Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Young FRANKenstein]

God~DAMN!! After reading you first three months there, I don't know why you bothered sticking around. I would have been out of there after one month, nevermind. Spitting on my car daily, privacy breached without apology, work hour agreement broken, and students swearing at me without penalty. Pfft... I'm gone. Find themselves another sucker to "teach" there.

[semi-fly]

While I don't want to argue this point you did sign a contract with the school; if you had some kind of verbal agreement with the principal or head Korean teacher that should have been added to your original contract to make it legally binding (verbal agreement are legally binding, but this is just a smart thing to do for all parties involved).

As for them wanting/needing you to sign additional stipulations to your contract that would simply be a matter you would need to discuss with your employer. You argued your point with your principal or head Korean teacher and he or she would not abide by the agreement made to you and you took action.

Considering your actions it would be best if you consider your next move carefully, even if you have an F-Series visa your action reflect poorly on those E-Series visa holders. While I am not saying you shouldn't look after your best interest (health and well-being) things could have ended better for both parties.

[Hank the Iconoclast]

[earthbound14]

[semi-fly]

[Ruraljuror]

"There is a sucker's born every minute" to quote David Hannum



Is he the Hannum from "Hannum and Bailey's Circus"?

Oh wait, I'm thinking of Barnum...

[SHANE02]

[tzechuk]

I would have done the same thing if I were the OP - especially if he had prior verbal negotiation and agreement with the principals before.

It happened to me, I got my stuff and walked out.

For those who say if the OP signed a 9-5 contract, he had to stay there 9-5, let me tell you that this is Korea we are talking about... contract is just a *general guidelines* of what the T&Cs should be and that's it. A recruiter told me that!

What makes you think that it's OK for the Koreans to screw us by not keeping to the contract 100%, but not OK when we do it to them?!

Stick to your principles, OP!

[TexasPete]

Why do people think this dude's in the wrong for quitting? Last i checked, we all had free will and signing a contract doesn't negate that or bind one slave-like to the employer (for those who think the latter is OK, you've been in Korea too long). If the issue here is quitting without giving any advanced noticed, that's a bit of weak sauce IMO, but it seems that in this country, that's the only way to end your job (pre contract expiration) here and be guaranteed not to be screwed over in some way, shape or form.

OP--kudos to you for putting up with that BS for so long as i certainly wouldn't have the patience for that.

[simone]

OP - good on you.

As far as getting it "added to the contract", good luck ever getting Koreans to sign anything non standard. They just won't do it.

In my job, sometimes I've not been given the resources to do a decent job of something, but told to "just go ahead" and do a half-assed job, and that the appearance of doing something is more imporatant than the results. (All this said tacitly, of course.)

When I respond asking them to sign that I will not be held responsible or penalized next evaluation period of a lack of results on this project, they will never sign it. Often, then, suddenly, after hearing the word impossible previously, my necessary resources will appear.

Can only do this once in a while though.

In the OPs case, I don't think anyone would be willing to take the responsibility to have authorized any changes to the OPs contract. Remember how so many Koreans are motivated by fear in their current jobs.

[TheChickenLover]

December - Looking forward to vacation.

I was tired. Not just physically tired but mentally tired. I was thinking about next March and was really ambivilent if I wanted to remain at the school. We were having our winter vacation coming and I really was looking forward to having a long few days of sleep.

I was taking the classes on a day-by-day basis. Getting through the frustrations and lack of support was done on an hourly basis. Once I went home, I tried to forget all the problems that I experienced that day until I came back the next day. The school would not provide textbooks for the classes, so I had to do alot fo photocopying everyday. I never really understood that because they seemed to have a lot of money for other things.

