Korean Job Discussion Forums

[panthermodern]

How to run a hakwon ....


1. If you want to open a new school, look for a neighhborhood with several large and successful hakwons, and steal their business.

2. Never keep staff ... good experienced staff is expensive ... why pay 10 - 20% more for experienced staff when you can hire newbies for less, and more profit for you.

3. If one client complains out of 50 of 100, they are right, especially if they have not paid tuititon for a month or so ... change everything ... keep THEM happy at all costs ....

4. It is better to keep one badly behaved student then the rest of the class of well behaved students. Never kick out kids who bully the other students or distrupt the class. Lose the rest of the class, no matter.

5. Keep everything a secret, until the last minute, especailly from foreign staff. Things run much more smoothly if no one know what is going on.

6a. Never buy materials, photocopy them, it is much cheaper.

6b. Never buy a good photcopier, an old used one is much cheaper. It is cheaper to have staff fight the machine for an hour a day each then to buy books or a good photcopy machine.

7. Decorate your hakwon nicely, but never, ever clean it .....
Clean makes students stupid .... and leave ....

8. Always try to make your foreign teachers lose face with the students, the students love that.


cya

panthermodern

[captain kirk]

point four, yeah. there's one kid who's like danny devito/napoleon, a little barrel of belligerence some days. the wonjonim knows who the bad boys are, and shakes his head in balancing over the question of whether to drop them or not. but money talks, and those little rebels who make a sport of rallying for a mutiny have their good days, when they're spice, like the trolls and flamers. 'danny devito' (who all the other kids 'hate', because he throws his ham around) came back from a vacation in cheju today, and had to go through the wild contortions of a bronco nestling back into the ropes; a real spectacle. the only time he tunes in is to squeal his tires and answer perfectly like a gattling gun to show how 'facile' it is. just concentrate on the good students says the boss, meanwhile the spawn of satan continues his mission to bustle all into 'the mouth of madness'. good does triumph
point 6b. the used copier took months to get used to. it's the loading. have to blow on all four edges of the stack to get 'lift' between the sheets; at first i thought the boss was daffy, demonstrating this. 'Christine', the copier, by stephen king. worth the admission

[rudyflyer]

panth you forgot one:

If you have a foreign staff member with a "foreign" last name like say Martinez or Von Wupperfeld offer classes in say Spanish or German regardless if the person can actually speak the language.

remember somebody actually posting this on the old board

[saint_moi]

The photocopier, albeit ancient, is the hogwon's shrine.

Bow down to the holy copier. He speweth forth thy teaching matter. Bow down I say! Bow![/quote]

[Paddycakes]

Your school even had a photocopier?? W-o-w!!

[rapier]

1) Advertise in the local area with colorful flyers depicting blonde- blue eyed people. Include a non- existent line- up of foreign teachers with mugshots downloaded from the internet.
2)Get your waygook teacher to "talk' to as many parents as possible, even if its mutually unintelligible gobbledygook.
3)Don't worry if the photocopier is broken, waegook teachers possess magical abilities to teach without copies or books, at one minutes notice.
4)Make a point of delaying payments to your waygook every month: holding his money is the best way to hold onto him.
5)Never discipline the kids, no matter how bad their behavior. They'll only complain to the parents.
6)Keep your exotic waygook pet happy by inviting him for soju in his hard earned liesure time. Even if you ignore him because none of your staff speak English, no matter,- waegooks don't require conversation.

[whatthefunk]

1. Buy a sh*t photocopier, a hardly working water machine, and an ancient fridge. These will need to be serviced once a week.

2.Don't give the kids books, and then yell at the foreign teacher for wasting paper when he/she makes copies.

3.Have the foreign teacher use a different book every week so that the kids can learn from a variety of sources. The other hagwans don't do this, so it will probably put all of them out of business.

4.Don't tell the foreign teacher anything. This might lead to a state of unconfussion.

5.Never talk to the foreign teacher. This will take away from conversation time with the kids.

6.Have your foreign teacher parade around the local elementary school to advertise your hagwan.

[rapier]

Wow Whathefunk! Your place sounds worse than mine!

[whatthefunk]

Ya get used to it. Its not that bad I guess. Im completly ignored all day, so I do what ever I want.
My boss is in a constant state of confusion as to what books I should use, but Ive been fortunate lately because Ive been with the same book for three months now. Im almost done with these books, so sh*t will hit the fan soon.
They only buy books once, so if any new kids come into the class, they don't get a book. I have classes where only 2-3 kids have books. So I copy. I even do it double sided which is a complete pain in the ass with our copy machine, but my boss still complains about my paper usage.
And Im getting used to the 2am phone calls to alert me of happenings the next day.
Oh well, 3 months left...

[The Great Wall of Whiner]

When the kids don't bring their books or pencils, it's okay for them to sit there and talk to other kids while you're trying to teach.

[some waygug-in]

1. Don't give out a copy of the textbook,even the workbook. (unless of course the used tattered and torn copy that must be shared between 6 teachers counts)

Make sure you have a complete selection of tapes for the textbook that the waeguk can't have, but a bunch of broken down cassette players.

Things like marker pens, chalk, erasers, white boards (oh yeah, and heat in winter) are unnecessary luxuries. You needn't trouble your staff with these.

Be sure to start new students in level 3 regardless of the fact that they can't read 3 letter words.

Any disruptive behavior on the part of lower level students is to be immediately rewarded by boosting them up to level 5.

Any attempts at discipline by the waeguk should be dealt with quickly and harshly. They must know their place afterall.

Waeguks must not be allowed to wear extra underwear or protective clothing that would deny the future geniuses the full pleasure of the ddong chim.

Any attempts by the waeguk to assert him/herself must be dealt with similarly to the question regarding discipline.

Waeguks who don't smile at all times and in any and all situations must be terminated immediately.

Any attempts by the waeguk to take sick days must be dealt with accordingly. How dare they get sick anyway!

cheers

[jajdude]

Tell the wayguk how important and valuable he is to the business, but never mind supplying him with resources to teach effectively. He can speak English, so let him figure out how to teach without adequate resources or materials. Suggest he buy his own.

Let the waygook know he has to follow the contract but the employer doesn't. He'll learn the "Korean way" through this.

Make sure few of the Koreans at the workplace can speak English adequately. Then the foreigner won't cause problems asking for things like books for students or fixing that blasted photocopier or problems in his apartment (room).

[camel96]

[Walter Mitty]

[whatthefunk]