Tag Archives: English language schools

protest

Michael writes:

I am a TEFL teacher in Dublin, formerly a member of the teaching staff at the recently and scandalously closed MEC (Modern Educational Centre).
My colleagues and I had not been paid for six weeks, students lost hefty course fees of which many saved over years, and yet while all of us are left literally short-changed and betrayed by the mercenary School owners, we cannot but view this in systemic terms, because it is patently a deficiency of government regulation once again which is responsible for this the 14th EFL school closure in 12 months.
Please broadsheet readers come and support our protest going from Merrion Square, Dublin at 12 noon in the direction of Dáil Éireann!

Protest Over Language School Closures (RTÉ)

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Academic Bridge school, Capel Street, Dublin 1

Two English language schools in Dublin, Academic Bridge and the National Employee Development Training Centre, had taken proceedings against the Department of Justice in the High Court after the department introduced new accreditation requirements for English language courses. This new requirements followed the closure of a number of schools that were said to be operating as “visa-factories”.

From January 1, the new laws meant that only schools with courses approved by the State body Acels would be allowed to recruit non-EU students on visas that permitted students to work.

Previously: Direct Language

No School Today

Teaching English The Irish Way

Related: #collegeclosures

English language schools take legal action against Department of Justice (November 12, 2014, Business Post)

Pic: Academic Bridge

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[A notice on the door of Millennium College on Dominick Street in Dublin
this morning and students standing outside the school this morning after learning of its closure]

A notice on the door of Millennium College on Dominick Street in Dublin this morning states that it has closed and ceased trading – the fourth English school to close in recent weeks.

According to RTE, Irish Business School on Burgh Quay closed on May 2 and Eden College, which operated from the same premises, closed on April 28. Kavanagh College on Marlborough Street in Dublin 1 also closed on April 14.

On April 13, Mark Tighe, in The Sunday Times reported how the paper sent an undercover reporter to seven international schools and found that “some international language schools in Ireland will agree to falsify attendance records for students, allowing them to work longer hours instead of studying. Non-EU students must attend 80% of their classes, according to the terms of their visas.”

Mr Tighe also reported that former minister for education Batt O’Keeffe, who was president of Eden College in Dublin, resigned on March 1.

Prior to this Eden College International in London, which shares a parent company with Eden College in Dublin, featured on a BBC Panorama programme which showed fake candidates sitting tests in English and a multiple choice exam where the answers were read out.

The Irish Independent reported at the time how Mr O’Keeffe said “that while Eden College Dublin and Eden College International shared family ownership links, ‘there is absolutely no connection from an operational point of view’.”

Hmm.

Fourth English language school closes suddenly (RTE)

Schools will lie for foreign students’ visas (Sunday Times)

Recognition for school with links to ex-Minister Bat O’Keeffe pulled (Irish Independent)

Pics via Revolution and Photocall Ireland