Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Globutron]

Bad day. Bad day. First bad day in 4.5 months. Women are so unprofessional. From finding the place perfect, to wanting to quit in a single day.

Vent vent vent.

[WadRUG'naDoo]

Do tell.

[Hyeon Een]

Yeah.. I want at least a 5 paragraph essay about this. It'll probably be most entertaining. (Though surely frustrating for the OP!)

[PatrickGHBusan]

I vote for at least 7 paragraphs

It wil also be fun to watch the nutjobs swarm on this one...

[Globutron]

ugh, well it's only about one sentence worth of info, but I'm good at tangents so I'll see if I can expand to seven. In order to make this count as one I need a couple more sentences. That will suffice.

So to transition from one to the next as one should, I arrived late by half an hour, since i was not told to come half an hour earlier for a meeting, just that there WAS a meeting. I then had to sit for a good 45 minutes listening to my friend get obliterated into submission by the korean teachers. They have always hated him and make any excuse to annihilate him. They also like to do it in meetings in order to humiliate him and degrade him like a dog that sh*t on the sofa.

After that passed they gave out some new rules, rules that we have been doing wrong for months, but they failed to actually mention it to us. Only now do they yell at us for doing what they never taught. I was actually showed incorrectly (how to fill in some daily forms in this example) by the previous foreign teacher. 4.5 months ago...

We were told that from now, every wednesday we have to prepare a 15-20 minute presentation on how we teach particular classes etc. I'm first. I wasn't aware I was to be given homework in this job, but I suppose it's acceptable, if only the biggest loathing of all existence for me is presentations. I'm like a rabbit in headlights, and I'm first.

After another 15 minutes of b*tching, to the point that everyone in the room on the left side is in agonizing hatred to the right side of the room, the boss goes 'so i'd like to take us all out next tuesday, everyone up for it?'. Then a bit more b*tching.

Towards the end of the day, I let students go 1.5 minutes early, as I have, as well as all other staff have done frequently since I got here months ago, to find that I get battered for doing so, the kids brought back out of the bus and back into their seats to watch me get yelled at, before leaving again. Told me I finished the book too early even though I specifically recall her saying 'I don't care about this book, just get it finished and out of the way quickly'. so we have to go through the book again.

8 seconds later we get attacked for leaving our food on the table in the food room, and the koreans arent maids to pick up after us, so we had to go and pick it up whilst being watched like kids being punished for ripping up toilet roll or something. Let me highlight again that we have done this constantly for 4.5 months, leaving it for the MAID to clean up.

Now it's all very well telling us what we do wrong - even if you don't tell us the rules in the first place, which they failed to do on all accounts, but to actually yell and degrade us for a first time offence, not even being aware that its an offence? Hell no.

The new teacher has been here one week and she is already looking for new work. Since the previous guy left, it has gone vertically downhill from wonderful to Keanu Reeves awful. Oops, that was more than 7.

whoever read this far, I applaud you. I'll add an additional note to actually make this post worthwhile...

What would YOU do? bearing in mind it has been wonderful until the last week where it's just gotten cold, bitter and nasty.

[Hyeon Een]

Sounds awful.

Here are my two solutions:

(1) Quit. Sounds terrible. Things may get better but they probably won't.

(2) Go out next Tuesday. Have dinner with the boss. Drink with the boss. Make the boss like you. Chill him out and make him relax. There is probably some crazy shit you don't know about. Make him like you if you can. Listen to his woes and sympathize. This will help if you decide to stay. If this does not appeal go with (1).

[Sector7G]

[eamo]

[Bloopity Bloop]

[sarahsiobhan]

[Globutron]

Ok to clear up. First, the boss is female.

We leave our 'mess' because it is and has been the cleaners job to do so ever since i've been here. or if it wasn't part of her job description, she has been doing so since the dawn of time, so I just followed suit. I don't leave crumbs and snacks all over the place, I trash the lot, other than dinner time, where I don't really have the equipment to go around spraying the surfaces and wiping them down other than my sleeve and spit.

She was obviously away this one day, which was enough to yell, rather than just tell us. And yes if we did something wrong they should have mentioned 4.5 months ago.

I complain about personal problems over professional because of witnessing what they do to my friend. They get very annoyed because he actually has opinions, and he comes up with ideas to improve books, and they are simply furious about that, even though they are often very good ideas.
He complains when he has to teach kids with books that are incorrect etc, and because of this they get annoyed and bite back at him, telling him to come in on saturday and do extra work, almost, if not definitely spitefully.
They also talk about him when he's not in the room, in a derogatory manner, and when he enters, they all get up and leave, sometimes giggling.

As for the presentation, yes I'm OK with it as I stated earlier, apart from the fact that I, personally despise the buggers. I'm not sure how to make 20 minutes of presentation on a 40 minute class, really.

It's good that she's trying to improve but she seriously needs to sort out the manner of the staff, and the relationship with my friend before she bothers, because her foreigners are just going to keep quitting and thus wasting a lot of money if not...

[Fox]

In my estimation, in the Korean workplace your inter-personal relationships completely trump your actual professional achievements. If they hate your friend as a person, nothing he does will ever be acceptable. Conversely, if you can somehow win them over on a personal level, you can get away with quite a bit if you're so inclined. Like you said, it's a totally unprofessional environment, but if you want to stick around you pretty much have to accept that and use it to your advantage. I think this is especially important given that as English teachers we either make substantially more money than our Korean co-workers (in the case of 학원 work), or make comparable salaries with far less actual responsibility (in the case of public schools, though even there, you're likely to get more total compensation than many of your co-workers). Jealousy can easily take root if you don't go on a charm-offensive.

Sorry to hear you guys are having a rough time, especially your friend. Working in such a deprecating environment must be very difficult.

[Senior]

If your friend is serious about teaching, he is wasting his time in a hagwon.

You can't criticize even the minutest thing in Korea, because Koreans will see it as a slight against the entire Korean culture, country and society. The first rule is....

"Never criticize, condemn or complain."

Doing these things will get you nowhere.

[DorkothyParker]

For what it's worth, I doubt the weekly presentations will last. Your boss will probably get tired after watching everyone's first presentation. She'll see things are being done right (or right enough) or it will slowly just lapse in general.

If it were me, and I'm glad it's not, I'd be stressed as all hell complaining too.

Also women in general are not unprofessional (as previously noted).

[Dragoon]

I knew this would happen. Whenever I read posts from noobs claiming how they're having the greatest time of their life. I just sit back and wait for the time when everything comes to a head..usually about the 4-6 month mark..which is right about where you're at.

Globutron...all I can tell you is...Welcome to the REAL Korea...you have my sympathy bro.