Korean Job Discussion Forums

[karmarooster]

i'm 6 months through my contract with CDI. So far my time in Korea has been enjoyable, despite what some say about Chung Dahm (I even get a week and a half vacation because some other teachers got the flu! ). the pay is great and always on time, and I have no complaints with my boss.

However there are some things that I don't like.

We have almost no holidays. We worked christmas eve and day, New years eve and day, got only 1 day for Korean new year, and children's day. Thus, since starting my job in November, I have worked Monday-Friday every week and had only 2 days off. I don't even care that we only get 7 days of vacation (which is actually 5 days, because you take off one Monday-Friday period, i guess they count saturday and sunday even though we don't work then). Or the fact that vacation isn't paid... i make enough money already. If we got all the normal holidays that public schools get, it really help out with the weekly grind, and give me a 3 day weekend occasionally to go somewhere.

My other problem is over-reliance on the text books. We have a text book, and we follow an exact lesson plan every single day. 30 minutes of prep is all that is required to teach 6 hours everyday. Not only is this somewhat boring after a while, but i get the feeling that the kids aren't learning when reading stories about "Spies of the Civil War" or "The Salem With Trials." many of them can't make even a basic sentence without saying "is" (ie, "Teacher I is goes to bathroom?" or "Paul is dies"). whenever there is a grammar concept that i understand with my limited Korean but they don't yet understand its corollary in english, i know there is a problem. "i want go the restaurant?" c'mon. i want TO go TO the restaurant. 식당에 가고 싶어요!

so..... I've been thinking about doing a second term after going back home for a few months when i'm finished with my contract. Here are my questions about Public School jobs:

1. What are the differences (if any) between SMOE, GEPIK, and EPIK? smoe = seoul, gepik = gyeonggi-do, and epik = the rest of Korea? other than location, are there major differences in working conditions, ie salary and teaching methods?

2. Is it true that every PS foreign teacher is attached at the hip to a korean teacher? Does this teacher ever change or are you stuck with the same one for an entire year? having read other threads, it seems that the relationship between foreign teacher and korean teacher varies widely. some are control freaks who teach the entire lesson and allow the foreign teacher to speak only when called upon, while others sound almost lazy and content to let the foreign teacher do all the work, while others have a good balance and work relationship. the opportunity to work WITH someone in an effective way is exciting, but the possibility of it being a shabby setup is disconcerting.

3. Do most school have only 1 foreign teacher? it sounds like most people are the only foreign teacher at their schools. are there any schools out there that have 2+ foreign teacher?

4. How much freedom do you have with the lesson material? is there a set curriculum for each organization (ie, textbook for SMOE, GEPIK, and EPIK? How much work do you have to do to prepare each day? i guess this question relates to the work relationship you have with your korean teacher. ideally, i would like to follow the text book on some days, while on other days include some repetitive speaking and writing drills that work on basic sentence structure.

5. How can vacation seemingly vary so much from school to school? One of the 'selling points' according to many people about public schools is that you get weeks of vacation in both the winter in the summer. however that i've also read some school have mandatory and even unpaid (?!) camps. if you work camps during vacation, when exactly do you get vacation, if at all? Also, what is your exact vacation schedule, ie how many weeks in the summer and winter? 2 weeks in the winter + 3 weeks in the summer + 15 days of holidays = about 800% more vacation that i get now, with the exception of swine-flu panics.

6. What is the average class size at public schools?

In summary, i'm interested in public school because it offers new challenges in the classroom, as well as more R+R. i'm not concerned about less pay... i think i would be making 1.8 mil + 200k for 1 year experience + 200k for English degree + 200k if i take a 100-hour TEFL course = 2.4. not bad, esp since since i think you get paid for vacation! can anyone confirm this?

My BIGGEST reservations about going to PS relate to the lack of control I have over my placement in terms of age level and location. I find that i enjoy teaching elementary students more than middle school because they are sweeter and cuter, generally try harder, and haven't turned into punks yet. i have never taught high school. I read on another thread that some people have requested elementary and specifically said they don't want middle school or vice versa and not gotten what they want. and yet others wanted the opposite and didn't get what they wanted, either!

Is there anyway to apply directly to a specific school without going through the network? there's a huge difference from, say, Bundang or Incheon and some raggedy old industrial city elsewhere in gyeonggi. i'm not sure that i could accept a contract without knowing what general area i would live and work in. "Seoul" is simply not specific enough... "Jamsil," or "Anyang" for example, would be enough.

Positive and Negative aspects of PS job thread: http://forums.eslcafe.com/korea/viewtopic.php?t=156689

hopefully several teachers at public schools can help me out a bit, and this thread can be helpful to newbies as well as hagwon teachers who are considering making the change.

Thanks in advance.

[Johnny_Bravo]

First of all, always remember the PRIME RULE:

everything depends on your individual school and its principal and vp

1) all depends on the individual school more than the regional Dept of Education. There are some differences re salary and vacation time between the three dept of education. Use the search function or google contract and the name of the dept.

