Korean Job Discussion Forums

[OttawaScott]

Hi! My wife and I were in Korea (before we had children) about 5 years ago and worked at a hogwan (sp?) and now we are coming over to Korea with our 2 young children and want to take jobs with hours between 9 and 4:30 so we can be with our kids in the morning and the evening and of course on weekends. From what we can see, we would need to take a job at a Public School.

We've also been informed that there are international schools (as someone suggested we may want to put our 3 year old in one) and that if we teach there we would get free tuition for her. Does anyone know if this is true or what the enrollment cost of these international schools might be?

Also, does anyone have experience teaching at either a Public school or an International school? What can you tell us about the experience, the hours, the pay, the vacation, the benefits (sick leave?)? Any info would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!

Scott

[Yu_Bum_suk]

I teach at a public middle / high school and given the hours I'm here I wouldn't want to have kids unless I had a stay-at-home spouse and higher salary (and my salary's already a bit above average).

[leebumlik69]

I work at a public school and I can tell you it won't be easy to get a job at one right now as they hire towards the end of the year (Gregorian), and public school teachers start teaching on March 1st. in line with the end of Korean Winter vacation. Try for a reputable hagwon franchise like Avalon, or maybe even an English village if you're into the bestiality like type of work environment.

[seoulsucker]

Over the past 3 years I've been at a public high school, a private elementary school, and now at a public middle school.

The pay is fantastic (my salary has ranged from 2.6 up to 3.4/month) but in 2/3 years I've had to provide my own housing.

The vacation is unreal. Last year I had close to 12 weeks off, PAID vacation. This year will be about the same, but unpaid.

The hours are great. I teach 4 or 5 classes a day at 45 minutes each, and on a few days I'm done before noon. My office hours are 8:30 - 3:00 M-F. That provides me plenty of time to do lesson planning, extracurricular activities, etc.

I haven't taken a sick day in a few years, but it's not nearly as big of an ordeal as it is at a hagwon. I have Korean coteachers in the classroom with me for every class, so if I do call in sick, there is already a teacher scheduled to be there. Of course, as in any Korean work environment, actuall USING a sick day is frowned upon.

The only downside is that I'm consistently out of the loop as the only foreign teacher. I often find out about schedule changes, days off, activities, outings, etc. at the very last minute. For example, last year I had the entire week of Chuseok scheduled off, but the following week there were 3 days of exams for which I did not need to be present. I could have used that time to extend my trip home, but because they didn't tell me until I returned to work on Monday dragging ass from jetlag, I was unable to take advantage.

I highly recommend gunning for a PS position. The positives outweigh the negatives 5 to 1.

[Trumpcard]

Seoulsucker, sounds good, did u apply for your postions via EPIK or the like?

[flyingteacher]

To work at an international school you need to be a certified teacher. Also, most schools have already hired for the coming school year (August 2007-). So it may be hard to get a job now. You normally have to be in Korea to interview direct with the school or go to a international school job fair which you have to apply to go to.

If you can get into an international school the conditions are great, paid vacation, free education for your children, real school experience which counts back in your home country. To enter your child into an international school, they cost around 12-16 million for the school year so they dont come cheap.

[seoulsucker]

[krats1976]

[VirginIslander]

Right now there are jobs being offered at the Busan International School. Employment begins in August. Please refer to the Korean Jobs thread.

Job1: 3 months VACATION in Haeundae//Job2: make 2.8 to 2.9 mil per month

Here are the details:

School Contract

Contract: 2 year contract 180 contract days/year
Salary: 24,000,000 won to 32,500,000 won per year (Depending on work experience) tax free!!
Furnished accomodations and rent-free,
Annual flight, (spouse and children included)
100 percent medical,
Korean Pension,
Maintenance and Winter Heating costs are covered by the school,
Rest & Relaxation allowance ($850.00 for membership fees.)
10 month school years (September to June)
Baggage allowance (up to $2,500 for a family of three)
Paid sick leave in the case of an emergency
10 days of sick leave
A settling in allowance of 1,000,000 million won.
Start in August 2007

Requirements

Bachelors of education,
3 to 4 years of classroom teaching experience,
Love children,
Love working in foreign countries,


Teachers needed

Middle / High School Mathematics

Middle / High School Social Studies

Middle School English

Computing (all school)

Grade 1 teacher

Grade 2 teacher

Most international schools offer free tuition, I am assuming if they will pay for your children's flight, they will expect that you want them to pay for tuition.

If it doesn' t work out in Korea, there are hundreds of international schools that offer the same benefits.

Here is the site:

http://www.eslgateways.com/internationalschool.htm

[Saxiif]

Most reputable international schools want teaching certification and two years of teaching experience in your home country. There's are, however, a lot of quasi international school in which classes are taught in English but 90% of the kids are Korean. Don't think that those places would be necessarily bad places to work and might be worth looking at...

[krats1976]

[VirginIslander]

I dont know why but there many Korean students at the international school in Nepal.

[VirginIslander]

Regardless of which international school one chooses--International or quasi-the benefits are much better at both.

If I were to teach professionally and if I were to raise a large family, I would definitely work at an international school. In the long run, that is the only way to go. You can teach in the field of your choice...even if ESL is your choice, your children receive free tuition and you can jump from to country to country every couple of years.

Teach in China for two years, expose the kids to Chinese. Then head down to Trinidad. Or if you want to teach them a particular language, say Portuguese, start in one of the Brazillian school, then teach in Angolo and finally in Portugal.

Its responsible and finacially more than feasible.

[OiGirl]

[krats1976]