Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Ihavenolips]

I don't know if anyone is interested. But, I have wondered how many teachers live in Korea. I couldn't find the exact number, but my research sheds a little light on the subject. The following list is of the top 10 western visitors by nationality for 2004 (from the Korean National Tourism Organization):

1) USA 511,177
2) Russia 156,876
3) Canada 77,597
4) Germany 68,851
5) UK 65,975
6) Australia 57,839
7) France 41,231
Netherlands 18,165
9) New Zealand 16,050
10) Italy 14,722

If you eleminate the non-native English speaking countries the order would be: USA, Canadian, UK, Australia, and New Zealand. Of course, the United States is bumped so high because of its military presence. So, the list should probably start with Canada as #1.

What is important is to look at this stat by ratio. The population of Canada is only around 30 million. The second place, UK, has a population of nearly twice that size. The number of visitors by ratio is also very high for Australia (population around 18 million) and New Zealand (3.5 million). Also, for those interested, there are 4,324 South Africans who come here every year. Many of them teach. I hesitate to guess the percentage of how many visitors are teachers, tourists, or businesspersons.

It is hard to extrapolate how many of these visitors are teachers. I don't live in Seoul, so it would be difficult to research E-2 visa permits. However, in contrast to popular perception, many of these teachers are working without permits. There are probably a fair share of English teachers from India, the Philippenes, and European countries. However, that is an entirely different story.

Many of the Europeans are in Korea as engineers. Germany, Italy, France, and Slovakia are high on the list.

Well ... that is the best that I could do. Hopefully, that might answer some of the age old question about the number of teachers in Korea and where they are from.

[Yu_Bum_suk]

Interesting bit of research - well spotted. I think that on a per capita basis NZ must contribute the most teachers (though S. Africa's a bit of a wildcard), followed by Canada, Aus, UK, and then USA, though in terms of quantity it might go to the Americans by a hare. Remember, though, that a lot of Canadians have duel US or UK citizenship.

[Tiberious aka Sparkles]

[tomwaits]

does this really shed any light on anything?...I guess you could say since SOME % are teachers the top "teacher suppliers" are Can UK and AUS with US being some wild-card. After all the military likely skews these numbers. It sounds right but I would have thought Oz supplies more teachers than UK. hmmmmmmmmmmmmm

[uberscheisse]

[Pyongshin Sangja]

Cor blimey, dude, like where's my toque?