Korean Job Discussion Forums

mysterious700 · Joined: 10 Mar 2006

What is the average age of public school teachers in Seoul? I have done countryside schools for a couple of years. I want to move next year but I want to know if there is any age discrimination by SMOE. I am in my 30's. I am also curious as to if they discriminate against some types of English speakers. I am from Canada; so I prob wouldn't have problems there.

mysterious700 · Joined: 10 Mar 2006

Also, is it getting more difficult to get hired by SMOE?

oldfatfarang · Joined: 19 May 2005 Location: On the road to somewhere.

You might want to reconsider working for SMOE, after you've asked your interviewer about the summer 'camps.'

I had the pleasure of teaching at a SMOE camp:
- 14 + 1/2 hour days
- made to eat in the cafeteria with the kids (threatened with 'problems' for
not doing so),
- locked in dorms at night (with students),
- refusal to allow teachers to leave camp after work
- teaching for 19 days straight. Finally, they gave us 1 day-off when another group of camp teachers arrived (with better conditions).

Oh, and let's not forget:
- sharing accommodation, 2 to a room that was barely bigger than a cupboard.
-Dorm aircon that only lasted 1 hour
- Oh, food poisoning. Who could forget seeing your colleagues running, literally.

And the real kicker, at day's end, when you're really tired, and want to simply get away from kids:

- compulsory daily attendance at pointless 'top down' 'meetings' (8pm)where supervisors read 'instructions' to the NETs.

Yep. Go ahead and apply for SMOE. Oh, the fond memories.

Epicurus · Joined: 18 Jun 2009

oldfatfarang · Joined: 19 May 2005 Location: On the road to somewhere.

This was on a standard SMOE (2007-098) contract. But I was really suckered by my school (and I should have known better).

First, my school asked if I wanted to do a camp. I asked if the camp was live in, or 5 days, and my handler lied and told me: "I'm sure it's M-F." So I said yes, as SMOE offered 5 extra days vacation for camp work (more about this below).

So I applied for my normal summer vacation (including the extra camp bonus days, and some extra days as well). The principal kindly approved all the extended vacation. I was laughing - but I should have know better.

Once I'd booked/paid my flights, and made vacation arrangements - we were taken to the district office for a camp 'meeting.' We were told about the camp (but, funnily enough, they didn't say anything about locking us in at night, and they also didn't say we'd have to be with kids 24/7 (on threat of 'problems' if we didn't comply).

At the end of the meeting, we were given a special camp contract and asked to sign it. I was very unhappy about the extra money (about $3 a hour extra), and the long work days, but I couldn't refuse, as I'd paid for flights/made arrangements that included the extra camp bonus vacation days.

The camp was a total, hideous nightmare.

And the real kick in the teeth was the extra 5 days SMOE gave us for working the camp - weren't extra days at all. They were just the saturdays and sundays we had to work, and one national holiday that fell in the camp period.

So I got done, like a dog's breakfast. My fault for not being my usual cynical self. This camp left a very nasty taste in all the teachers mouths, and it destroyed my relationship with my school and the SMOE POE.

This was a classic case of why western teachers become distrustful of the Korean way, i.e., lying (through ommission) is common business practice in Korea. Lying through ommission never works with westerners - and it's a classic case of the disparity in the concept of 'honesty' held in our disparate cultures.

winterfall · Joined: 21 May 2009

AgentM · Joined: 07 Jun 2009 Location: British Columbia, Canada

Duly noted, thanks for the heads up fatfarang. I'm never going to sign on with SMOE, and public schools in general don't sound all that appealing to me.

oldfatfarang · Joined: 19 May 2005 Location: On the road to somewhere.

Epicurus · Joined: 18 Jun 2009

once again oldfatfarang, I am confused:

oldfatfarang · Joined: 19 May 2005 Location: On the road to somewhere.

[quote="Epicurus"]

smee18 · Joined: 24 Mar 2009 Location: Korea

I work for SMOE, and I've never heard of these camps, so thanks for the heads up. Though, after the debacle that was the disorientation - not allowed to leave, mandatory activities scheduled till 9pm or some such thing (all of which exceeds the bounds of the contract, so I really don't know how they enforced it ... we should have all told them to stick it!!) - I would never sign up to do anything additional with SMOE.