|
Korean Job Discussion Forums
"The Internet's Meeting Place for ESL/EFL Teachers from Around the World!"
|
| View previous topic :: View next topic |
| Author |
Message |
cfile2
Joined: 28 Jun 2010
|
 Posted: Wed Jan 04, 2012 8:34 pm Post subject: |
 |
|
| northway wrote: |
Also, I guess her Korean ain't too hot:
| Quote: |
| On the other hand, there is little written by foreign teachers about the irresponsible behaviour of many of their fellow Weygookin � the all-encompassing term Koreans use to refer to any citizen of an English-speaking country. |
|
I noticed this too. Annoying. |
|
| Back to top |
|
 |
shifty
Joined: 21 Jun 2004
|
| Posted: Wed Jan 04, 2012 9:01 pm Post subject: |
|
|
The writer of the article is a prime candidate for one day becoming a runner herself.
She whines about "the long hours, unapproachable boss, fighting for exact dates of a too-short vacation."
The day some real runworthy abuses kick in she'll become a foghorn and go running for the hills.
She tacks on at the beginning of the article all the bad elements in a few short throwaway lines. These "reasonable man" tactics are to gain credibility so that the reader may become ripe for the slaughter when she delivers her main thrust.
To my mind, anyone who can't see through this article is criminally dimwitted and as atonement should tear up his degree. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
jpe
Joined: 15 Aug 2011
Location: Seoul, SK
|
| Posted: Wed Jan 04, 2012 9:25 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| Yeah, 2-10pm is "not ideal." Because I only get to sleep in everyday and get drunk every night if I want. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
eamo
Joined: 08 Mar 2003
Location: Shepherd's Bush, 1964.
|
| Posted: Wed Jan 04, 2012 9:49 pm Post subject: |
|
|
All these issues can be traced back to one source...............the regulations concerning issuing visas to teach English in Korea don't stipulate any qualifications or experience in teaching English.
If I was running a business and I hired workers who had absolutely no qualifications or experience in what my business was about, and didn't bother to give them any training or guidance, and then plonked them thousands of miles from home in an alien culture, and had them work 50 weeks of the year, shouldn't I expect some staff issues? |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
jdog2050
Joined: 17 Dec 2006
|
| Posted: Wed Jan 04, 2012 10:16 pm Post subject: Re: Foreigner lays herself and some issues on the line |
|
|
| Draz wrote: |
What's "off" is that you'd think someone with an MA would be a little brighter than this.
| Stout wrote: |
Of course my job is not perfect. The working hours are far from ideal � 2pm until 10pm. Vacation time is short, only 10 working days per year, which have to be booked and fought for months in advance. Teaching 30 hours per week can also be difficult and exhausting at times.
On the plus side, my boss is decent and fair, if sometimes a little unapproachable. My Korean co-workers are friendly and incredibly helpful, my accommodation is good, the school is new and well-equipped and I have never been paid late � once even receiving an advance from my boss when I was a little strapped for cash.
But even if there weren�t all these pros to balance out the cons |
 Being paid on time is not a "pro". It's part of the bare minimum anyone should expect from their job.
An example of a real pro would be if you didn't have to fight for your contractual vacation time. Wait, no it wouldn't. That also fits under the minimum that should be accepted and this job doesn't even have that.
| Quote: |
| In my opinion, having worked at the school for nearly two years now, one answer is that we are hiring the wrong sort of teachers. |
People who want to be paid a fair wage for their work? People who won't compare their jobs with other people and figure out how much they are being short-changed? People who have more intelligence than misguided loyalty? You'd have to be dumb as a post or just very very timid to stay at a job like this for longer than a year. |
That was my exact problem with this post. She trots out the most banal things as though they were bigger pros than having to give 4 MONTHS of notice for a frakkin 10 day vacation. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Stout
Joined: 28 May 2011
|
| Posted: Wed Jan 04, 2012 10:31 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| Let's not be too hard on the writer. 'Tho she may be a bit princessey and may have to face the day when she's had it with her hakwon, she does bring up some points in the article that obviously need to be addressed by both sides. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
r122925
Joined: 02 Jun 2011
|
| Posted: Wed Jan 04, 2012 10:32 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| eamo wrote: |
All these issues can be traced back to one source...............the regulations concerning issuing visas to teach English in Korea don't stipulate any qualifications or experience in teaching English.
