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dam_on
Joined: 12 Dec 2006
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 Posted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 11:27 pm Post subject: update |
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Last edited by dam_on on Wed May 28, 2008 6:11 am; edited 7 times in total |
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Yu_Bum_suk
Joined: 25 Dec 2004
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| Posted: Mon Feb 05, 2007 11:43 pm Post subject: |
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A very interesting (and typical) story. I don't think taking a sick day is the answer unless you want to start the process of eventually getting fired. It looks pretty clear that nothing is going to change. The question you have to ask yourself is do you want to last it out another six months or start trying to secure a LOR. You're still getting paid and you don't work mornings or weekends, right? Now might be the time to throw your hands up in the air, just show up and do the minimum, not give a rat's ass about professionalism, and just collect your paycheque.
Switching mid-contract is do-able in Korea (I did after half a year, but not without getting nasty), and not caring anymore is perfectly justified given what you're described. However the one thing you can just about bank on is that you will never be able to change how things are run at your crap hogwan. |
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dam_on
Joined: 12 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 12:54 am Post subject: |
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Hey Yu Bum Suk....lol, that brings out a chuckle...thanks for the comment.
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| The question you have to ask yourself is do you want to last it out another six months or start trying to secure a LOR. |
I agree with you, it's now at that point where I need to decide if I can put up with it for six more months. I check Dave's daily for new job listings in the International and Korea section, I guess that in itself says a lot. I really would prefer NOT to quit as I did sign on for a year...but the fact that it was under false pretences bothers me. I have been holding out on the hope that things would start to change. I don't really know if the boss knows exactly what's going on but I plan to remedy that very..VERY soon. She's not usually in the office which is kind of nice but kind of not.
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Now might be the time to throw your hands up in the air, just show up and do the minimum, not give a rat's ass about professionalism, and just collect your paycheque.
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Honestly, I don't think that I am the kind of teacher that could just go through the motions not caring and collect the check at the end of the month. It sounds stupid to many, I'm sure, but I've really been trying to improve the school and students. I'm an English major and planned to go into ESL after graduating to fufill a dream of living in/experiencing Japan, which I did. I've tried to make things better here, even set up an English book library with a lot of books I picked up in the Philippines...but without the support of the other two K-teachers I feel it may be hopeless.
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| I don't think taking a sick day is the answer unless you want to start the process of eventually getting fired. |
I agree with you that taking the sick day is not the answer, but looking back on it I guess they are getting a taste of what I have to deal with constsntly. (feels kinda good  ) |
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dam_on
Joined: 12 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 2:14 am Post subject: |
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a quick update...I was laying on the couch watching TV, generally enjoying my "sick day", and I got a text from one of the k-teachers which said:
"This is xx school, will you teach adult class? if you cannot, today adult class have to be supplement on Friday at 7-8 please let me know quickly i have to notice to adult."
I thought it was a bit ironic and replied:
"It's funny how you need two hours notice but it's ok for my schedule to always change at the last second"
"No, I am not working today."
"Please arrange a meeting with the boss and the three of us for tomorrow at 1pm."
So, she replied that she told the boss and we will meet tomorrow at 1. I've decided to write down the major complaints I have and bring them up with the boss tomorrow. Problem is, she doesn't speak English and will be relying on the K-teachers to translate for her...  In all fairness, the boss is a really sweet woman, she has been very kind to me but as I am the first foreign teacher here, she doesn't know exactly how things should go. Hopefully she will be willing to go along with a few conditions I want:
1. A days notice of schedule changes
2. Faster resolution to problems
3. Clearly defined roles of the foreign/Korean teacher's duties
#3 is funny. I'm going to bring this up because during an argument I was having with one of the k-teachers about lack of communication, she told me that it wasn't her job to help me...meaning to act as a translater when problems arise or whatever. It's funny b/c no one else speaks English.  If the boss seems hesitant about these very basic requests, I will suggest the possibility of starting to look for a replacement.
Last edited by dam_on on Tue Feb 06, 2007 3:37 am; edited 1 time in total |
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kimchi story
Joined: 23 Nov 2006
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| Posted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 3:32 am Post subject: |
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#3 is worth arguing for.
#1 is good filibuster.
#2 might just come around when #3 gets resolved.
