Please read the visa requirements for China if you are planning on working at a school there. Single parents travelling to China with children under 18 are required to have a copy of the father's/mother's passport and the other parent must sign the visa application. Be careful. Chinese authorities are also stopping people from leaving at the airport. Reason and resolution are not known.

For some reason Psyguy isn't telling you that since SA got you your last job they have fulfilled their obligation to you. You will not be reactivated until you pay another fee. Read the fine print about which Psyguy very truthfully informed me. Good luck.

Here is what SA can do. What are repercussions? For me broken trust. For SA? Probably nothing. What can I do about it? Whine and complain about what useless pimples they are.
Michael Williams is a worthless twit. Stay away from him and his successors.
Tried to activate account thinking my previous payment for their ‘services’ would be adequate. Then to receive the following was an absolute mind-blower. If my records have been removed due to’ inactivation’, what is the basis for not representing me? caveat emptor!!
“INACCESSIBLE ACCOUNT, We are sorry but your account is no longer accessible due to inactivity. Please contact Senior Associate, XXXXX to see if your account can be re-enabled on searchassociates.com. Thank you.”
“From our candidate agreement:
Registration Fee: The Candidate Registration Fee is USD $225.00. This registration fee is good for three years or until you find a position in an international school, either through Search Associates, or any other means, whichever occurs first.
When you accepted your most recent position, your previous registration fee expired.
As for receiving notification from Search regarding termination of your contract, our contractual obligation to you was fulfilled once you accepted the last job. For a candidate file to be reactivated and a new contract entered into, the file must be updated by the candidate, reviewed and approved by the Associate, and another registration fee paid. In your case, based on a thorough review of your file, I have chosen to not represent you in your current search.”

I have great respect for most of BCIS. However, in the past I have seen staff severely and openly admonished for even suggesting that BCIS was a Chinese private school. The same leaders are now discussing the situation as if it has always been freely and openly discussed. Disingenuous is too nice a term.
Events seem to be progressing as previously discussed. Colleen Drisner, Diploma Program Coordinator, will replace Shawn Hutchinson as Secondary Principal. She is currently at BCIS so this is a local hire. The replacement for Bill O'Hearn has not yet been announced. Some courses are being dropped with little advance notice so that more resources are available for a large influx of ESOL students. A new idea for a program called 'IB Plus' is being planned which will accomodate the influx of ESOL students. This program will apparently be unique to BCIS since it is not an approved IB offering. It appears to be designed to allow students with very basic English skills to achieve an IB Diploma. Student plans for this year's prom are up in the air because no knows what happened to the money. As might be expected sanity is as scarce as fresh air in Beijing.

Regards to Mr. L. Carroll, but this is getting curiouser and curiouser. So Shawn returns from a seemingly happy holiday in Vietnam, as appears on Facebook, to have a special meeting for Secondary staff. He announces, without much emotion, that he has not been terminated and has not resigned. His family decided it was best to leave. Perhaps there is a Chinese term, with which I am not familiar, that cannot be easily translated , that he is attempting to use to describe the situation. He certainly made a convincing appearance during his previous announcement that he was not happy with his situation. It may take some time before the truth is revealed. Still doesn’t look good for OSH.

Just some additional items to shed more light on the situation. The responses from Zhongguotong2003 and Bill O’Hearn are noble, but somewhat disingenuous. “Shawn's contract was up at the end of the school year and although his decision not to renew was sudden, it is not an early departure.” To say that Shawn chose not to renew his contract is ludicrous. He was obviously very emotional and upset when he announced he was leaving.

The ISR moniker for the entry by Bill O’Hearn is listed as ‘andiohearn’. She is Bill’s lovely and devoted wife. She is listed as the Director of Communications and University Counseling, and she is also losing her position. He states there is currently a search for replacements for his position and that of Secondary Principal.

Normally such position announcements would be listed on Search Associates, of which BCIS is still a member. The only one listed as of February 6, 2015 is for the position of Communications Director. Ms. An Wei mentioned in her presentation that the position of Head of School and Secondary Principal would be recruited and filled locally.

There appears to be overriding economic concerns that BCIS must address. They have a responsibility to their investors. If the business model does not provide the promised returns, then the business model must be changed. This reality should not generate an emotional response since it occurs every day in the business world. The ‘not-for-profit’ status of BCIS must have some unique legal definition for the Chinese registration.

The process of changing the business model usually generates the stress and distress. There are radical changes to personal livelihoods. If contracts need to be changed to reflect the new economic realities, then they will be changed. This is a business decision that can have drastic negative consequences for the individuals involved. How much advance knowledge do you feel you deserve? Probably much more than the school owners feel you deserve.

I have done all the heavy lifting I feel I can do. Free expression of ideas has its limitations. These people can be scary. I wish my colleagues the best.

BCIS, Bejing City International School, is approaching full meltdown. Recent developments have left staff stunned from the changes announced. Bill O’Hearn, Head of School, and Shawn Hutchinson, Secondary Principal, are leaving at the end of this school year, a year earlier than expected. Then Ms. An Wei, Executive Director of the Board, briefed the school staff on plans for next year. The school will become a Chinese private school and retain the current name. Any staff that are not interested in staying under local Chinese staff benefit levels will have to find other employment. The full impact of these announced changes has yet to be assessed, but it cannot be good for current foreign staff.