Sabis Erbil Management Case
The following case was sent to us by a former teacher in SABIS’ school in Erbil, Kurdistan in Iraq. After being bullied, intimidated and neglected by SABIS management, she left and sent us her story.
Dear Sabisstinks,
First it seems that Mr ZZZZ (Principal) refuses to fix the air conditioning system so about 11-15 teachers including me were left without air conditioning until now. I resigned and the AQC,s do not care about Education at all including Mr. ZZZZ. It seems a Miss ZZZZ has no experience and does not even care about the treatment of the teachers there or the kids. They are trashing rooms because there are 38 kids in a small room.
I was called a liar to my face in front of the new Principal and was told to get out of her office. After that Mr. ZZZZ wrote me a letter about my bathroom toilet being plugged and it was horrible also with the wrong date October 14th 2008. I will scan it to you it. I got very sick and the school nurse sent me to the doctor who gave me an IV in my arm and antibiotics to be injected by the school nurse every day 2 times a day for a week. Ok Sabis made me sick no air conditioning and they at that point refused to fix the problem. They gave me an apartment with no refrigerator and I had to go back and fourth to eat and then the air conditioner went out in the second apartment too.
I slept in the teachers lounge in a chair and was yelled at and refused help by management (Mr. VVVV) to get another flat until the principal got involved and then it was 10PM the next night and I slept in an unfurnished flat with my mattress only. I was accused of socializing and refusing to work and a bad teacher all in the first 2 days of the opening of the school… I am the only tenured teacher with a Masters Degree that they hired. I should have been the AQC… Before I left the Ministry called me and said one of their teachers at the old school was badly treated by Mr. ZZZZ due to he was taking alot of expensive things and they were coming up missing. When she complained he fired her and caused her alot of problems. Again I will scan and send to you all proof and I hope Mr. Bistany gets wind of this because this Mr. ZZZZ is not a good person and when I saw Mr. ZZZZ and Mr. VVVV apartment they seem to have alot of things that Mr. Bistany’s apartment doen’t. Mrs BBBB is reporting everything to Mr. Bistany but she does not know as much as I do. I received at least two unprofessional letters from this guy.
Thanks,
E-mail #2 sent by teacher to management
The letter about the toilet is insane and the date should have been September 14th and the doctors notes and IV prescription prove I was really to sick to be going through this. The ai rconditioning was out from 3 three days before the letter. The schedules were given to me all after three days of work. The original KG 2B was given to me on 8/26/2008 after that I was given the one that says…Gr2/3 GR 6/7 this one is for a teacher that could not work the schedule because you have to walk back and fourth between buildings all day. I even refused this one because it was said I had to take it. I resigned and I was given the third one and I immediately got very sick from all the stress.
Click here for images of diagnosis, letter claiming teacher’s infractions, teacher’s timetable.
Dear Kurdish Globe,
The problem is not with Dr. Bokhari she is an example of “Excellence” and is to good for that school.
The problem is directly with the Lebanese Managment because it seems that they do not like American Muslim teachers.
Also do not for one minute think that there is no back up for this story. There is more proof than you can believe or imagine and you were not there. Please post the proof to the parents in KURDISTAN.
This is the Sabis way to destroy teachers and these comments came from Management. Is it fair to use words like this?
________________________________________________
SABIS in ERBIL, Kurdistan
I am once again astounded by negative comments posted elsewhere on the web (where a teacher who has left the SABIS school in Erbil openly and viciously castigates the school, without any evidence onto the web for all to see and apparently believe THEN I receive a Google Alert this morning from an OFFICIAL VERIFIABLE SOURCE. (I once again ask, why do people blog falsehoods so blatantly? Is there an automatic assumption that the rest of the world are thick? Below is an article published in the Kurdish national newspaper commending SABIS:
Thursday, 25 September 2008, 04:45 EDT
Choueifat School excels in Erbil
By Qassim Khidhir
The Kurdish Globe
A superb education system gives students and parents a better choice.
Due to the exceptional performance of the Choueifat School in Erbil, other SABIS Network schools may soon open in regional cities.
When Humara Bokhari was informed that she would be serving as the director of the Choueifat International School in Erbil city in Iraqi Kurdistan Region, she began searching the Internet for the answers to two of her most pressing questions. First, is Kurdistan Region safe? Second, is there electricity? Both answers, she discovered, were positive.
Bokhari was born in Pakistan. She was a teacher there at the Choueifat International School for 15 years and for 20 years in the U.S. The school, currently in 44 countries, is part of the SABIS International Education System Network.
But Choueifat in Erbil, which opened in September 2006, is the first SABIS school in Iraq. In August 2008, it moved to a permanent campus capable of housing up to 2,500 students, and it includes a semi-Olympic-sized swimming pool as well as modern classrooms, IT and science laboratories, a library, and staff accommodations. The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) donated most of the construction funds for the new campus.
The school was opened due to the growing demand to learn English and the increase in the number of Kurdistan families returning from abroad.
Bokhari told the Globe that the school now has around 670 students; more parents continue to show up every day to register their kids, she said. The KRG pays the fees for those gifted students who previously studied in government schools.
Bokhari expects that in the future Choueifat will open a second school in Erbil and a first school in other Kurdistan Region cities, including Suleimaniya. Duhok city will welcome its first Choueifat College next year.
SABIS Network is currently training several local teachers in Kurdistan so that they may be able to teach in Choueifat schools in the region.
“We have 19 foreign teachers in the school, mostly from the UK, the U.S., and Lebanon,” said Bokhari.
UK resident Juliette Sexton is now a teacher at the Choueifat School in Erbil. She admitted she was nervous about security before she arrived. “Now I am here and I don’t feel nervous,” she said. She described her students as excellent, pleasant, and keen on learning.”
cynthia herzog
October 11, 2008
I think I’ve seen that article before. When was it published?
wanderingbookworm
October 11, 2008
[...] Stinks has aggregated information posted on the internet from forums, blogs and testimonials, all from people who have experienced the SABIS system. They are mostly former teachers with [...]
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