Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Super Mario]

I have read many posts here on this board about the Moon Kang Hagwon chain being one of the better hagwons to work for. I worked for them and I think that the reputation they enjoy on this board is not entirely deserved. While I understand that every place has it's issues, and that MK may be much better than some hagwons things there have taken a turn for the worse over the past few years and their reputation has remained positive despite the changes. I am not writing this post because I disliked my employer. I am writing this post because I know that Mr. Moon cares deeply about his school's reputation and for some reason he and the rest of upper management has chosen to ignore the problems there. I hope that this post will improve the situation there because I do care about my former students and co-workers.

The positive aspects about working for MK is that you always get paid on time and the pay is slightly higher than at other hagwons, 2.2-2.3 million won, 4 pm -10pm M-F. The hours are good and the prep is minimal for most but not all classes.

One of the downsides is that the cirriculum has serious problems. There are two types of classes for the foreign teachers. One is a speaking class where the children focus on a theme and grammatical concept. The cirriculum often contains spelling and grammatical errors. The material is also highly recycled and doesn't cover a wide variety of speaking concepts or vocabulary. This class is not perfect but not terrible. The other is a class where the students go on the internet the night before, memorize a story and come into the class and speak the memorized material. As you can imagine the children learn almost nothing from this, they aren't forced to actually learn any of the vocabulary in the story but simply memorize and repeat it. The children are then graded based on how well they have memorized the story and can use "hand gestures" to retell it. The children find this class grueling and completely uninteresting. Needless to say so do most of the teachers. However, there is no preparation on the teachers part so few have complained despite the fact that they know it's a complete waste of time.

Incoming students are placed in a classroom level based entirely on the mother's demands and little else. I am aware this is a common problem at all hagwons, however as I said earlier MK enjoys a reputation for not being like other hagwons and in this respect they are absolutely no different than the worst hagwons in Korea. Very low level students are placed in high level classes because their mother's demand it. High level students, whose mother's don't make demands are placed in low level classes so that the school can make more money. Likewise, poor performing students are leveled up according to their mother's demands and high performing students are kept in the same level for as long as possible to reap the maximum profit. This has resulted in most classes having students of vastly different capabilities. The administration has absolutely refused to even acknowlege that this is happening or discuss it.

There is major lack of administrative support from the head office. Nearly every teacher who has been hired in the past year has arrived one to two weeks late for their first day of work. This is because new teachers visas are not being processed on time by the individuals responsible for that task. This lack of competence has caused serious problems throughout the company.

First, the floating teachers, those who fill in for teachers while they are sick or on vacation are completely spead too thin and unable to fill all the spots. This has resulted in head office telling all the teachers on numerous occasions that they cannot call in sick because there is no one available to cover their classes.

Second, the editors, who should be writing the material, are being sent out to fill in for teachers and therefore not writing the new material as required.

Third, new teachers are not recieving the full three-day training period and training sessions that they are supposed to recieve because there is no one available to teach their classes while they are being trained. Meanwhile they are still being paid 60% of total pay as though they did recieve the full training period. Almost all new teachers, whose flights arrive on weekdays, are also being picked up at the airport and immediately brought to their schools or another school to begin work.

The same administrative staff responsible for processing the visas also take care of getting the teachers plane tickets. Problems regularly occur in this area as well. Teachers, are not being picked up at the airport unreasonably late or not at all, and are being asked and in some cases forced to take buses from the Busan, Daegu and even Incheon airports.

Like I said before it really isn't my intention to attack MK. I thouroughly enjoyed working there and was treated well. However, the problems there are culminating to a very tense situation and nothing is being done about it. That is my only intention is to get the attention of the office in the hopes that these problems will be resolved.

[Corporal]

Hey, I worked there before they even HAD a curriculum.

Overall I think your post is fair and deserves some attention from the powers that be.

[the eye]

Back then, was the owner as ego-maniacal and misogynistic as he is said to be now?

[seoulsista]

Wow! Well, I have mentioned before on this board that I currently work there and I feel inclined to respond, but... no comment.

[Steve Schertzer]

I worked at MK four years ago in 2002, and it's nice to see nothing has changed. But like Super Mario said, you do get paid on time and prep time is minimal. That, in and of itself, places MK above the vast majority of McHagwons.

But it does have its problems. An uninspired and insipid curriculum, and in some of the branches, backstabbing Korean managers. But I did get along with the foreign managers, especially Richard. He was cool.

If you can put up with a bit of crap, then it's not such a bad place to work.

Steve.

[wire]

edited

[Pericles77]

Well-said.