Korean Job Discussion Forums

kilgore_trout · Joined: 20 Sep 2007 Location: KOREA

Evergreen International School Cheongju

-I am writing this to warn others about the terrible experience I had with the Evergreen International School in Cheongju.
-This is the information I was given about the Evergreen International School, before I accepted a position teaching there.
$ The school was in the city of Cheongju
$ There was another foreign teacher from Canada
$ The director of the English program was also a Canadian
$ That there was a house near the campus of the school where I would be living
-However when I arrived there I discovered:
$ The school was approximately an hour to forty-five minute car ride (no public transport ran to the school) from the city of Cheongju, about thirty minutes drive to the nearest grocery store and bank, and that there was no l form of public transportation between the school and civilization. On the weekend all the Korean employees leave the school, so I would be basically abandoned there.
$ The other �foreign� teacher was actually a Korean, who had lived in Canada long enough to change his citizenship.
$ The �Canadian� director was in fact the same mentioned above.
$ The house near the campus where I�d been told I would live was actually for guests and other �important� visitors. I was actually going to be living in the dorms with the students. So along with teaching I would be expected to play �dorm supervisor.� The room was a cell with tiny windows too high to let in any sunlight. The room had a mattress on the floor and a TV. The walls were filthy and it appeared that someone had wiped their shoes that had been covered in feces over the walls. I was left with no drinking water in the room after a 22 hour flight. I asked for a bar of soap, since there was no store nearby, and was given a dirty used bar, you know the kind with other peoples� hair stuck to it. Starting at 6 in the morning Christian hymns played through the speaker inside my room at a volume that couldn�t be ignored.
-In addition I learned shortly after arriving that the school only had four students, and that there were only three other teachers. All of the other students and the entire teaching staff had quit at the end of the previous semester because of �management problems�. I was also informed on my first day of employ that the school was a Christian school (funny, no one mentioned that in any of the emails that we exchanged, and it didn�t say anything about that in my contract). Now, normally I would have no problem teaching at a Christian school (I have actually substitute taught at a Christian school back home), but these people where not normal Christians. Actually the word �Cult� comes to mind. Anyway, when I told them that I wasn�t Christian they told me to convert to their practices or they didn�t want to employ me. This all happened about twelve hours after I got off my flight from America. My freedom cost me my airfare, and hotel room charges the following four days. Plus all the taxi money I had to shell out because of the amount of baggage I was traveling with. Technically I don�t feel that I should have refunded the airfare, but I was quite literally trapped at the school and completely at their mercy.
-I would be lying to you if I said I wasn�t a little bitter about the whole thing, but I am not writing this to get some sort of revenge, I am writing this to warn you about this school. I have been teaching ESL in Asia for 7 years and have never encountered people like this, and have never been expected to live or work under these kind of conditions. Christian or not, I cannot in my wildest imagination picture someone being happy working at this school. One of the great things about teaching abroad is the chance to meet new people and experience a new culture. At this school all that you would experience is fanaticism and isolation. The one night and morning that I spent at this school was like a living Hell. Korea is full of great jobs and job opportunities, this is not one of them.
-Consider yourself warned.

dmbfan · Joined: 09 Mar 2006

Oh, brother..........that sounds horrible! Although, I'm not surprised to hear something like that about Korea Rolling Eyes

Well, it is good to know that you got the hell out of there!

dmbfan

moosehead · Joined: 05 May 2007

Snowmeow · Joined: 03 Oct 2005 Location: pc room

Hi Kilgore_trout

Sorry about your experience.

I was just curious if you had e-mailed the other Canadian "teacher" at the school or had a conversaton with that teacher. I know you said the Canadian teacher was actually the Director, I am just wondering if the director masqueraded as somebody else just to give you a shining evaluation of the school.

I think your experience also serves as a real message to teachers that may be arriving in Korea for the first time in their lives, to not show up without some emergency finances.

spliff · Joined: 19 Jan 2004 Location: Khon Kaen, Thailand

Trout...what did you end up doing about it? Give notice or pull a runner. Shocked

wylies99 · Joined: 13 May 2006 Location: I'm one cool cat!

Thanks for posting the warning. Hopefully this post will help another teacher avoid this place.

Draz · Joined: 27 Jun 2007 Location: Land of Morning Clam

How did you find this job?

yingwenlaoshi · Joined: 12 Feb 2007 Location: ... location, location!

That's pretty crappy. I would've taken one look at the apartment, made sure I had all my papers, and fled. Fk the flight money. But at least you got out. You can get flight money from another employer.

Sounds like you didn't have a visa yet. Is this true?

You got out. That's what's important. And thanks for posting.

Kimchieluver · Joined: 02 Mar 2005

I saw a job add from them about 4 years ago. It looked too good to be true so I didn't bother looking deeper into it. Back then it was supposedly brand new. They had a picture of the academy, it looked really nice.

kilgore_trout · Joined: 20 Sep 2007 Location: KOREA

[b][i]I found this job through a recruiter "Job in Korea," maybe I'll write a warning about those idiots later.

No, I didn't have my visa yet (luckily). However I had already fed-exed my documents to the idiots at "Job in Korea" so the school had my paperwork. The deal was that the school was going to pay for my ticket from the US and then also pay for my visa run to Japan. Their semester was already a week in, so they needed someone real bad. This really worked in my favor, as I hadn't actually even signed the contract yet.

I didn't actually have to do a runner, because I hadn't signed the contract I had a lot of pull in this no win situation. They couldn't really do anything to make me stay, but they did have all my documents and I was in the middle of no where with two huge bags, so I paid back the airfare in order to get the hell out of there ASAP. As I said before I probably shouldn't have, but I was jet lagged and really wanted to put as much distance between me and these people as quickly as possible.

No, I didn't talk to the Korean/Canadian teacher/director via email or over the phone. Big mistake. I am embarrassed to admit that I have been teaching on and off in Korea for the past seven years and had just gotten a little too comfortable. "Oh Korea, been there done that. How bad could it be?" Pride cometh before the fall . . etc.

Thanks for your good wishes. Since I was already here I had a chance to check out a couple of jobs, before I took my current one, which is as advertised and so far great.

Cheers.[/i][/b]

yingwenlaoshi · Joined: 12 Feb 2007 Location: ... location, location!

jiyull · Joined: 21 Mar 2008 Location: Seoul

hmm...
thanks for posting this... I just got an offer from their Suwon campus...
If this is a Christian English institution...I'm out..

SHANE02 · Joined: 04 Jun 2003

Good luck and thanks for the info.

cruisemonkey · Posted: Mon Apr 07, 2008 4:08 pm Post subject:

Wow... that situation sounds potentially worse than Prisoner of Wonderland!

At least you got out right away and didn't become a 'prisoner'. Good for you.

crescent · Joined: 15 Jan 2003 Location: yes.

Interesting, what the OP said about becoming too comfortable and not checking things.
A few years ago, I signed with a school that seemed awesome. I would have been the only teacher at a brand new school.
That's a newb mistake i shouldn't have made.

Long story short, my 'apartment' was a tiny room INSIDE the school. Barely enough room to sqeeze around the bed. My kitchen was the shared staff kitchen with old, broken furniture and appliances. My bathroom was the shared public bathroom near the elevators..
The kicker...since there was no shower in the public bathroom, they installed a water line on the OPEN BALCONY! Could you imagine winter? Nothing separating my bits from the frosty cold wind, but a thin piece of plastic pretending to be a wall.