ESL Jobs Forum

[jerome_idiot_savant]

This post has been moderated UJ

I saw a long post on Daves ESL Cafe forums and I too would like to share feedback about a summer camp program in France. All I have to say is it's an awful place for anyone to work. I would warn anyone who is looking for work as an ESL teacher at a linguistic camp to steer clear of that place. The working hours are atrocious and run from early morning to early morning. The working environment is hostile 100% of the time. Harassment from coworkers to coworkers, especially by senior counsellors, harassment by site directors, constant criticism, insults, name calling, I mean the list goes on and on. It's just an overall dehumanizing experience. It has all the bad attributes that your worst job with the worst supervisors and the worst coworkers would ever have. Avoid the place.

I've also seen people either quit or get fired. That’s how the headquarters directors run that sweat shop. The counsellor roster changes all the time. Even if you get a job offer you're being lied to. name removed makes regular visits to the camps to meet with selected counsellors and requests their written resignation. No proper performance evaluations. If you displease any of their unreasonable site directors in the slightest way, you're done. Also, the headquarters directors are lying to you when they state in the contract that counsellors are bound by any form of respectful conduct toward each other. Any French worker could easily file a complaint with the government against them for the poor working conditions and harassment at their ESL summer camps program if they wanted but the headquarters directors know they can get away with it because chances are no average American would bother with the time and energy to file a complaint or research their labour rights. All that happens is they are forced to resign and some just resign voluntarily. The problem is, the people running the ESL summer camps program and posting job ads online are misleading unsuspecting people who just want to have a good experience working overseas and make an honest go of it. Oh BTW, if you don't write a resignation to your contract when requested, you're subjected to further hostility.

Please contact the poster for further details UJ

The author believes that the name of the summer camp should be posted for the well-being of the ESL teaching community.

PS People like me who are left indignant will not pull any punches and I believe it's important to mention name of program on subject line. The way I and many others have been treated by (names removed) and the site directors after paying $1500 to get out there was with incredibly insulting conduct.