If I see one of the idiots and I think/believe that what he is sprouting is drivel or wrong then I tend to wade in with full batteries firing. Two I remember tearing up recently were a dude called rheno747 and a guy call wake who tends to like to fight with me. I guess you could say I am a bit of a troll, but then I would counter with the reply that I have strong convictions regarding education and truth. maybe the admin/mods will slap me down here once or twice, who knows, we shall see.
anyway good luck for now.

[Rick_BKK]

I for one, would like to see more of the schools represented in the debate.? Answering charges or offering their side of the story as appropriate.? Unfortunately, I think these guys will be put off by the inevitable idiots!? The result has been observed in the past incarnations of TSW, a snowball towards a forum for idiots

I too would like to see more responses by schools to the allegations made against them. However I think we are unlikely to see this unless posters show schools a certain amount of respect. In many ways given the way posters respond to replies from schools, schools would be far better off saying nothing and hoping that the thread will die off. This is an unfortunate state of affairs and one that I do not see changing unless schools feel that they will get a fair hearing.

[Mods-Rockers]

But thats what we mods will be looking for, if flame wars start then we kill them, good debate and thats ok. on the last few TSW's when schools have officially come back on postings they were well recieved. The immediate threats of legal action was a different matter as this tended to be threats about defamation and it tended to confirm the bad things that were being said about the schools.
Remember that in Thailand defamation is not saying a lie to defame a person/company/school but saying anything including the truth that may defame. it is then up to the defamer to prove in court that he/she had a reason to say what he/she did.

[Rick_BKK]

The immediate threats of legal action was a different matter as this tended to be threats about defamation and it tended to confirm the bad things that were being said about the schools.

Absolutely the threats of legal action were pathetic and I think generally indicated that the school needed to be avoided.

All I am saying is that while, undoubtedly many schools have treated teachers poorly and unfairly and deserve to be named and shamed, some schools may be reported by teachers who were rightly let go and should be allowed to defend themselves. It would be nice if posters would allow schools that opportunity before making a decision regarding a particular school.

[keekwai]

A good mate of mine has  a fairly new website (thaiexpat.org) started last December  that deals with Thailand expat issues in general and has a small teaching related section in the forum area.

I  got him to  post a link to this site there... every little link helps.! 

This is the post he made http://thaiexpat.mcmweb.info/forum/index.php?topic=102.0

 

[hero]

^ link (currently?) doesn't work

[Mods-Rockers]

It worked for me at about 6 PM but then again access to ajarn forum has been indifferent the last few days sometimes fast sometimes very slow sometimes impossible. one starts to get paranoid about big brother throttleing the pipes to these websites if they get mildly anti govt.

[Mods-Rockers]

just checked it again and for me at least it still works