Korean Job Discussion Forums

[thebektionary]

This recruiter was relentlessly pushing a Christian school on me. First I just politely declined without reason. I didn't want to get into any details about my ethnic/religious background. Then she kept pushing it and said she'd set up an interview so I told her "I'm not Christian so I'm not interested". Then she kept pushing it so finally I told her I'm Jewish. She finally gave up.

[Modernist]

[ThingsComeAround]

That's the flag that means "find a new recruiter"

[koreatimes]

Go in with a witch outfit for your interview.

[ThingsComeAround]

Or go in dressed like this

http://splitsider.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/marriedchildrenbomb.jpg

[thebektionary]

[jvalmer]

Are we talking about an actual christian public school?
You do realize at the middle school and high school levels not all, if not most, students of those schools are of the school's professed denomination.

Anyways, I found it pretty easy to just brush off their religious overtures. Just nod and smile.

[thebektionary]

Christian private elementary school. Like a public school just not public.

[Carbon]

[dgove]

You just made a huge mistake. I work at a private Christian elementary school. We get 7 weeks of vacation this winter with zero classes, it's a real vacation. Then, we have to teach 3 weeks of winter school, from 9am-12:30pm, when classes are over we go home, no friday class. In summer we have 5 weeks of vacation sandwiched around 4 weeks of summer classes, same schedule as winter. This rivals university jobs, and the pay starts significantly higher then my friend who works in a public school with same years of teaching in Korea. There are no desk warming hours, if we don't have class at that time, we aren't expected to be at school. We don't have class on Wednesdays. One of the four remaining days is only a half day. I won't give my school name, but I absolutely love it. Besides the work schedule, the teachers are awesome, the kids are awesome, the lunches are awesome. Not one complaint.

We aren't forced to go to Church, and I am rarely asked about religion, and have NEVER been pestered about it. If that school happened to be in Incheon, you just missed out big time on one of the best teaching jobs in Korea outside of Universities. Trust me, the private elementary schools are nothing like public schools. I was referred to this job by a friend in a Suwon Christian school, her job has similar benefits to mine. Anyways...good luck with the next school you find :wink:

[grant gerstners]

The expectations probably vary from school to school. You could ask to be connected to a former foreigner teacher at that school through email to get more information.

I talked with a foreigner teaching at a Christian school. He said there was no expectation nor pressure to get him to participate in any of the religious stuff.

He was there to teach English. Period. Said he was very pleased with the job.

Actually, it does broaden the range of teaching material if you can use bible content for teaching English and various videos and even movies. For example, MGM's movie The Ten Commandments has lots of teachable content (strictly talking about English here). I would never use any of that in a regular public school.

[dgove]

oh, and to the person that says there is forced attendance on Sunday services, of the three Christian schools I know co-workers at, none of them have said anything about that. Do you actually know any Christian schools? Actually, at two of the three I know (one is mine), the students have service one morning of the week for two hours, which means I can get an extra two hours of sleep that morning. Of course we aren't forced to attend a church service that we won't understand. Especially not on Sunday.

[cheolsu]

I agree with dgove. I'm a Muslim who has spent the last two years working at a private Christian elementary school. I'm leaving only because I don't want to work at an elementary school anymore. It certainly does rival a university (I've applied, unsuccessfully, to many university jobs that had worse conditions) for pay, vacation, work environment and other benefits.

I told the school's office administrator on my first day that I was Muslim (he asked about my ethnicity and religion) and while he has since left, I imagine that somebody somewhere must know, and yet nobody cares. About ninety percent of the students don't belong to the specific denomination that operates the school, and half aren't even Christian. There are Bible classes and voluntary (for students and non-Christian teachers) church services on the weekend.

Some Christian schools only explicitly hire Christians, while others don't care. I'm fortunate that this school was in the latter camp, the school the recruiter suggested might have been the same, speaking to other teachers might have made it clear. My recruiter assured me that they had placed other teachers there who weren't even remotely Christian, without any issues, and gave me the email address of a teacher to prove it.

[NohopeSeriously]

Well, I'm a Presbyterian Gyopo working at an English hagweon that only hires Presbyterian Christians. My job requirement was something like

[AlastairKirby]

I worked at a Catholic Elementary School for 3 years. The students and my co-workers were fantastic.

Averaged about 8 weeks holiday a year. No desk warming. The only reason I left was because I needed to better myself as a teacher. Bit of a dumb decision in hindsight. Just needed to pull my finger out.

I've already been offered another job. But I'd be more than happy to go back there in the future and see if I can give the school the teacher it deserves. They were really good to me and I feel ashamed sometimes for not rewarding their trust in me.

Stay true to your principles, but don't dismiss Christian schools out of hand.