2) typically you work with the same teachers year round. in March at the beginning of the school year, there is often some rotation, depending on the regional dept of education.

3) most have have one FT, a special school like a special foreign language school may have more.

4) See prime rule. At many schools you're thrown into a classroom the day after getting off the plane with no materials, curriculum or books and told to "teach" and this continues for the entire year. At other schools you are forced to follow a certain book or curriculum, etc. Generally speaking, FT's get significant control, but always revert to prime rule.

5) see prime rule. The biggest variation comes with whether you are forced to seatwarm when school is closed for everyone else and there is no camp. My sense is that the trend is changing to more and more schools requiring either camps or seatwarming. However, almost no matter what, you'll get your 2 weeks in summer and 2 weeeks in winter, that's the worst scenario.

6) BIG. Typically anywhere from 30-45.
If you apply thru SMOE, GEPIK, EPIK, they may place you anywhere. You're better off going thru a recruiter and applying to an individual school. Try to talk to current FT there when going thru the process so you can learn what you're getting yourself into.

pay scales vary with depts,, typically you get 100K extra for year of experience and toefl, not 200K


btw.. from what I've heard and observed, my sense is that being in elementary means you will be worked harder re: camps and you're more likely to come in and seatwarm. I also think you may have less control over your lessons/curriculum, but everything goes back to the prime rule.

[Yu_Bum_suk]

It's a very different ball game. Some love it; some can't stand it.

1. It's more down to the school(s) than the programme. SMOE, however, will not give you a LOR if you have to bail - an important consideration, as it could sink your Korea career if you want stay here long-term but run into an unacceptable situation at your school.

2. Not really. Usually you'll have to work with a variety of KETs, though how closely you work together really varies.

3. Yes.

4. Usually a lot. You really have to work hard if you want to stay interesting and supplement what the KETs are doing in any sort of meaingful way.

5. It can vary so much because while there are lots of vacation periods, the schools are still open year-round and stuff is happening at them. No matter where you go, you'll get a minimum 2 weeks, but this could easily increase to 10 if you're at, say, a vocational HS where little happens during the winter and summer break.

- You should be able to get ES if you request it. If that's what you really want, GEPIK might be your best bet.

[cruisemonkey]

[D.D.]

Can you handle going through the motions with apathetic students and co-teachers. If you can just go along for the ride and not speak up then you will enjoy. Also if you can handle people gossiping about you right in front of your face. Half covering their mouth with one hand as they talk about you. ( I always say I wouldn't know they were gossiping if they didn't try to cover their mouth and turn away.

Some really good students and vacations make it an ok job but chances of cool co-workers is not very high.

Desk warming is a big worry. A cool hogwan would trump an average PS.

[Xuanzang]

1. Anyang isnt in Seoul

2. New challenges? Academically? No, the curriculum is way too easy for some kids and hard for others. 5th graders still write the alphabet and 3 letter words in the "let:s write section". Classroom management and peer relations can be a challenge.

3. Class size? 25-35 kids at the elementary school level. I believe 3rd grade is capped but the other grades can go high or low.

4. Some Gangnam schools have more than one NSET. Same with the foreign language schools.

5. Vacation

Depends on your principal and the teacher is charge of the winter camp. Vacation can involve desk warming. It`s not hard but tedious.

[yeremy]

I'm going to reply bullet-style. So, I'm just going to answer your questions, from my point-of-view, quickly and succinctly. If I make any spelling mistakes, please pardon them.

1. The main differences is geography. You got that right. All three are large organizations but I see two other differences. A) GEPIK, I know for sure, has better Coordinators luke Dain Bae. EPIK does not have the same coordinator deal that GEPIK has. In my province the EPIK coordinator position is not funded as Dain Bae's and another woman, the last I knew, are in GEPIK. So we have to call and work through the EPIK manager, a bureaucrat. B) I have worked in both GEPIK and EPIK and in my opinion, GEPIK schools have higher standards. In particular, in GEPIK my co-teacher and I were told the NET should talk 80% and the KT 20%, that it was the "proper" ratio they discovered through their research. In my city, the KT' s have been given the "suggestion" that they should speak 60% of the time and the foreign assistant 40% of the time. Go figure.

2. No you're not attached to the hip with your co-teacher unless you dally with them and/or marry them. That has happened. You and I are not licensed teachers with Korean education degrees, so we are not regular teachers. In the elementary schools, schools will insist more on co-teaching than not. If a KT does not want to co-teach, it is difficult to enforce it unless you and that person have an open class coming up. In the high schools, I found last year that my KT's simply did whatever they wanted to do even though their English proficiency was generally much higher than elementary school KTs because they were "professional" English High School education majors.
My first co-teacher was a control freak. I learned to live with it. My second co-teacher lasted a month before she was allowed to transfer to be closer to her ill mother in another part of Gyonggi-do. I had looked forward to working and learning from her because she had a master's in English Education but she was gone almost before I knew it and I taught for a day without a co-teacher. My final GEPIK elementary school co-teacher had never taught English before, so I had to help her a lot. Her Japanese was also better than her English and we had some communication problems. she didn't like speaking in English outside of class, so our class preparation meetings were very short and to the point. This woman was wonderful in how she handled the students. She did not hit nor verbally intimidate them like my first KT did.

