Korean Job Discussion Forums

[big_fella1]

Just saw a university job ad where they said they would only count hagwon experience at half the time and I am wondering why.

How can teaching 30 hours a week with 10 days break during a year be equal to half of teaching 15 hours a week for only 30 weeks a year?

Some may argue that teaching at a university is a higher standard of teaching than in a hagwon, but in my experience this is not necessarily the case.

[plchron]

maybe it is a typo and they meant public school. We only 'work' about half the time we are here.

[edwardcatflap]

[Skippy]

The person/group/school doing the hiring sets the standards. To them they consider hagwon teaching as different from public school or other.

Their gain or loss. Some skills do not transfer - kindy is different from University. Your option is to sell yourself with other skills. So if your hagwon time counts as half - try to show them it is more then that. If for example you taught adult hagwon or you taught high level children. So it to them. That is what cover letters and resumes are for.

The job market is getting a little tough. So some places can be choosier.

The school may also be doing this so they can set wage levels. Also by stating it they can also circumvent whiners who think they have been done hard upon.

[thegadfly]

Actually, you should consider it fortunate that hakwon experience counts at all -- and this practice is common in my home country (USA). In-state, out-of-state, out-of-country, and different levels count as different types of experience. When I taught high school in the US, my US university teaching did NOT count toward the "experience" portion of my salary calculation, whereas ALL of my hakwon time in Korea DID count...but my out-of-state teaching experience was capped below my actual experience, and my time with adult education programs in the US was excluded.

A straight-up "2 years in hakwon = 1 year experience pay bump" is fair and reasonable, and easy to understand.