The most used frauds are fake degrees, diplomas or fabricated resumes. Because the demand is high for qualified ESL teachers overseas and these schools have few or no resources to check credentials many fakes go undetected. There have been estimates that 30% of the teachers in Korea used fake degrees to get jobs, and over 60 % of the teachers in China have absolutely no qualifications or fake certificates.

The most common "Teacher Fraud" is traveling to overseas countries on a visitor visa and then teaching illegally.

FRAUD used by Homestay Providers

Homestay can be a wonderful experience for international students when the host family is honest, provides all the contracted services and quality time with the students.

Fraud by homestay providers occurs when the family cannot speak English or there is no food, heat, water, toilets or electricity in the house. Some fraud homestay providers jam 5 or 6 students into an illegal basement apartment and some homestay families work at their 3 jobs spending no time at home with the students. The dangerous homestay providers are the sex predators looking for new victims.

FRAUD used by DEGREE MILLS

A degree mill is any organization that issues fake credentials. There are fraud schools that offer degrees for life experience and claim this is the equivalent of an academic degree from an accredited university. Sorry but many believe this is fraud.

The usual price for a fake degree or tesl certificate is $100 in Asia. Many of the schools are attempting to eliminate the frauds by asking for university telephone contacts or the university transcript marks sent directly to the school. The more aggressive fraud degree mills are now selling "the package" degree, tesl, transcript and hotline university contact # for the fake university for $600. The frauds are faster than the police.

There are many ESL teachers who have taken a 10 or maybe 20 hour program in a hotel room somewhere or completed some internet reading program and suddenly claim to be a certified TESOL, TESL or TEFL teacher. Many of these "certified teachers" have never been in a classroom. Sorry but many believe that this is fraud.

ESL in Canada has conducted several tours of ESL schools across Canada and the USA. Our fieldwork to collect information for the webpage directory has uncovered frauds, misrepresentations and some very bad situations.

For more info: http://www.eslincanada.com or http://www.eslincanada.ca