|
Just because the visa requirements are relatively low doesn't mean the hagwons have to accept anyone that can get a visa. They could choose to hire people with more experience or qualifications or whatever, but it seems that most hagwons are perfectly happy with the never-ending stream of 22 year-old newbies. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
eamo
Joined: 08 Mar 2003
Location: Shepherd's Bush, 1964.
|
| Posted: Wed Jan 04, 2012 10:46 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| r122925 wrote: |
| eamo wrote: |
All these issues can be traced back to one source...............the regulations concerning issuing visas to teach English in Korea don't stipulate any qualifications or experience in teaching English.
|
Just because the visa requirements are relatively low doesn't mean the hagwons have to accept anyone that can get a visa. They could choose to hire people with more experience or qualifications or whatever, but it seems that most hagwons are perfectly happy with the never-ending stream of 22 year-old newbies. |
Of course, you're right, but my main point is that the government keeps the visa requirements intentionally low so that the public and private teaching sectors can be sure of a plentiful supply of cheap foreign teachers. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Unposter
Joined: 04 Jun 2006
|
| Posted: Wed Jan 04, 2012 11:11 pm Post subject: |
|
|
I thought Draz hit this one on the head. There is something not quite right about the writer of the "blog." For someone with a background in human rights, she sure doesn't seem to know one.
And, while I completely agree with the sentiment that hakwons (and any business or even school) get what they deserve - I mean it is their responsibility to hire and train their employees and if they are having staffing issues they should not look any farther than themselves - but I don't understand why people get so worked up about qualifications. I mean hakwons aren't even schools - they are businesses. I don't see why the government should do more than to suggest some basic hiring criteria and then leave it to the business to decide.
And, this whole idea that the other side is not talked about as if this was a Western person's problem rather than an individual problem. We tell people on this board time and time again - don't look at things like it is a Korean problem, it is an individual problem. But, all of sudden, it is okay to say, well, look at Western people, what's wrong with them, when they don't like their job, they just quit and don't give notice. NO!!! Some people do that and some people don't. It is an individual circumstance.
I don't know how wide-spread this issue is. But, if it is as wide-spread as the blogger suggests that I think it should be telling any sane person that their endemic problems with the system here (such as the nature of hiring, visa's and the way contracts are done here - and my guess at the lack of cross-cultural communication that is taking place) and not some moral failure or weakness on some individual's part.
Again, I don't know to what extent this is really a problem, but if it really is a problem, nothing in this blog in any shape or form is going to deal with the root problems that are causing it.
So, Draz hit it on the head, the writer offers nothing and makes herself look silly, even uneducated, in the process. And, I would put Stout and anyone else who supports such dribble as to what could possibly be gained from such nonesense? |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Steelrails
Joined: 12 Mar 2009
Location: Earth, Solar System
|
| Posted: Wed Jan 04, 2012 11:11 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| Stout wrote: |
| Let's not be too hard on the writer. 'Tho she may be a bit princessey and may have to face the day when she's had it with her hakwon, she does bring up some points in the article that obviously need to be addressed by both sides. |
That's what was off...She was too perky, too...happy.
I want my opinion writers snarky and cynical. I want them to make me feel like I'm better and and smarter than the glorified primates that are my opposition, like the great political writers out there. I need them to remind me that I'm happier on my computer reading their rant than I am out in the sunshine. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
TheUrbanMyth
Joined: 28 Jan 2003
Location: Retired
|
| Posted: Wed Jan 04, 2012 11:39 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| eamo wrote: |
| r122925 wrote: |
| eamo wrote: |
All these issues can be traced back to one source...............the regulations concerning issuing visas to teach English in Korea don't stipulate any qualifications or experience in teaching English.
|
Just because the visa requirements are relatively low doesn't mean the hagwons have to accept anyone that can get a visa. They could choose to hire people with more experience or qualifications or whatever, but it seems that most hagwons are perfectly happy with the never-ending stream of 22 year-old newbies. |
Of course, you're right, but my main point is that the government keeps the visa requirements intentionally low so that the public and private teaching sectors can be sure of a plentiful supply of cheap foreign teachers. |
So why are they changing it and upgrading the requirements? |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
eamo
Joined: 08 Mar 2003
Location: Shepherd's Bush, 1964.
