Korean Job Discussion Forums

quercus · Joined: 04 Feb 2003

hello, i have taught in korea for one year and will be coming back in august. i taught at a hagwon and had a very good relationship with my director, etc. and expect a good recommendation. i would like to teach at a university when i come back and have a few questions i would really appreciate answers too/advice on:

-i can return in the fall, when do universities hire? i know they hire in march, but do they hire in the fall as well?

-any advice on how to find a university other than listings on this website which i am aware of already?

-i am 24, am i too young?

-any other advice on the hagwon to university shift? all will be much appreciated.

thanks
quercus

Len8 · Joined: 12 Feb 2003 Location: Kyungju

You can apply anytime for a university job. They start looking in December for March and in June for September. There are agencies that will help you, as well as Daves Esl. Now you either end up teaching at an institute on a campus where you teach paying students hogwan style or you become staff and teach either Freshman or English majors or both. As a member of the staff you could also teach elective classes with students of different majors who genuinely want to learn English.
If you work in an institute on campus, it's no different from your previous hogwan. The students might not be so unruly, but then you might also get apathy or a decrease in attendance, because the students will be too worried about their regular classes. If you work as a staff member then the students will be there every day, and depending on how well the university has it's programe organized that could be either heaven or hell.l

lawyertood · Posted: Mon Apr 21, 2003 5:06 pm Post subject: university gigs

Universities are starting to hire now. See the listings today on Dave's. Without a masters degree it is very difficult to land a true university job. Sometimes being at the right place, at the right time can get you the job with only a BA. I've known teachers to get jobs the first week of school because professors under contract did not return. Check university homepages as they advertise positions there, as well.

rick · Joined: 20 Feb 2003

what agencies help with finding university jobs?

dutchman · Joined: 23 Jan 2003 Location: My backyard

The Lemon · Joined: 11 Jan 2003

(reposted for Medic:)

BTM · Joined: 20 Jan 2003 Location: Back in the saddle.

re: Lemon's repost for Medic.

Holy crap. If my university job was that bad, I'd be lookin' elsewhere...

Medic · Joined: 11 Mar 2003

So what's your university like?

Len8 · Joined: 12 Feb 2003 Location: Kyungju

Interesting post about student behaviour in classes. I'm in Kyungju, and I have heard that Kyungju university has English conversation classes for all students except the freshmen. Can you believe that. I commend them for pushing the English language, but they are sure going about it the wrong way. The freshmen have writing classes only. The administration I guess felt they had to extend their students highschool education.
Once the students have decided on there major though they have their work cut out for them, so they haven't got time to do extra curicullar unrelated classes. When they do attend these extra English classes, they either sleep or make life miserable for the native teachers. The turnover rate there for foreign teachers I've heard is 6 months.

The Lemon · Joined: 11 Jan 2003

Medic · Joined: 11 Mar 2003

It's too bad that the many students that get taught English in an English Institue are only a drop in the bucket compared to the overall number of students who don't get any English instruction whatsoever. When I was in an Institue I used to assume that the majority of Korean students were getting simmilar instruction, and I think it's an erronius assumption many Emglish teachers make. The students who are fortunate to get into an institute are usually the sons and daughters of professional parents who are doctors, dentists, university professors, lawyers etc or parents who are buisnessmen, buisnesswomen or both. I heard someone say that the system favours the haves, and that certain powers that be would like to keep it this way so that only the haves can get the good jobs.
In my university fresman classes there are only a few who really have a good English speaking ability, and some of them are the products of institutes. Others are the rare exceptions who enjoyed English in their highschools inspite of the poor quality of their teachers, and who who worked hard independently. These I've found to my great chagrin wont major in English, because they've figured out that their English ability aint gonna get better by staying in the English programe. They opt for either Chinese or japanese.

weatherman · Joined: 14 Jan 2003 Location: Korea

Medic · Joined: 11 Mar 2003

My night students are generally better too, because they are either the mature older types, or they're the students who work full time during the day. The classes are a little shorter in the evenings as well.
My university is in Kyongboak province, and when I first started I'd swear we got the rejects from the province. The ones who didn't get accepted anywhere else. We had Korean co-teachers whom we taught alternate classes with, and they all voiced the same opinion. I was glad to find that I wasn't the only disgruntled teacher.
Now we don't have any Korean co-teachers, and the programe has been totally changed for the best. One of our expatriate teachers wrote a short paper on how the tesl programe should be organized, and passed it on to the Korean mathematics professor who because she graduated in Canada spoke fluent English, and who was also agitating for an improvement in the programe. We foreigners picked up on all the very bitter in fighting amongst the Korean staff over the way English was being taught.
The Korean mathematics professor rewrote the paper about how TESL should be taught into Korean, and presented it as her own over the heads of our English department to the Vice president of the university. It had to be done like this, because if the paper had been presented as coming from a foreigen English teacher, it would have been thrown in the trash can. Anyway the Vice president was dutifully impressed, and promptly changed the programe accordingly. The sum total is that our poor English Department lost face, but on the up side the students are now getting more exposure to English. We as teachers now also have nuch smaller classes, so we can get into the faces of the students and make them speak.
I have also found that many bright students who goofed off in highschool go to a provincial university to complete two years with reasonable grades, and then transfer to a better university. I noticed this when I started missing my better students. The class performance seemed to drop, and I saw that it was because some of the best students wern't there anymore.

Len8 · Joined: 12 Feb 2003 Location: Kyungju

Have just finished mid terms, and was pleasantly surprised to see some of my freshmen students actually thinking their way through my oral exam. I get them in groups of 4 according to the role or "chusok" and have them sit in a semi circle in another room with me in the middle. I make sure that all extraneous note papers are put on another desk, and that they don't take quick looks at them while I'm quizzing another student. I also have to tell the good students not to help the bad students. Their egalitarianism is admirable, but I costantly have to say "ssh" "ssh".

I've covered what they have to know in the test in the class work, so they can't say they didn't know. Sometimes unfortunately to get em motivated I have to say that my private school elementary school students do the same work in half the time. That really hurts them. However the ones who surprise me, and show flashes of intelligence really make up for the slowness of the dunderheads.

I don't give written tests, but I do give them a written exercise during the semester. I don't tell them it's a test, otherwise they'll run around the room and try and copy someone elses. Rather than get stressed out, and put em in order I choose to do it this way saying it's just an exercise.

The walls at our university need to be white washed, because of all the test material that has been scribbled on the walls.

Skippy · Joined: 18 Jan 2003 Location: Daejeon

Posted by Skippy's Girlfriend
Hi there,

Well, I'm 23 and I'm doing it. Of course the university teaching here at my place is a joke (it is on top of the students regular program and they don't care). Of course, be careful about the living conditions you agree to.

I am living in the dorm with the students (OK) and have an 11 O clock curfew (not OK).

On the upside the pay is good. I have a Grad Cert in TESOL on top of a normal degree, and I had work experience from home as well as more then a year in Korea.

Don't let people tell you you can't do it. When I got here I was told I was the 'youngest and most inexperienced' teacher, but it hasn't mattered a bit. Only one of the others did the TESOL, which surprised me.