Korean Job Discussion Forums

[pkang0202]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_South_Korea

As you can see, the South Korean government has been through a LOT of instability. Its amazing that Korea could get to where they are today despite that.

Treefarmer:

There is a large English speaking Korean population outside of the Korea.

[Guri Guy]

[Treefarmer]

[quote="Guri Guy"]

[Treefarmer]

[endo]

[endo]

[mack4289]

This is an interesting article about some of Korea's weaknesses in developing their young people
http://joongangdaily.joins.com/article/view.asp?aid=2876560:

"In interviews with the JoongAng Ilbo, only four out of 35 star Korean students studying at seven prestigious U.S. universities said they will return as soon as their studies end. Thirteen said they will eventually go back, but not right away, 16 said they did not know if they would return and two said they would not come back.

At the same time, businesses in Korea are having trouble recruiting workers with a world-class education. The SK Group set up a special team three years ago to hire such Koreans, but can�t find enough of them.

.... In interviews with the 35 students, who attended Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Columbia, Stanford, MIT and UC Berkeley, many said they decided to leave Korea in the first place because of the rigid education system here, which they said fails to nurture creativity and leadership. More than 3,200 Korean students are studying at 11 of the top universities in the United States, according to tallies from each school.

�I hated my high school education, which was focused on memorizing everything only because it would appear in exams,� said Baek Jin-su, a 20-year-old freshmen at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, or MIT. �I figured the university education in Korea would not be any better.�

.... Other scholars at home and abroad expressed concerns about Korea�s academic system. In a lecture in Korea on June 3, Alvin Toffler, the American writer and futurist, said changes in the education system are the key for Korea to lead the world in the future.
Chang Duk-jin, a Seoul National University sociology professor who is currently lecturing at the Harvard University on an exchange, said universities in Korea must redefine their roles and functions. �The abilities of students at Harvard and the Seoul National University are similar,� Chang said. �But the two schools� students show very different levels of concentration when studying.�
Yale admissions officer Peter Chemery also pointed out the shortcomings of the Korean education system. He said Korean students at Yale are extremely bright, but they appeared to be educated to focus on outcomes such as test scores, rather than nurturing their leadership and creativity. He said it was hard for the university to find out what the students� real talents were and what kind of future they are seeking.
Chemery said such a tendency is common not only in Korea, but also in other countries where students have to take a state-administered entrance exam to get into college."

Failure to develop critical thinking skills is the classic criticism of Korean education. As Korea develops that weakness will become more and more glaring because developed economies need leaders who can adapt to changing circumstances and sort out important information from the irrelevant stuff. Here's a good article about the education system's biggest structural problem, "The Three Nos". http://joongangdaily.joins.com/article/view.asp?aid=2874723

[Treefarmer]

thst article matt just posted sgreed with sll my prejudices about korea

[Saxiif]

Korea is one of the few countries where if I could vote I would have a very hard time even figuring out who counts as enough of a lesser of the evils to vote for:

We have Uri which is run by a blundering idiot.

We have Hannara which is a collection of left over fascists from the military dictatorship and puppets of the chaebols

We have the labor party which is made up of largely union members working in export industries that support protectionist trade policy, which is remarkably idiotic

And then we have a motley collection of has-beens and parties that only survive on regionalism and patronage networks

[cbclark4]

[jvalmer]

I thought the form mayor of seoul lee myoung-bak would be a good potential president. But, his idea of building a canal through korea is very foolish. Why they hell would he want to build a country wide canal and waste money better invested in industry or even as some kind of fund for possible unification.

[thepeel]

[cwemory]

[R. S. Refugee]