I'm serious about #1 being good filibuster. I'd keep it as a distraction while arguing for #3, but it's a demand for a major shift in infrastructure and is totally unreasonable. If the staff is used to making last minute schedule changes (not just a Korean thing, a common teaching thing in general) there is no way to change it. However, because it sounds totally reasonable, it is top notch filibuster.
G'luck |
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dam_on
Joined: 12 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 4:00 am Post subject: |
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Thanks Kimchi Story...i'll keep what you said in mind tomorrow.
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| If the staff is used to making last minute schedule changes (not just a Korean thing, a common teaching thing in general) there is no way to change it. |
I know that changes can and will pop up every once in a while, it's the fact that they wait until the last minute to inform me that I have a problem with. Case in point, I had a special boy's high school class four days a week during the winter break. I broke it up into reading, writing, listening, and conversation classes. I was told on the Wednesday that that class would be cancelled on Thursday, was even given a revised schedule showing no class. I double-checked with that K-teacher to make sure and she confirmed. Thursday I went to work and prepped all of my classes as usual. Thursdays were my listening classes and I would usually bring in my Cowon PMP and play a few videos on the TV that I selected from the net and printed out question worksheets for. But since the class was cancelled I didn't bring it or prepare any listening activities...why would I, it's cancelled. Low and behold, twenty minutes before my teaching day starts, she tells me there WAS class....
I didn't make a huge deal about it...just explained my situation and asked why it changed back at the last minute. She said she had JUST found out the night before...huh...excuse me...what was that...the night before??  At that point I got peeved. She has my cellphone number, has texted me numerous times before but decides to fill me in right before classes start. I think this type of situation happens quite often where they just REMEMBER to let me know right before the class. That's what I hope to change. |
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Fresh Prince
Joined: 05 Dec 2006
Location: The glorious nation of Korea
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| Posted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 4:07 am Post subject: |
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My sympathies. Sorry to hear about your situation. I think that the big issue is the cultural differences between the Korean ways of doing things and the western ways. Even though it sounds like it's a difficult hogwan to teach at, it might be helpful to explain to your director that you are from a different culture and think very differently. Explain your frustrations and emphasize that you are from a different culture and although you are in Korea, you would really appreciate it if they could do a few things differently.
Hopefully if you explain exactly what you want and why you want it they will understand.
Good luck |
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Son Deureo!
Joined: 30 Apr 2003
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| Posted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 4:57 am Post subject: |
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| Fresh Prince wrote: |
| it might be helpful to explain to your director that you are from a different culture and think very differently. Explain your frustrations and emphasize that you are from a different culture and although you are in Korea, you would really appreciate it if they could do a few things differently. |
This argument will likely fall on deaf ears. They have little reason to care about the cultural differences. This is Korea, and when in Rome....
An argument that is more likely to be effective is that the school's lack of organization makes it more difficult for the teachers to do their jobs which will ultimately cost the wonjangnim money as educational quality suffers.
Then again, even this logic requires the boss to have a little bit of vision beyond this month's tuition envelopes.
OP, I sympathize with your situation 100%. The lack of professionalism that undermines all of your hard work is enough to eat at anyone's soul.
Yu Bum Suk is right, though, you have to make up your mind one way or another about what you want to do before you have that meeting tomorrow. Either get out, and get your letter of release, or be ready to suck it up and do what you have to do to get through the next six months. Most hogwons are flying by the seat of their pants from month to month, and yours isn't likely to change just because the foreign teacher isn't happy about it.
If you don't like it, you should probably get out of the hogwon game. There's a reason why they're famous for this kind of nonsense. |
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Hater Depot
Joined: 29 Mar 2005
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| Posted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 5:52 am Post subject: |
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| I think that the big issue is the cultural differences between the Korean ways of doing things and the western ways. |
Disorganization on this scale isn't cultural, it's a consequence of a clueless owner hiring incompetent and inconsiderate people.
