After writing and submitting a glowing Review of his school, Bill Fishbone, school Director, panicked. “Why is my name visible at the top of my Review? This isn’t good!”
Believing ISR had taken the liberty of designating him as the author of his own Review, Bill wrote to ISR: “Hey guys! I thought all reviews were submitted anonymously. Why is my name included with the review I wrote?”
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All ISR Reviews ARE submitted anonymously and ISR guarantees your anonymity. Bill, however, deeply immersed in attempting to lure teachers to his sub-par school, didn’t realize his name appeared simply because he is the Director named in the Review, and not because he wrote it. Bill had revealed his true colors, true to Comments made about him in previous Reviews.
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Bill Fishbone is not his real name, of course, but the incident is entirely real. Fortunately, ISR has a warning system in place for the Bill Fishbones of the International teaching world. When you see the words Who Wrote This Review? you can be sure something ain’t right and that further investigation on your part is in order. (Click link for more information)
Occasionally a teacher will write ISR to ask: “Why are so many directors writing reviews of their schools?” We then explain that the Director’s name appears next to the dates covered because they are the named administrator in charge during the period covered by the Review. We thought it was obvious, but maybe not.
To avoid further confusion, we decided to clarify the meaning of data that appears along with ISR School Reviews. To do so we created a page that we hope explains everything. See our Guide to Reading School Reviews
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I agree and disagree. Some teachers like to complain. I saw a teacher at one school, get on side with the school director so much so that although her classroom practice and behaviour management and her constant and public put downs of the school and locale she was in (were well known by all) she was able to get away with it all. UNTIL she was way behind in her reports and was asked by her administrator to get them done asap. Naturally she approached the director for sympathy, but this time he had lost patience with her ( it only took him 10 months to come to that despite been told by the administrator and other head of section)and told her to get them done. So what did she do ? She saw the writing on the wall finished the year left her classroom a mess cleared out her family and apartment again left in a mess, took the rent and holiday pay and eventually wrote to the director merely 2 weeks from the start of new school year to say not coming back and wrote nasty and vindictive reports on director and administrator on this site.
On the other side of the coin I have known directors spouses to write reports ok I can’t be 100% certain but 99%, so glowing that are in stark contrast to commentary from others, someone clearly on a different planet.
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More typically a head of school will strong arm parents – with outgoing kids who need his support – to write positive reviews. Such as what happened at the school in LA for HG students after a celeb left the school and outed the school and head for shoddy business practices. Suddenly parents flooded fb to overpower her horrific reviews with their fake praise.
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You can always recognize the fake reviews
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I worked for a guy who made it against the rules to post to any web site about the school. He posted great reviews of the school all over the place. I did notice that on ISR it said “who wrote this review” with a link to a caution, next to the review. As soon as I got out of that hell hole I wrote a review and told the world what he was doing. The next year he couldn’t hardly get any teachers to recruit. The school year started with parents taking the place of teachers and some locals who really weren’t’ teachers. Moral of the story: honesty is the best policy.
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Exactly why references need to be taken with a grain of salt. I put a lot more weight on a teachers’ digital portfolio and general online presence than any recommendation. It continually makes for an interesting read though !!
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ISR earned my respect and support when they caught my former head of school having written/posted three reviews (most glowingly about himself!) in rapid succession. Even when I am no longer involved in international education I will gladly pay for my subscription because ISR makes it possible for teachers to tell the truth. Thank you!
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It seems some of these so called directors will stoop to any level. I worked for a guy who made teachers’ lives miserable and then wrote a review of himself. I felt it was my duty to post the truth about him and I did. He then went on a campaign trying to find the author of my review. Teachers then started posting about the witch hunt and this made him go ballistic. He was eventually fired for being an inept jerk. If it wasn’t for ISR he would probably still be there today.
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When people write the truth about certain superintendents then people say oh they are bitter
In reality it’s the truth and racism exists in the school but people are too scared of losing their jobs so they say nothing
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