It's certainly a more corporate-style environment. Bigfoot Entertainment, the company that owns the school and studio, seems to have its hand in everything. It has a fashion channel, Bigfoot Coffee is served out of a cafe in the lobby, and there are even a few ostriches in a pen outside that one of the company bigwigs bought on a whim for a movie and never used.
The language school in the main building is run by Cleverlearn English Language Institute, an affiliate of Bigfoot. It has multiple locations in the Philippines and throughout Asia. As with the rest of the school, everything in the language center is shiny and new, with long rows of glassed-in booths for one-on-one and group instruction. It certainly lacks the family feel of ALTA, and the square, concrete buildings seem incongruous with a waterfront property on a tropical island. But it is a more traditional educational environment for students not interested in charting their own course at ALTA.
But Bigfoot emphasizes fun too. It also has two-week "learning vacations" where visitors can study English and also try their hand at various aspects of the film industry. The school is willing to be flexible and let students do mixtures of ESL and film activities to break up the hours of language drilling.
Southwestern University in downtown Cebu offers the most traditional collegiate fare. It has a very well respected medical program to go along with the standard bachelors and masters degrees. And it is also the only school of the three with Taiwanese students currently studying there.
Having its campus spread out through the city costs Southwestern most of its holiday vacation feel, but it makes up for it with a real college atmosphere. Whereas ALTA and Bigfoot tend to follow the resort tradition of making themselves independent enclaves in the surrounding community, Southwestern is much more integrated into Cebu. Students should be ready to take care of themselves. Though the university has an office to help students find apartments in Cebu, it doesn't guarantee university housing. Southwestern has programs to help students acclimate, but it doesn't hold your hand like all-inclusive resorts do. Of the three, this would probably be the best option for serious students truly intent on hitting the books.
Students would certainly need a sense of adventure and a lot of flexibility to thrive in the Filipino ESL schools. Cebu is regarded as the safest major city in the Philippines, but parts of it can seem a bit gritty and chaotic compared to downtown Taipei. Still, all three schools emphasized that the common Taiwanese conception of the Philippines as a dangerous place is out of proportion.
The industry is just burgeoning and schools are eager to make accommodations to entice students. They are especially happy to have Taiwanese students, who are still very underrepresented. The schedules and courses laid out in brochures are often more guidelines for you to adjust to your preferences than set agendas.
There aren't any western-style grassy promenades and ivy-covered buildings, but there is solid instruction to be had at a fraction of the price. If you want to study English at the University of Southern California Language Academy, you have to fork over US$125 just to apply, and a six-week program will run to US$2,200. Four weeks at Cleverlearn is a mere US$490, and that's with the vacation thrown in.
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