Korean Job Discussion Forums

[A.I.]

I've recently been 'informed' that all teachers at my Hagwon will be required to clean the Hagwon on an up and coming Saturday. No extra pay has been discussed- but that's hardly the point to me. I kinda feel that cleaning and teaching are two quite different jobs.

God knows the Hagwon needs a clean. I've been there 5 months now and the place hasn't been cleaned once......leaving it pretty bloody grotty. There's unidentified gummy stuff gripping the brown tiles and morbid pencil drawings cover the walls. When Noah found out he was transporting animals and not people he threw the furniture off the ark and our director picked it up. The insides of most of the chairs are strewn throughout the school.

I spend quite a bit of volunteer time at the Hagwon doing decorative classroom stuff to help improve the environment, so it's not like I am being lazy.

I have no qualms about refusing the 'request' but I think it's a little unfair that the Korean teachers, some of whom are friends, will then get stuck doing the job themselves.

Who else has been 'asked' to swap their markers for mops? Did you do it? Do you think this is fair and just or just plain rude? Should I bite the bullet and make it into a "Woohoo" fun event with party food, music and a lot of elbow grease or just tell the director to hire a cleaner ?

[Skarp]

Is the director and family rolling up their sleeves and pitching in? Or are they at least providing lunch?

It's a difficult one this.

On the one hand, I'm not above doing hands on work of this sort. There's nothing about being a teacher that makes me above that kind of work....I've done plenty of it while 'resting' from the glam world of efl.


But - it's unpaid, it's your leisure time they're taking over and I bet it wasn't in your contract...


Difficult...

Skarp

[canuckistan]

Just do it. As long as it's not every Saturday, big deal. Maybe the hagwon owner will spring for pizzas after.

Last year I used to clean my classroom top to bottom desks and all 'cause I really hate working in a dirty classroom.

[anae]

At my first hagwon after the so-called IMF crisis, we had to clean our own classrooms everyday as the cleaning staff had to be let go. I didn't say a word and neither did the other two foreign teachers. The Korean staff including the director had to clean the toilets, so what were we going to say about a little mopping?

If it is just the one time and all teaching staff is included, I wouldn't get upset. I found with all of my directors that my cooperation was always rewarded in the end.

[VanIslander]

When I started at the hogwan I was told I was to be responsible for cleaning my own classroom, and at what time we all clean. I noticed that the Korean teachers did much more of the general cleaning than I. Yet we all use the common areas equally. It didn't feel right not to do my share.

So, when the staff size was reduced by one teacher, I volunteered to do more: the heavy job of sweeping and mopping the outside area including two flights of stairs.

But then again, I've been doing my own laundry and helping with household chores since I was nine.

For some posters, this may be a question of upbringing: You contribute to the mess, shouldn't you help clean it up?

[some waygug-in]

For some posters, this may be a question of upbringing: You contribute to the mess, shouldn't you help clean it up?


No, the mess comes from the hundred little tyrants who are allowed to terrorize the place every day. If the school had some rules, there wouldn't be such a mess to clean.


Where I work, they have 2 girls who do the cleaning. One is a part-time kindy teacher, the other is a part-time receptionist. The receptionist does most of the cleaning. I am supposed to straighten my classrooms after each class, which I do, but I would not agree to doing mopping and general janitorial work. If they can't afford a cleaning person, chances are pretty good that they can't afford to pay me.
Do what you like, I can't say what your school or situation is like, but for me I have to draw the line somewhere.

I do plenty of non-payed work for my hagwan, including preparation for classes, making games and materials for special events. Last day before Chu-sok we had our market party day. I helped as much as possible to make this day a success, even helped with cleanup afterwards, but I sure would not do it on a regular basis. I buy extra stuff for the school, like books, games and things that the school would otherwise not get. I would be insulted and angry if a director told me that I had to clean the school every day. I say this because I know that our school can definately afford cleaning staff. If I were in a small place, where they had no extra help, perhaps I would be more accomodating, but I probably would not take a job in a place like that in the first place.

I came here to teach, not to be a slave.
That's my line and I'm stickin' to it.
Cheers

[captain kirk]

just clean my own class, that's it. bought a dustpan and broom and after two classes shove the chairs to the wall and sweep. swipe the desk to get the pencil scribbling off. a littered classroom encourages anarchy.

[canuckistan]

There are rules in my classroom, and by god not using the floor as a personal garbage can is one of them. I make the kids responsible for their detritus. They don't dare toss stuff on the floor now.

[coolsage]

This place is not Japan, where the subways are perfumed and there's an ashtray on every steet corner (and guys are not spitting in them). And until they get the bathrooms right, i.e paper in every stall, it's still not a first-world country.

[Squid]

If you mop classroom floors and hallways and clean graffiti and spit and gum from the desks and walls of the school you're a mug.

Next, your wongjangnim will be asking you to run the students to and from school in the bus, in your own unpaid time of course.

Using the cooperation of the Korean teachers as peer pressure upon you is also grossly negligent.

If you signed a contract, however, stating you would clean classrooms then you will have to... and you're a mug for doing so.

My opinion.

Squid.

[mishlert]

Any hogwon owner who has any of his staff cleaning is just downright cheap.

[kylehawkins2000]

Tell him to hire a cleaner like every other hogwan owner does. If not tell him to put on some rubber gloves and start scrubbing those toilets himself.
Sounds like he's on a power trip to me....My old director used to make fun of me for cleaning my own apartment! He figured that every man should have a woman to do that sort of thing....either a mother or a wife. Immature attitude....no wonder there are so many grown men who don't know how to take care of themselves in this country.

[Infoseeker]

I worked at an elementary school and I was responsible for keeping the classroom clean. So, cleaning was included on my list of punishments and once in a while when the classroom was getting pretty grotty, all the naughty children would be sent off to bring the broom and the mop and they'd spend their breaktime making the place look half decent again.

[Draven]

After my first year in my first job in Korea, the boss asked me to help out the other Korean staff with the weekly cleaning of the hogwan. I did it, mainly because I always felt guilty that after I left for the day some Korean teacher would have to clean my classroom.
That being said, I would never do it again. As another poster has mentioned, if your boss can't afford a cleaner, he has much bigger problems. My current hogwan has two cleaners come in every night for a couple of hours for the princely sum of 300,000 a month.

[crazylemongirl]

I clean, not because I have to but I like to pitch in. It takes all of 10 minutes to give a classroom a sweep, mop and clean the tops of the tables.


CLG