Yes, every foreign teacher has stories like the OP's but this isn't the way things go down at Samsung. Cultural differences doesn't cut it as an explanation. |
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R. S. Refugee
Joined: 29 Sep 2004
Location: Shangra La, ROK
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| Posted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 6:29 am Post subject: |
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Well, did you get the free dinner every night?  |
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Adventurer
Joined: 28 Jan 2006
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| Posted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 6:56 am Post subject: |
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| Frankly, if I was lied to left and right to work somewhere I would have enough cash saved up and potentially do a runner. I mean the school doesn't deserve you honouring some contract if you were lied to. That is like you marrying someone who told you she didn't drink much but turned out to be a binge drinker on weekends and then you seek an annulment. In this case, there is no annulment just getting out of dodge out of a dodgy place. If you can go to Japan, go there. I don't expect you to have many debts since you've been working for a while abroad. Now if this boss is going to bend over backwards to accomodate you, that is another story. This sounds like a bad hagwon one of my Irish acquaintances worked at, and he eventually just threw in the towel. |
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dam_on
Joined: 12 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 7:13 am Post subject: |
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| Well, did you get the free dinner every night? |
Yes, just as stated. This actually brings up some more of the story that i'll share. Over the past 5 1/2 months I've had run-ins with both of the K-teachers. These run-ins were 99.9% the result of having had my schedule mixed up suddenly at the last minute, or some other random form of mis-/lack of communication between myself and the K-teacher.
I had free dinner nightly during the work week. My dinner time was originally supposed to be the 10 minutes between classes. This is not enough time to eat dinner (for anyone who isn't in the military at least) so I pressed them to extend my dinner time. Eventually I got 20 minutes which was ok with me. Now, I've tried to keep a good relationship with everyone...brought back small gift bags of snacks from Japan for all after my visa run, did the same thing on a slightly larger scale on my return from The Philippines after X-mas, hoping that these small acts of generosity/kindness would spill over into the workplace and we could all get along and help each other. "Can't we all just get along?"
It worked each time!!! for about a week. Then things just went back to usual...chaos...no answers to my direct questions...general confusion...things being unorganized...etc.
About two weeks ago I ordered Kimchi chigae for dinner, but asked the K-teacher to have it delivered by 4:30 as I know this stuff is served HOT and figured that it would have time to cool by 5:00...my dinner time. I made this order at 4:00..plenty of time to get it done. As I said I have 20 minutes for dinner and can't wait for 10-15 for the hot @ss soup to cool off. I finish my class and head for my office to chow down...I run into said K-teacher on the way and she mentions "a problem" with my order. Problem, what problem. Apparently it was just delivered before I finished..why I ask? She tells me that when she called them a second time (I can only guess she called back because it was late) that they told her the couldn't make it in time. Now, if she would have knocked on my door (it's right next to the phone) and told me this, I would have just cancelled my order and got something quicker...but nothing was said until I finished my class. So, I can't finish my dinner because it's scalding hot and I can barely eat it...props for those Koreans who CAN!!
She felt I had no reason to be upset and I just reminded her of all the times I've asked her to just let me know if there were any changes/problems with schedules or anything else. This is when it gets interesting as she goes on to say how she does her best to help me EVERYDAY!! And how it's not her job to help me. I was temporarily unable to speak as I was trying to think of how she has helped me....
*translated my problems to the boss
*ordered my dinner for me
*at times given NO response to my "Hi, how are ya?" at the beginning of the day
*at times simply walked off after I have asked a question (leaving me scratching my head)
*she DID make me a small menu of things that shops will deliver in this town...although I got it 5 months after I arrived and had asked for one many times
*other than that...I was drawing a blank
So I raise my voice a little, we exchange words yada yada yada. I write a letter to her the next day apologizing for raising my voice and also cancelling my nightly dinners. I just asked for the money in its place and sure enough I've gotten that, too. |
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dam_on
Joined: 12 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 7:22 am Post subject: |
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here's a copy of the letter that I gave her the next day:
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XX,
First I wanted to say, I�m sorry for getting angry with you yesterday. Sometimes my patience isn�t very good and my adventure class kids weren�t listening very well, so when I talked to you I wasn�t too happy. I hope that it doesn�t happen again because I don�t want to make you upset and I don�t want to be upset. I decided to write this in a letter so there is no misunderstanding. I made the request to have the food delivered early because I wanted to be able to eat as soon as I finished my class and still have time to relax before my next class. Teaching seven classes back to back is very tiring and I really don�t like having to eat my dinner so quickly before class starts. Unfortunately, the soup was too hot when I wanted to eat it and I had to wait until about 5:10 to start. I know that Koreans can eat their food when it is still very hot, but I�m sorry that my mouth is different and I can�t.
