Korean Job Discussion Forums

[simpleminds]

Despite the 2.5/mth, 20hr/wk, free internet in the dorm and fantastic students, my friend recommends you do not take this job.

Reasons:

"1) Inconvenient location. One has to take a taxi to catch a bus...On return, the taxi never returns you to your dorm, so you have to walk in pitch dark 15-20 minutes on a busy narrow road. Uphill.

2)One is not allowed to cook, and not allowed to order food from restaurants. Therefore, you're stuck with the crappy food in the cafeteria.

3) They don't have a set curriculum, and it keeps changing. Foreign LAnguage teachers are hired to teach conversation, and end up teaching something else. eg:I was originally hired to teach Eng. Conversation, but I ended up teaching TOEFL. One teacher was hired to be a councellor, and ended up teaching Eng. Literature. One for conversation, ended up with Political Science/American History....

4) The administration sucks....everything is last minute, and they keep changing class schedules every other day. Yes, I know this happens in public schools, it's nothing new, but it's annoying.

5) Living in a dorm. Cleaners or anyone will enter your room andyou live on the same floor as the male students. Makes it extremely loud, up until 2:00am. My laundry was STOLEN from my room. I had a BIG SIGN saying "PLease do not enter this room under any circumstances" written in Korean, but they still got in and took my laundry. After making a big scene, I found a couple of pieces in the GARBAGE BIN outside, on the street! The school NEVER conpensated me for it...

6) They make false promises. eg; A kitchen for the teachers. There's only a bunch of fridges to share with the students. A shuttle bus, because we live in the boonies, but no shuttle bus. Pay for the extra work in the summer, but they did NOT pay foreign teachers, only the Koreans.

The work for the summer vacation was not a summer camp. We were to teach ET classes (Extra curricular activities), They made me come back early from my vacation, and made me come to school, but they had NO
teaching scheduled for me! But another whose name is Ronald was here and taught, but did not get paid for the extra work. However, the school paid the Korean teachers.

We already had two teachers from the Eng. Dept. quit during the first
semester, and now ALL English teachers are quitting. Including me.

And the list goes on and on..."

As for the dorm, announcements sometimes start at 6.45 am. I stayed overnight on a Sat night. From 6.45am, we had to listen to an average of 4 announcements per hour for students to come to a meeting at 8am that morning. Did I mention it was a Sunday?

PM me if you want more details.

Consider yourselves warned.

[hubba bubba]

ya, but can you have chicks in yer dorm overnight?

[Yu_Bum_suk]

Sounds like they really know how to screw up what has the potential to be a dream job. Just think of the teachers they could attract if they'd shell out for officetels along a bus route. Seriously - living with the high school students? Do you know of any Korean teachers who do that if they're not taking turns on gee-sook-sa duty? Why don't they just say 'no housing' and offer a housing allowance. Oh, probably because that's the W300,000 they're using to make the job look like it pays about .3 better than most HS jobs.

[simpleminds]

Precisely. I did ask my friend about the possiblilty of housing outside campus. "Oh, no, that's not possible." Those words have got to be their admin's mantra. "Oh, it's a misunderstanding." Yeah. Sure. That's got to be their Plan B mantra.

It's too bad; it could have been a fantastic job.

[simpleminds]

UPDATE on my friend:

'Everytime the students are gone home which is once a
month, and during holidays, the school CUTS OFF the
heater, shuts the doors, as we speak, X-MAS cold as it
is, plus NO HEATER on the top of the hill, plus NO HOT
WATER. They even cut the internet connection.

Anyone who thinks of applying is a big FOOL!!'

Pleasant, huh? Guess the whitey isn't valuable enough for the powers that be to put the heating on when the students aren't around.

[ChuckECheese]

[Kimchieluver]

Chucky, sometimes I like your thinking.

[Junior]

[bellum99]

[mindmetoo]

[Hotpants]

I hope that everything you're saying about this job is unstretched truth. If so, it's a valuable warning for any prospective teacher. It sounds like a terrible job as far as the living conditions are concerned. Sounds more like human rights abuse! I hope that the current teachers stand up and voice their opinions to the powers that be and try to get things changed.

[Yu_Bum_suk]

[Junior]

[simpleminds]

Too damn right it's like human rights abuse. That's why all the teachers are leaving. Sure, they voiced their complaints, but admin employed their mantra mentioned above, like the bully saying, "It's only a joke," after insulting the victim with a slur. Admin is on a serious power trip, and I thought admin at my old job was bad.

I don't think my friend is stretching the truth;he's got better things to do than slander a school, he's not even on Dave's, but they're advertising now. I would have applied, for the students alone.

I had a job interview last week, and enquired after the living arrangements, because they don't suppliment rent if you choose not to live in the dorm. The director was good enough to show me; it was like the residence Ya-bum-suk mentioned with kitchen, etc, but the teachers (mainly Chinese) are living on the same floor as the students. Uh, no thanks. And no, I'll not take the job

[Yu_Bum_suk]