|
| Posted: Wed Jan 04, 2012 11:50 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| TheUrbanMyth wrote: |
| eamo wrote: |
| r122925 wrote: |
| eamo wrote: |
All these issues can be traced back to one source...............the regulations concerning issuing visas to teach English in Korea don't stipulate any qualifications or experience in teaching English.
|
Just because the visa requirements are relatively low doesn't mean the hagwons have to accept anyone that can get a visa. They could choose to hire people with more experience or qualifications or whatever, but it seems that most hagwons are perfectly happy with the never-ending stream of 22 year-old newbies. |
Of course, you're right, but my main point is that the government keeps the visa requirements intentionally low so that the public and private teaching sectors can be sure of a plentiful supply of cheap foreign teachers. |
So why are they changing it and upgrading the requirements? |
You mean criminal and medical checks? They don't relate to professional requirements, which is what I'm talking about. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
nathanrutledge
Joined: 01 May 2008
Location: Marakesh
|
| Posted: Thu Jan 05, 2012 12:07 am Post subject: |
|
|
| Steelrails wrote: |
| PatrickGHBusan wrote: |
| Steelrails wrote: |
| Something about this article seems a little off... |
Reads more like a blog post than an actual article but whats "off" about it? |
I think that's the start of it...Not enough citations of studies or facts or whatnot.
As an opinion-based slice of life, I guess its alright, but it just lacks a certain...gravitas.
That and there' something just...I'm sure it will hit me...
I'd say that treating your employees well is just as likely to work out for an employer as sucking up to the boss is likely to work out for the employee.
That is to say, sometimes it works, but the bottom line is that people are generally selfish and no one is too loyal in this industry.
Hagwons could do everything well and you'd still get a lot of the clownery that happens with NETs. Likewise, NETs could be perfect and the Hagwons would just walk all over them. |
The quotes around the text message from her American co worker is what got me. No single American ever, in the history of America and mail/post, would refer to a mailbox as a letterbox. If a person is sloppy with quotes, that's a big red flag for me.
Then the ending of it bugs me. Saying "we" and then "contented foreigners"... One, I couldn't care less about people running from hakwons. I don't work for one, I have experience, I have more than a BA - hakwon monkeys and I are not in the same group. What they do only has a passing effect on me. Second, I'm not a child. I can easily speak for myself, and I don't need this woman to speak for me.
Echoing the sentiments of others on here, it's a honeymoon/newbie/holier-than-thou rant. Big deal. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Harpeau
Joined: 01 Feb 2003
Location: Coquitlam, BC
|
| Posted: Thu Jan 05, 2012 12:19 am Post subject: |
|
|
It's an intersting article, but there are a few things that I have a problem with.
It's not ESL, but rather EFL - English as a Foreign Language. If she can't even get this right, how can I take the rest of the article seriously?!!
As a counselor who has been working in Seoul for over 11 years, I've been informed by many clients on why they had to leave the country. They include:
Sexual abuse, rape, stalking, creepy behavior from both bosses and coworkers, culture shock, loneliness, isolation, anxiety, depression, death in the family, wanting to get back together with an ex (back home), a great job offer (back home), an impulsive busride to the airport, a very messy break-up with a partner, needing a proper vacation, paranoid schizophrenia, psychotic break, boredom, etc.
There are many reasons why one may choose to do a midnight run from a hogwan. I really wonder why they don't happen more often. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Unposter
Joined: 04 Jun 2006
|
| Posted: Thu Jan 05, 2012 12:46 am Post subject: |
|
|
Curiouser and Curiouser, if you follow the link and read the article, there is room for comments. The one comment left discusses the trials and tribulations of one "Dr." David Thiessen in surprisingly intimate detail. Coincidence? I think the comment screams something.
Good luck with this one... |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
|
|
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum
|
|
FAQ
Search
Memberlist
Usergroups
Register
Profile
Log in to check your private messages
Log in