I thought that we understood each other already after almost five months. I know that we have talked many times about the way things suddenly change and how I don�t like it. Maybe it is Korean custom to accept this fact, but I am not Korean and have not had this problem much at the other two jobs in Korea. I like to know what is happening and if there is a problem, I would like to know about it so I can make a decision on what to do next. I know that what happened yesterday is finished, but looking back I wish you would have at least let me know that the restaurant couldn�t deliver the food by the time I asked, and if I wanted to keep that order or order something else. At least then it would have been MY decision and you would not have had any responsibility. I know this is not the first time we had problems about ordering/delivering food, so I think it is a good idea if I just don�t order dinner anymore. This way, we will not have those problems anymore.
I have been trying to make a good relationship with you and YY lately, but it seems that there are many cultural differences between us. I think that you both have very limited experience with foreigners, and I have very limited experience with Koreans. Most of the Koreans I have worked with I the past worked with foreigners for many years and had a better idea of our customs. Hopefully, we can understand each other better in the future.
You told me that you do your best to help me everyday. I�m really sorry but I don�t notice it. I basically feel I have to do things myself. I did ask you and YY to order my dinner, talk to the boss about some important topics, and occasionally help with unrelated things like the metal detectors or booking my trip to The Philippines and I also appreciate the menu you made for me very much, but I asked for a menu when I arrived at AAA in August�almost five months ago. Other than that, I don�t see what you are talking about. There was very little support with learning the AAA method when I arrived. I have to plan my lessons, try to motivate the students, discipline the students, create lessons for the kids� classes that don�t follow any set materials, deal with students constantly not doing homework, deal with students constantly not bringing books to class, deal with students who don�t like each other and make fun of each other, and all of this is done by myself because there seems to be no communication or support between the teachers.
I have tried to have meetings with you in the past to talk about any problems in the classroom or to share ideas for each other but that happened only once or twice because I asked and I was the one doing all the talking. I have even tried to sit in and watch your class so that I could see how the students act with each other during that time but left because you seemed very uncomfortable with me there. After that, you started locking your door for a while.
You said that it is not your job to help me, I apologize but I thought it was. If I need to talk to the boss about some important things like my taxes, healthcare, pension, problems with my apartment or anything else, what do I do? There is no one working at the school to do this, right? Should I just continue working and not paying my taxes illegally? Since I have been in Korea for a few years now, I understand many of the laws for English teachers here. I know that this is the first time the school has hired a western teacher but these things are very important.
I am always the first teacher at school and the last to leave. I care about the school and the students and want them to do their best. I want them to be successful in their future. I hope that I can make a good impression on them about America, foreigners, and English. I try to teach them to respect each other, to have good manners, to be polite, to be curious, to ask questions, and to be good people. But I can�t do all of these things by myself. All of the teachers need to work together, talk about problems with classes, think of ways to make classes better together, be consistent in how we treat students, have rules and enforce punishments when the rules are broken, and most important is work together as a team�not fighting or arguing with each other.
Some things that need to be done as soon as possible:
1.)Call the tax office and find out how much I should pay in taxes monthly.
website: www.nts.go.kr
2.)Enroll into the National Health Insurance
website: www.nhic.or.kr
3.)Enroll in National Pension Service
website: www.nps4u.or.kr/
4.)Setup direct payment of salary into bank account.
5.)Have my water heater at home fixed�NO hot water for showers.
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dam_on
Joined: 12 Dec 2006
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| Posted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 7:26 am Post subject: |
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| btw, she hasn't spoken to me since giving her the letter....... |
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Adventurer
Joined: 28 Jan 2006
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| Posted: Tue Feb 06, 2007 7:37 am Post subject: |
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| dam_on wrote: |
| btw, she hasn't spoken to me since giving her the letter....... |
Everyone pays taxes in Korea whether they are foreigners or not. They are just trying to not pay yours and your health insurance. If I were you, I would make sure I have enough money to deal with some kind of battle. That is typical with these kinds of people. Essentially, they are treating you in a bigoted manner that is no different than someone treating a Bangladeshi in Kuwait like a non-person which led to a riot in that country and then reforms to ensure the Bangladeshis got paid.
This talk of them not having a Westerner before doesn't mean anything. So many Korean employers don't want to pay the pension, because it costs money. So start saving your money. You also may have to call the Labour Board. Plus, you need stubs that you paid your taxes. Uncle Sam or Revenue Canada will want them. My lost boss was like yours.
You need to do something. |
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