Korean Job Discussion Forums

[OTCIXS]

Greetings all!

Last night I was lurking around and saw a thread about some schools asking about transcripts. What exactly does the school/recruiter use the transcript for? I understand one aspect of it is to verify the degree, but do they make decisions based on grades or GPA? The only reason I ask is because as of now (a little more than halfway through my BA) all my credits are pass/fail. Many of them are military credits while others are certificates and CLEP tests. I don't have a GPA!

I'm going to a legit school (Thomas Edison State College) but my current schedule (which will be the same until my enlistment runs out) greatly restricts my ability to attend any sort of class, whether it be online or B&M.

I know it's sort of an unorthodox approach to getting a degree, but does anyone see me having any issues?

[earthquakez]

I believe transcripts are irrelevant here in English teaching employment as a rule.

Why? 1) The E-2 visa regs have changed so you do not need them to get a working visa.

2) If it's good enough for Immigration it should be good enough for a two bit hagwon that pays you less for hours put in (including having to hang around there between classes) than you get for working in the service industry back home.

3) Most jobs in Korea are entry level. That is why some employers proclaim "No experience needed!". Unfortunately they then demand all sorts of extras despite the fact that they have lowered the bar of experience from the beginning.

4) You should not have to show that you received a fail because you didn't make it to all of your American history classes or whatever to a hagwon. The kind of work there is not based on anything you studied at university.

5) Even in the cases of the better jobs (and there aren't that many in Korea) I think it is not necessary to show an academic transcript unless you claim in your cv that you studied Linguistics, for example, if they are asking for somebody with that on their subject list.

6) Following on from 5), among other high end jobs I taught at a couple of colleges in Japan and Taiwan, and worked as a corporate English trainer at two of the biggest name Japanese companies.

NEVER was I asked in any of my interviews to provide my future employers with academic transcripts. It was obvious to them that I could not have accumulated the job experience already on my cv without being highly literate in my native language and without being successful at jobs to do with English and English teaching.

7) My own academic transcripts have nothing but Distinctions and Credits. Yet I do not volunteer them to would be employers. They have nothing to do with my successful job record.

I have friends who are highly intelligent and have mediocre academic records because of failure to withdraw on time from subjects and heavy workloads to earn money to pay for their way through university.

( I don't know why there is a 'cool' icon here and I can't edit it out.) The following is point 8 but a smiley keeps popping up.

Koreans have the misconception that anything not in the 90s or a perfect 100 percent score shows failure on an academic record. They have no idea of our assessment and grading systems. I went to one of the best unis in my country and no teacher of mine there even gave anybody 100 percent for a Humanities subject.

Our methods of assessment make it much more difficult to get the high scores Koreans can owing to their favoured method of multiple choice, notion that there are always set answers to set questions, and less than rigorous exams for many subjects and disciplines.

That's the last reason why it's pointless to show them academic transcripts because they regard getting 80 percent for essay based test assessment from tough examiners as somehow mediocre.

Nobody should have to show academic transcripts to Koreans unless it's a uni job that wants to make sure you've studied the subjects they want you to teach where the job is specifically about certain subjects.

[ttompatz]

[Junior]

[earthquakez]

Where's your avatar from? Are these women FARC rebels in Columbia?

[OTCIXS]

Awesome, thanks for the answers

Now I just need to finish up my degree, get a TESOL cert, and hope for the best....oh, and finish my enlistment