Institut Servantesa V Moskve
December 2023 •
1
For context, I have taught English as a foreign language for nearly a decade now in four countries outside the UK. I am also the head of faculty in the international school I work in, so responsible for the training, materials and pedagogy in the school I work in. It has been 12 days since I requested a change of group or a refund and I still have heard nothing from the director of studies (G Lopez). This is 20 days after I first raised a complaint about the very poor quality of the teaching and course provided by the institute. I studied with Cervantes in the UK and found them to be very good, however, here in Russia my experience has definitely put me off IC. Naturally, when asking for a refund, not even a second is wasted to ascertain what the cause of complaint is. You are simply told that they are a mountain of ‘administrative charges’ which leave you owing money to the institute! Not even a single damn given about the fact you are unhappy with the course or the teacher. This is the response of a gangster who already has his hands on your money. Straight up theft and nothing but a middle finger in return. Amongst the problems I tried to point out to the institute were the sloppy planning and preparation of the teacher, the lack of any sense of pedagogical knowledge, no sense of any sequencing or thought given to the concepts or materials taught. Even worse, in a three hour evening class, 40 minutes or more will be wasted going one-by-one round an entire group of 8-10 people or more discussing what they did at the weekend – this is on a B2 level course! I paid a lot of money for a B2 level course, travelled for an hour from work to get to a 3 hour class, and then spent that time being dragged through a lazily taught three hours to have to travel home for another hour. From my experience, it is clear that the administration of the institute have nothing but contempt for the people paying for their services. They can’t even be bothered to reply. I can only speculate as to the reasons for this, however, I feel like I have been robbed blind by these people.