The school faculty were going to Seoul for a week-end as well as visiting one of the English villages there. I was told that I would be required to go. Not particularily interested in watching 50 people get sauced, I said that I wasn't available during that week-end (this was 3 days advanced warming btw ). "But you 'must' go, all the teachers want you to go" it was said to me. "I'm sorry to hear that, but I already have family commitments I can't break. It's also a little inappropriate to ask me 3 days in advance, 1 month would have been much easier". The teacher left, shortly later another teacher came to ask me if I was going to Seoul, how much they were looking forward to going drinking with me (I don't think I remember even having a long conversation with this person b4) and again I said no. A class later the VP came to me and asked me very gently and politely if I would come to Seoul with them. Again I said I couldn't because of family and family always comes first.

Faced with the reality he couldn't say it wasn't without looking bad, he agreed and said he understood. The principal came to see the teachers later & I heard my name spoken quite a few times. He looked dissapointed, but there wasn't really an option for them to force me to go. I said I wasn't available due to family commitments and they can't really go against that in this culture. Another teacher asked me if I really wasn't going. I said yes, and I asked him if she really wanted to go to Seoul, but she said she didn't. She had no choice because the principal was expecting all the teachers to go and they didn't want him to be angry with them.

The next week I was told by Mr. C that the principal had planned on introducing me to the English village so they could see me interact in the village setting. Pissed off inside but normal outside, I said it was too bad and I would need plenty of advanced notice b4 I can take off for trips like that. He understood my sentiments and after that nothing was said of it.

Exams were also coming. Since I teaching speaking/listening/pronunciation classes, I developed an oral exam where I get to interview the students on their speaking and listening skills. The format fo the exam was simple. It was based on 5 minutes, 2 minutes was reading 1 of 6 paragraphs provided well in advance so students could master their pronunciation and 3 minutes of free talking or what I termed "small talk" in which I could get them to speak a little and see how well they could understand me and how well I could understand them.

There was no fixed exam time. To accomodate the stress of some students, I had 1 week of exams where students could come to me at anytime to do their exam which would be recorded. My class period would be exam time and the students would be graded on the following criteria.

Effort - try to speak English or get a point across
Confidence - the impression that a person can speak English (Konglish is ok here)
Pronunciation - how clearly you can speak
Fluency - the use of easy to understand or natural English

This allows me to give everyone a mark and if a person can sit and have a quick 5 minute coffeeshop conversation and I can understand them, then I would consider my work achieved. It's very easy to tell if a person can speak English in about 10 seconds. 5 minutes is a *very* long time if someone has no confidence.

As the exam week was passing. I had some students, but others who just didn't want to say anything. A few students would sit for 5 minutes and literally not say a thing nor read the paper. I gave them a zero, to which they scoffed and demanded a higher grade. I said to many, "Sitting there isn't enough, you have to able to say something to get a mark higher than zero. You didn't say anything, so I can't give you a mark". Some protested, but since I record the exams with a recorder they tend to back off when I replay their exams. One particular student sat down with a smile and handed me a peice of paper. "If you want to speak with me, learn Korea". He then stood up and left. Later that day I mentioned to Ms. A that a student came to me with that comment and she had said she wrote it for him while laughing a little. It was surprising, and also very insulting to have a co-teacher actually helping a student insult a teacher and not try to encourage him to do better, but as the months passed by, she never really seemed to care about my classes and viewed me more as an annoyance.

In the end, around 30% of the students did my exam. I gave them zero, the rest had to receive a higher mark. What I also noticed to my shock was when students were writing other written exams, a strong majority would just write their name on the exam paper and sleep. Proctoring a class to my horror, 90% of some classes were sleeping within 8 minutes of the starting exam time. The KT's didnt' seem fazed at all, it was just another week of exams at the school when this happens normally here.


As exams passed, I said my goodbyes to teachers and went home. I spent 10-12 hours a day sleeping and felt increadible again. I could spin rollers, work out and regain my sense of health. I became happier. I was free for a few weeks of the school and very much looking forward to it. That is, until January.

Chicken

[ED209]

[PGF]

[crusher_of_heads]

[crusher_of_heads]