Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Mosley]

Long-timers here might remember me as an unabashed booster and proud alumnus of Japan's superb JET Programme, which has been going strong for over 20 yrs. now. It's amazing that in Korea, public school contracts and the bizarre immigration hassles have been regressing, not progressing. In short, there's even more dissatisfaction w/public school jobs in Korea than there was just a few short yrs. ago. And for good reason. Look what a new JET ALT, by contrast, gets:

-first visa is free of charge
-you don't pay for a flight and fight for reimbursement later. You're just given a (first class!) ticket.
-21 days vacation PLUS Japanese holidays PLUS any freebies your base school decides to give you.
-An orientation at a five star hotel.
-rate of savings comparable to that of PS teachers in Korea.
-a professional support network that is there to serve YOU.
-yes, you must supply a CRC but no horsehockey about apostilles, etc.
-if a successful applicant, you must submit to a medical but guess what? It's done in your hometown by your family doctor!


I could go on & on but I think you get the idea. At this point, there is always some joker(insert huffy-puffy, hissy-fit voice of a rejected JET applicant who's likely teaching in Korea or at a non-JET job in Japan) who comes up w/this gem: "Well! JET is set up to make the foreign teacher happy! It's done on purpose!! They want the barbarian to spread the word on how great Japan is!"

I won't go into the psychology of the person who would actually offer this as a criticism. It should actually be held up as THE model. Look at Korea: more and more PS NTs are getting POed as never before and the irony is that it's in a culture that's obsessed about foreigners saying how great Korea is!! And yet, right across that little pond, there's the model of how to please the barbarian....

[Sadebugo1]

[ippy]

Also JET alumni. Also teaching PS in korea, so lets edit one or two things:

1. No first class ticket. That was done away with years and years ago.
2. My medical cost over a 100 quid since you have to have an x-ray. It wasnt cheap.
3. Subsidised accomodation is pretty much luck of the draw. I was paying 12,000 yen a month, my best mate (also a jet in the city next to mine), was paying 60,000. I know because he wouldnt stfu about how he couldnt save money.
4. JET is for the most part the stuff of human tape recording. I was unlucky, i landed a proper placement where i had to do my own plans and lead my own classes, but how i longed for the human tape recorder. In korea it seems to be the other way around.
5. The pay is WAY better on JET. And yet im saving just as good here (without trying). Guess it balances out then.
6. I get 34 days holidays here, plus national holidays. Musnt grumble. Also if im sick im literally ordered to use sick leave and not my paid leave.

I love JET. If JET let me back on (and had a placement in hokkaido), id be there in a heartbeat, but well, even with the recent attacks on our pay and conditions, korea is still pretty much comparable. Plus i like the students here waaaaaaay better.

[reactionary]

I'd heard rumors that the JET programs were being scaled back and there were relying more on the "ALT Dispatchers." Conditions for those gigs are horrendous...something like 200,000 yen a month without housing (perhaps even less, 190,000?), working multiple schools, being forced to "rent" a car to commute to said schools, etc.

You can't really deny that the JET program is a bit of a PR tactic if the alternative (read: future) system manages to be worse than EPIK/SMOE. I really think you have to include those dispatchers when comparing the two countries' public school systems.

And yes, I didn't make the cut for JET when I applied my senior year. I'm not gonna hate on it though, I would've loved that job if I could've gotten some of the sweet placements I know some people got (met a guy who was the JET in my Kyoto/Osaka suburb, another one in downtown Kobe - yeesh).

Hell, I even got rejected by AEON after 2 years experience in Korea. I guess Koreans like hiring me more than the Japanese do.

[ippy]

[ippy]

PS.

Kyushoku.

[reactionary]

[dirving]

[ippy]

[Easter Clark]

JET's hiring standards are set quite a bit higher than EPIK or GEPIK, right?

[reactionary]

[ippy]

[Mosley]

Good comments from all.

I didn't know the business class ticket had been scrapped, but what the hey....

As for the medical, I don't remember it costing me anything(coming as I do from the land of socialized medicine). In any event, a lot better to have it done at home with no threat of putting your keester on the next flight out if some Korean doctor doesn't like you!

As some have pointed out: make no mistake-applying for JET is a long, tedious and drawn-out process. It's kinda like a test to see if you really want the gig. If you make it...it's worth it.

I got accepted on Apr. 1 for the July 21 Tokyo Orientation of that year. Everything was professional & extremely well organized.

The good news about teaching EFL in Japan is that JET is still going strong. The bad news is that the vast majority of non-JET jobs, over the past dozen years, have gone to rat s---. Yes, even EPIK is better! Dispatch cos. have been the most disturbing trend. A recent ad was recruiting for ALTs(and you won't be living the easygoing life of a JET ALT, believe you me) with a TOP rate of 240,000! And you pay your own airfare over. And you're advised to bring over 3K for "start up costs"! But as long as Japanese employers can find Westerners willing to sign up for that kind of abuse, contract conditions will remain as they are....

[sarbonn]

Isn't there also an age limitation with the Jet program? Could have sworn I remember reading that (which is why, I believe, I didn't pursue it back then...think that was the reason).

[Mosley]

Yes. If you're 40 or over at time of application, you're 99.9 % sure of being rejected.

It's a policy of JET I disagree with. Hell, I wish they had a MINIMUM age (say, 26) to help keep out spoiled brats w/a sense of entitlement(yes, JET gets them).