3. Most of the schools I know do only have one foreign teacher except the Foreign Language High Schools and those schools who have applied for the additional funds to hire another NET. It roughly costs about 50 million won, so I have heard, to hire-bring-train-house-emply a foreign English teacher from abroad.

4. If you're totally new to Korea et al-none. If you have a little experience, like you seem to have at CDI, just a little more. In general, the more experienced you are, the more they will let you have more input-as long as it works. The more value you can add to an English program will be to your benefit in the future. Many of my co-teachers are very curious to learn new and fresh ways to approach the different lesson themes in the elementary school curriculum and if you can come up with good, creative ways which get the students involved and talking, you will be given more rein to continue in that vein.

5. Vacation varies from school-to-school because each school has a different schedule from when they start to when their tests are, etc. In EPIK, when you take your vacation will vary from other NET's due to your schools's schedule, whether or not you have to do provincial camps, whether or not you have school camps to do, your contract, the local Education Office who may ask you to teach vacation classes for teachers and the whims and desires of your co-teacher, vice-principal and principal who has to sign off on it.

6. The average size varies. Last year, I had 35 to almost 40 high school students in each class. This year, I have about 32 students per elementary school class in both schools I work at. When I was in GEPIK, and I was at the same elementary school for three years, there were 35 to 36 students per class. When we had summer/winter camps, we often had 40 to 50 students at that time but it was not a big deal as those kids had competed to enter and they really wanted to be there.
I would not worry so much about the average class size but what will be more important for you is the mixed levels from special education students, to beginners, to low-high intermediates and even kids (Returnees) who spent a couple of years in an English-speaking country going to the local elementary schools because their father was studying or working there. This can be hard to deal with.

7. Placement issues-You will have little or no control over placement except with summer/winter English camps, where, hopefully you and your co-teacher will give level tests and only accept those of roughly the same English proficiency or use the interviews to create levelled camp classes for an away camp. The GEPIK city I used to work in did the former. We used to give oral interviews to the lucky students whose names were drawn from a bag ( or whatever container) and then they were placed in leveled classes. It wasn't a failproof system but it worked more often than not.

And, this is only my opinion. Take it as such. Good luck. Cheers.

[buddie3232]

I work at a rural Epik elementary school. I'm the 5th Native English Teacher to ever work in this town. I find the public school more relaxing work environment compared to working at a private school.

You can find recruiters that only have contracts in specific locations. You can also pick an elementary school. Now the issue becomes once they place you in a school and location the POE office can change that at anytime. If the POE office cannot fill positions for the area then you could be working in 3 locations with elementary, middle, or high school.

Epik:

1. I have a 4 week winter camp and a 1 week summer camp - No additional pay. No summer camp. Just desk warming.

2. It takes my VP 4 weeks to approve my vacation time. The reason is the POE office and the school cannot agree on the interpretation of my contract.

3. I get overtime every month ranging from 240,000 - 320,000 per month.

4. No co-teacher in the classroom. I teach with the homeroom teachers. Sometimes they help and sometimes they don't. I teach 98% of the lessons for each class.

5. I can use additional materials to supplement my class. I have complete freedom when teaching.

6. The school gives me additional funds for my afterschool class and provides me with supplies I need for my regular classes.

7. Brand new apartment with all new furniture.

8. I just get the contract vacation time.

9. I just ignore the teacher gossiping. I put on my headset listen to music and do my lesson planning.

10. Many classes canceled.

[Ukon]

Really good advice in this thread....

It really depends on your staff and school....hell, one of my co-teachers lets me teach the class on my own if I want...others might want to relegate you to a assistant role.

It's a roll of the dice, but I suppose any job is really(can't know if you'll get asshole bosses and dorky co-workers)....Your benefits and money however are rock solid.

[DorkothyParker]

For what it's worth, I went to the EPIK website a couple days ago and it says they are no longer accepting applicants accept those with suitable experience and certifications for some positions left in Seoul.
I do not know if they are still hiring through recruiters.

[alphakennyone]

I received an ad from a recruiter offering 3 public high schools. It seems like I would be applying directly to the high schools and not through GEPIK (this is in Bucheon).

What are the potential pitfalls from staying outside of the GEPIK/SMOE umbrella? The benefits seem nearly identical.

[buddie3232]

I spoke with a recruiter I have used in the past. He still has opening but just in the rural areas. He doesn't know why Epik is posting information on the website saying no application after June 3rd Only for Seoul.

He said yes positions are filling up faster than last year for the Sept positions.

He still has:

3 Elementary School positions
5 Middle School positions
3 High School positions

He is just a small recruiter for a specific POE. So if you are still looking for Epik public school positions. They are not filled up yet. Just ignore the Epik website. [/url]