Korean Job Discussion Forums

Aglamesis · Joined: 06 May 2003

Hey there,

I just thought i'd throw in my opinion about the school i've been working at for almost a year now. It's a small, privately owned school in Mok-Dong. They are going to be looking for some new foreign teachers soon. It's been a great place to work. I was initially concerned when i read around this site before i came to Korea, but there were absolutely no problems with my fellow teachers or the administration. The people there are very nice and helpful. They do as much as they can to not let the business side of things infringe upon the students' learning. That's a lot more than i can say for other schools around. In fact, i'd stay on for another year if i hadn't chosen to travel and return home for a while.

I believe one or two positions will be opening up at the end of August. I couldn't find any information about the school when i looked on this site before leaving the US. I hope this will let anyone looking know a bit about it. The school has treated me very well and respectfully, so i hope this post will serve to get them another good, qualified teacher in return. If you have any questions, i'll try to respond timely, or forward them to the academic director.

you can email me at my address "aglamesisinkorea"
it's a hotmail address (trying to avoid spam by not explicitly writing it)

enjoy,
jon.

marista99 · Joined: 05 Jun 2004 Location: Incheon

1) you're really not supposed to advertise job openings here
2) more people will read about your school if you post it in the job information journal (there's a link at the top of every page on this forum)

Gosp · Joined: 13 May 2004 Location: 85% There.

Personally I enjoy it when people post about their experiences [good experiences, preferably] on this forum. And if there's a job opening or two to be filled at a great school, so much the better. Yeah, the MODs don't like it when people post job openings on the regular forums, but so what. This post may be gone before anyone has a chance to complain about it.

prosodic · Joined: 21 Jun 2004 Location: ��

The Den · Joined: 26 Jan 2003

I had a post deleted a while back and I was a bit upset by it. If this is supposed to be a job discussion why can't we pass along the good jobs to people who are here already. (Oh I know, because this site charges 75.00 US for an ad, What a ripoff) As for recruiters that is always a risk but for me who is just a simple guy who is trying to do a favour for his school because they did me a favour by trying to find them a teacher. Anyway whatever. I still have not been able to find a teacher though.

prosodic · Joined: 21 Jun 2004 Location: ��

prosodic · Joined: 21 Jun 2004 Location: ��

How has this post lasted this long? It's been up for nine hours. Where are the MODs? Where's Hardy Boy?

The Den · Joined: 26 Jan 2003

Yes. where are the mods?? BTW I have no problem charging hagwon owners and recrutiers 75.00 to put up a legitimate ad. I am talking about using this JOB forum as a tool to network with other teachers to make it easier to find quality jobs. There is the job information journal but it is vague and once the person has posted their information that job is gone anyway. Why do I want to read about so and so who had a positive experience 6 months ago. Especially after his job has been filled.

When I first came across this site in 1997 it was free to post ads. I even posted one or two for one of my hagwon bosses. No problems. I left ESL for awhile and came back to it last year and lo and behold 75.00 to post an ad. I also see recruiters bypassing the rules by posting a whole bunch of jobs in one ad. Power to them I guess. BTW have you noticed the quality of the ads has really gone down. Anyway that is my opinion. You can argue against me I do not really care but I will stand my ground and still say that 75.00 per ad is a ripoff.

oneiros · Joined: 19 Aug 2003 Location: Villa Straylight

I think $75 is pretty reasonable.

What are the other options? A recruiter who costs a million won?

If a school is too cheap to pay $75 to post a job ad, I'd think about whether I really wanted to work for them.

prosodic · Joined: 21 Jun 2004 Location: ��

Actually, I agree with you that the quality of ads has gone down a lot. There are a lot more places to post. I find much better jobs postings on other sites. I'm not talking about hotjobs or monster.com because those two sites have crappy esl listings. There's a Korean government site that I like better for job listings.

By the way, job postings were free in 97 because it was a much smaller site with less traffic and it wasn't intended as a job site. Dave has given interviews explaining the process of how the site changed from a free service provided as a hobby into something that required all his time and energy. Look for it. I'm sure there's a link to it somewhere here. But think about it. If this website was your fulltime job, I mean more than forty hours a week, wouldn't you feel entitled to being compensated?

You have the right to your own opinion about whether or not $75 is fair. However, fair pricing is ultimately determined by market forces. If $75 was truly a ripoff, then nobody would post jobs here.

The Den · Joined: 26 Jan 2003

Dave has a perfect right to make a living from this site. It is a great site do not get me wrong and he deserves to make a living from it if he chooses to do so. If recruiters and schools and whoever feel that 75.00 is a fair price then good for Dave.

But I am talking about using the forum as a tool for teachers to pass their jobs on to other teachers. This may be an anonymous board but I would feel as comfortable trusting the opinions of someone on this board as some former teacher I just communicated with through email.

I was upset that my post telling people I was leaving and that my job was going to be vacant was deleted and I was advised that I was not allowed to post job ads here. I did not post details. All I said was PM me and I would hook people up. I am not a recruiter, nor do I own a hagwon. This was a one time thing.

Unfortunatley my hagwon is a bit frugal as are all hagwons and they are not willing to spend 75.00 without some sort of guarantee. I have tried to reason with them but what can you do.

prosodic · Joined: 21 Jun 2004 Location: ��

The Den · Joined: 26 Jan 2003

Those are all valid reasons to delete those kinds of posts. I do not have the answers to your questions. Maybe the only answer is to keep doing what they have been doing, which is deleting suspicious posts.

That does not lessen my frustration at being unable to use this forum as a resource for either finding a job or looking for a replacement for my position. I see a lot of negative posts on this board and it gets a little tiresome after awhile. I do not post much but since coming across this board I have told a lot of people about it. People back home who were interested in Korea and people here. My point is that it is because of people like me that this site gets the traffic it gets. It felt like a slap in the face when I was not permitted to use it for my own purposes.

prosodic · Joined: 21 Jun 2004 Location: ��

Hey The Den,

I understand how you feel and I actually agree with you. I don't have any idea how the policy against posting jobs in this forum got started. I can only guess that some people abused the forum. If that's the case, then it's too bad that happened. Good things often get ruined by a few bad apples.

I hope you understand that I'm not actually arguing with you (at least not anymore). At this point, the only reason I'm responding is that I'd like to try to help you feel better about the situation. And I think that talking something through and trying to figure out why a situation is the way it is can make it seem more ok.

prosodic · Joined: 21 Jun 2004 Location: ��

Over 12 hours and still not deleted????