Job Discussion Forums

Teacher Lindsay · Joined: 31 Mar 2004 Posts: 393 Location: Luxian, Sichuan

Borrowed from an alternate discussion forum, under a thread titled "65% of English teachers working (with working visas/E2) in S. Korea are Canadians";

4nic8r · Joined: 18 Mar 2004 Posts: 68

No, I don't imagine they are that bad. As for getting taken advantage of, those who are inexperienced or naive are sure to get taken advantage of. Those who have a backbone don't. It all depends on the person..

yaramaz · Posted: Mon Jun 14, 2004 7:58 am Post subject:

No, it isnt that bad. However, it is a struggle for those who have graduated from university with not-very-practical degrees like my own (English and History major/minor). I lived in the UK for a few years and noticed a lot of job ads for graduates... any graduates. Entry level positions that lead to greater things. There is nothing like that in Canada. Perhaps we are an over-educated population with not enough skilled jobs to go around. Even to get low-paying, unskilled jobs you need qualifications (at least on the west coast). If you want to be a waitress, you need Squirrell or Silver Service training, if you want to be a secretary you need a course for that, even minimum wage retail demands experience and training. It's crazy. And often, you won't get full time hours and probably no benefits. I struggled in Canada as I struggled nowhere else.

I think if I had done my degree in something more concrete (even stage craft!) then it would be different-- friends who had done diplomas in home care for seniors or legal secretary training or chef training have not had this problem.

I think in my next life I'll get a degree in glass blowing and open up a studio. Very Happy

Louis · Joined: 02 Jan 2004 Posts: 275 Location: Beautiful Taiyuan

Somewhat true. There is a big market for highly specialized jobs (read "requires specialized education"), but maybe not so much for recent graduates of artsy programs that have little/no work experience. There is also a huge demand for skilled tradesmen/women (welders, plumbers, and the like) but you don't really get a job like this with a BA!

As for the "Canadians get exploited easily" comment, that's a bit of a generalization, isn't it? Regardless of nationality, we negociate our own contracts.

Teacher Lindsay · Joined: 31 Mar 2004 Posts: 393 Location: Luxian, Sichuan

Louis

Regarding:-

Gordon · Joined: 28 Jan 2003 Posts: 5309 Location: Japan

I'd certainly bet there are more Cdns teaching overseas (per capita) than Americans or Brits. There are about 8 or 9 times more Americans than Cdns.

As Yaramaz correctly stated, we have a glut of uni grads looking for any job and even Korea looks appealing. I know I went there 2 years after university.
Go into any Starbucks in Canada and a majority of the employees have degrees.

darkchild · Joined: 30 May 2004 Posts: 47

i think that those who are being taken advantage of are not only Canadians. It really doesn't matter which nationality he/she is, if you don't do research on the countries/schools you're applying to, you're more likely to be taken advantage of...

being a Canadian, i think that our economy is way better than most of the countries out there, it's really a matter of which country we're compared to. In light of reccent events, i think that even though our economy has been on the decline, we are still doing ok. Another thing is, i didn't know that the US were that much better than us, cause i'm aware that the US also experienced some drawback in their economy. I personally believe that it's a cycle, we can't be up all the time, right? Rolling Eyes

that's just my two cents! cheers~ Cool