Korean Job Discussion Forums

[frankhenry]

[thegadfly]

[stevieg4ever]

What about profiling of students op, have you thought about that? Hagwons would only want to take in the best English students so that maximises their score and in turn their ability to take in more high ability students. It then becomes a vicious cycle.

This would in turn alienate and ostracise the children deemed not good enough or incapable, leading to more stigmatization. The last thing Korea needs in my opinion is more stigmatization for those who, er hmm, do not fit in.

I know this sounds kind of crazy, but this is Korea, have you thought that some of the best students may actually be paid to attend the hagwon in order to affect the above situation and give the hagwon a good profile etc...

Also, it may not be the hagwon's are solely accountable for that students progress: what if some of the students have spent their summer vacations in the UK, US, Canada etc... Some of those students may be having one-to-one classes. The plausibilities are somewhat endless.

Also how would you differentiate between hagwons that require daily attendance for 2 hours a day compared with those that required attendance of 2 hours a week??

I don't think it is a particularly good idea at all. You haven't thought through all of the potential outcomes.

[frankhenry]

It's your turn OP.

[Catfisher]

800k to 1 mil a month? Are you sure. I know that the English immersion kindergartens charge 1-1.5 mil a month but that's for roughly 5 hours of all English teaching. I'm pretty sure the going rate for an English hogwan 3x a week is no more than 500k a month. But then, I've been doing BS at a PS for the last few years, so maybe I'm a little out of the loop.

[wooden nickels]

Most hogwons will charge around 250,000~280,000 won per month for students attending twice per week, 2~3 hours per day. This is for basic studies. Elementary~Middle~High School Students

[murmanjake]

Havent read the thread so sorry if this has been mentioned. But I think some sort of publication would be useful.

I always thought it'd be awesome to have a Hagwon guide for parents. Something a little more organized and unbiased than the forums where parents go to vent all their petty grumbles.

Something like a monthly newsletter? Or a more serious guide? a book?

Have someone visit the hagwons, go to those parent meetings, and make assessments of each hagwon's offerings. An evaluation of the actual classroom experience would be harder to obtain. Students, parents, and ex/current teachers would all be biased sources of information.

Maybe then a free newsletter. HAGWON TODAY! An advertising platform for hagwons, but requiring an English mission statement or something. I don't know. I've felt pretty hopeless about the hagwon situation lately. Even though my boss is great and my hagwon is pretty decent, I still feel like we should be doing better. Recently we've had an influx of students transferring from the local franchise and they've been outperforming all of our long-term students.

When I feel dissatisfied with the students' success, I start getting really serious about developing new programs(being the only foreign teacher, my opinion actually counts), and using different strategies/textbooks and whatever. Then I remember that these kids are in first grade, not 9th and are wasting away their childhood in these horrible english factories and I say "no homework!" to a round of cheers and applause.

[some waygug-in]

I agree that some tutors are not worth their salt, but I would venture a guess that on average, more students would benefit from private lessons than they would from attending hagwon classes.

Perhaps I am wildly wrong in this idea, but I don't think so.

The average student in a class of 10 - 12 gets maybe 10 minutes of interaction with the teacher during an hour class. (If even that much, and that's probably pushing it in most cases)

It's simply a fact.

Then you add all the other factors like disruptive students (who spoil things for everyone else), poorly chosen textbooks (wrong level for the students) disruptive bosses who expect to rush through a book at ridiculous speeds, well-meaning but bothersome parents who think they are doing Jr. a favor by demanding he be pushed up 4 levels overnight.

I would guess that there are a lot of hagwons that would be more effective if they let their foreign teachers teach and not be trying to micro-manage them all the time.

But I'm sure I'll get hung out to dry for posting this.

Anyway, have a great Christmas season.

[Catfisher]

[murmanjake]

Or the parent insisting that, despite the children being friends and approximately the same level, their child be placed in a higher level because shes obviously better at English.

The competition between parents through their kids has to be one of the most destructive things I've encountered working in a hagwon.

[Catfisher]

[some waygug-in]

I didn't mean to turn this into a complaints against hagwans thread. I just wanted to point out that there is probably no easy fix for them.

There are just too many reasons why hagwans are what they are.

The OP's idea of testing, while well-meaning, would just make things worse in my opinion.

Over the years, I could tell which students had private tutors and which ones didn't.

Generally speaking, those with access to private lessons were light years ahead of their counterparts. (though not always)