Experience Taiwan and Teach English

Overall, I would say that my experience at Shane was good. It was my first teaching position and my first time in Taiwan. For the most part, I would say that the school is a bit more professional than some of the other foreign owned English teaching schools and certainly more professional than the English schools set up by local proprietors.

Shane does provide an initial teaching orientation, which helps in gaining your footing if you've never taught before. The pay is slightly lower than other schools, but as others have stated that seems to be balanced out by being part of a responsive and organized school i.e., your concerns are generally addressed and the admin in the head office do try to help.

There were three aspects which I did not particularly like. The first is with respect to taking days off. While the Shane program does have an organized request based vacation system, this does not necessarily work in practice. For example, all of the English teachers tend to want the same days off - usually clustered around specific holidays of times of the year. I found that admin tended to have first choice to take off such days for themselves and then tried to accommodate everyone after. The second problem I had, and one which I do not have a solution for, is Shane's "on-call" system. Every few weeks each teacher is "on-call" on their day off and must be prepared to go in to substitute for any other English teacher who happens not to go into their job on that day. Needless to say, this can be a drawback and - in practice - takes away one of your days off fairly frequently. If you are working for the money, however, this may not be as much of a concern. Lastly, Shane has a dress code. For men they require a button down shirt and tie. Although this isn't a huge issue, Taiwan is a hot and humid place and there are those times when you look at your non-Shane colleagues with envy for not being drenched in sweat.

Overall, a solid program, especially for those new to teaching.

Hands down, Shane English is a great place to get your feet wet in the teaching English game. A very difficult thing in Taiwan is working with Taiwanese management as their approach won't always align properly with yours. Shane has a terrific support structure to accommodate this with Western Management readily available to help. The managers became good friends of mine and I still keep in touch with them today.

Shane places a strong preference on academic achievement and professionalism. Some people don't like dressing up for work- I relished wearing a shirt and tie. I took my job seriously and presenting myself correctly was a key part to that.

The team I worked with has remained in my life even though I am no longer in Taiwan. I have traveled to visit fellow teachers, been to their weddings, and continue to keep in touch. Shane does an excellent job selecting top notch teachers with great personalities and a love for their jobs. Working with them made my job a lot more enjoyable.

If I could improve anything about the school, it would be two things. The first, I believe that initial compensation should be a little bit higher. By no means is it low, but it was a little bit lower than my friends' working for other schools. They make up for this by giving two days off a week, having an excellent support system, and making it very easy to take holidays- very important aspects that I think outweigh the salary issue (all of which made my friends jealous). The other thing is that some of the schools could use a bit of a facelift. They are all clean, safe schools that make for great working conditions, but some of them have lost that "new car" smell.

These two things are really nitpicky and shouldn't detract you from pursuing a job with Shane. If my friend went to Taiwan to teach, I would strongly suggest they look at this school- it's a great way to start out.

As my first experience with teaching ESL, I found that Shane had a lot of benefits. The initial training and observations allowed me to feel comfortable when I finally stepped into the classroom. Also, I appreciated the assistance offered with finding an apartment, setting up a bank account, and getting my health check done. Also, I knew that I could contact the staff at the Head Office if I ever needed help.
I really enjoyed teaching in their kindergarten program (preschool) and was lucky enough the have a wonderful TA in my class. I taught “kindy” morning and afternoon followed by an elementary class in the evening. I mainly enjoyed my time with Shane, but felt that I needed a change after my first year. Again, a very good experience for a new teacher.