Report from the diaspora
The LSC's new priorities sound good. That article ignores the fact that provision for ESOL is going to be severely curtailed. Indeed, the books will now balance nicely.
Johnny Boy "The Enforcer" Reid talks tough. But one can wonder whether he had any influence on the LSC's funding decision. During the summer, I spoke to dozens of would-be students from Poland. They were very keen to get free English classes. And if that meant doing a shit job in a strange country for a couple of years, so be it.
Romanians and Bulagarians won't get the same chance next year.
Well, the Editor of the Daily Mail would no doubt say, Why should the UK taxpayer provide free English lessons for immigrant workers? Well, they'll come here to do the shit jobs, we could give them something useful, the English language, couldn't we? Surely it'd be a Good Thing if ordinary Europeans could communicate with each other. And we wouldn't have to learn Bulgarian.
The changes also include Asylum Seekers - they won't get free lessons unless they're granted refugee status, if they're over 18. Nice, eh? Washed up on foreign shores, thousands of miles from all you know, waiting for the wheels of immigration bureaucracy to grind through your case, and you can't even be given the means to go to the shop and ask for a loaf.
This also means we'll probably re-join the English teacher diaspora next year. Classes at my college are going to be severely curtailed, and I'll probably be out of work. Maybe we'll go to Bulgaria. Or Romania. Actually, there aren't many jobs for English teachers in those countries.
Johnny Boy "The Enforcer" Reid talks tough. But one can wonder whether he had any influence on the LSC's funding decision. During the summer, I spoke to dozens of would-be students from Poland. They were very keen to get free English classes. And if that meant doing a shit job in a strange country for a couple of years, so be it.
Romanians and Bulagarians won't get the same chance next year.
Well, the Editor of the Daily Mail would no doubt say, Why should the UK taxpayer provide free English lessons for immigrant workers? Well, they'll come here to do the shit jobs, we could give them something useful, the English language, couldn't we? Surely it'd be a Good Thing if ordinary Europeans could communicate with each other. And we wouldn't have to learn Bulgarian.
The changes also include Asylum Seekers - they won't get free lessons unless they're granted refugee status, if they're over 18. Nice, eh? Washed up on foreign shores, thousands of miles from all you know, waiting for the wheels of immigration bureaucracy to grind through your case, and you can't even be given the means to go to the shop and ask for a loaf.
This also means we'll probably re-join the English teacher diaspora next year. Classes at my college are going to be severely curtailed, and I'll probably be out of work. Maybe we'll go to Bulgaria. Or Romania. Actually, there aren't many jobs for English teachers in those countries.
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