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chronicpride
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
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 Posted: Wed Apr 13, 2005 5:32 am Post subject: |
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| Yu_Bum_suk wrote: |
| chronicpride wrote: |
| Daechidong Waygookin wrote: |
If there are more hagwons than teachers, demand will drive wages up. |
True, but there's not. There's far more teachers applying for jobs than schools looking for teachers. Directors get hit with so many resumes that they can afford to be selective and say things to recruiters like 'only North American females, under 30.' You won't believe how many employable people are sending resumes into this country. I know directors at some big schools that employ a lot of teachers who you would think cannot afford to be picky based on the yearly turnover, but they can still be picky on who they want, because there are 60+ recruiters pumping resumes into Korea. But almost every single time a picky school gets down to the wire and can't get exactly who they want, they opt for hiring the 50yr old, overweight guy from South Africa just because he'll sign for 1.9 and has been desperately job-hunting here for the past 5 months..
Schools will ease up on their hiring particularities among the sea of applicants, long before they even thinking about raising a salary for a couple 100,000Won. |
I find this hard to believe given my hogwan's trouble finding a new teacher. They even brought in one guy with a British passport for an interview who turned out to be a Morroccan. I also suspect that hogwans' offers are turned down most of the time, and a large % do runners. I got an email with an offer after I had already come here, and getting offers was not much of a problem compared to some other countries I had looked into. |
I suppose that my vantage point might be dated, as I haven't posted an ad for teachers for almost a year, but based on the feedback of those that I know that are still in that racket, they say not much has changed. Depends also how many recruiters that your school is going through. If he's loyal to only one or two, and they don't market themselves very well, then your director might be getting dribs and drabs. The last marketing push that we did last year, we fetched about 30-35 resumes per job, but we were also going through Monster. The resume-job yield at this place has been going down slowly since 2003. I don't know what the avg yield would be around these days.
You used to be able to stick 5 resumes/pictures in front of a director and they will turn them down for the pettiest and most superficial of reasons. Anything from them labelling a guy with low eyebrows and dark eyes as being 'scary-looking' to a girl dressing 'too old-fashioned'. Then you have to go out and find 5 more and repeat, until you unlocked the preference riddle (which usually meant that they were not on a power trip that day and were worried about finances, as the departing teacher's last day is in 2 weeks.).
If there were any such supply/demand effect as a result of booting out the illegal teachers, schools will just start saying, 'well, I suppose that guy isn't that scary-looking' or 'I guess that girl dresses alright'.
In other words, the word 'irreplaceable commodity' does not exist in schools over here, save for the hangman boards of the teachers who think they are. |
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Yu_Bum_suk
Joined: 25 Dec 2004
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| Posted: Wed Apr 13, 2005 5:53 am Post subject: |
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| chronicpride wrote: |
| Yu_Bum_suk wrote: |
| chronicpride wrote: |
| Daechidong Waygookin wrote: |
If there are more hagwons than teachers, demand will drive wages up. |
True, but there's not. There's far more teachers applying for jobs than schools looking for teachers. Directors get hit with so many resumes that they can afford to be selective and say things to recruiters like 'only North American females, under 30.' You won't believe how many employable people are sending resumes into this country. I know directors at some big schools that employ a lot of teachers who you would think cannot afford to be picky based on the yearly turnover, but they can still be picky on who they want, because there are 60+ recruiters pumping resumes into Korea. But almost every single time a picky school gets down to the wire and can't get exactly who they want, they opt for hiring the 50yr old, overweight guy from South Africa just because he'll sign for 1.9 and has been desperately job-hunting here for the past 5 months..
Schools will ease up on their hiring particularities among the sea of applicants, long before they even thinking about raising a salary for a couple 100,000Won. |
I find this hard to believe given my hogwan's trouble finding a new teacher. They even brought in one guy with a British passport for an interview who turned out to be a Morroccan. I also suspect that hogwans' offers are turned down most of the time, and a large % do runners. I got an email with an offer after I had already come here, and getting offers was not much of a problem compared to some other countries I had looked into. |
I suppose that my vantage point might be dated, as I haven't posted an ad for teachers for almost a year, but based on the feedback of those that I know that are still in that racket, they say not much has changed. Depends also how many recruiters that your school is going through. If he's loyal to only one or two, and they don't market themselves very well, then your director might be getting dribs and drabs. The last marketing push that we did last year, we fetched about 30-35 resumes per job, but we were also going through Monster. The resume-job yield at this place has been going down slowly since 2003. I don't know what the avg yield would be around these days.
You used to be able to stick 5 resumes/pictures in front of a director and they will turn them down for the pettiest and most superficial of reasons. Anything from them labelling a guy with low eyebrows and dark eyes as being 'scary-looking' to a girl dressing 'too old-fashioned'. Then you have to go out and find 5 more and repeat, until you unlocked the preference riddle (which usually meant that they were not on a power trip that day and were worried about finances, as the departing teacher's last day is in 2 weeks.).
If there were any such supply/demand effect as a result of booting out the illegal teachers, schools will just start saying, 'well, I suppose that guy isn't that scary-looking' or 'I guess that girl dresses alright'.
In other words, the word 'irreplaceable commodity' does not exist in schools over here, save for the hangman boards of the teachers who think they are. |
Intersting to get your perspective. I wonder how many directors got my resume on their desk? If it were more than the number that ended up on my current director's desk, then it might be more of a seller's market than meets the eye. I also have an MA and some experience teaching, and wasn't being very picky (took the second offer that came along just because I wasn't going to pay my own airfare), so maybe that gave me a leg up, but Korea did look by far the easiest place to find work. |
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Pyongshin Sangja
Joined: 20 Apr 2003
Location: I love baby!
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| Posted: Thu Apr 14, 2005 9:09 pm Post subject: |
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Its not illogical. Its supply and demand, silly.
Situation 1: School has several teachers to choose from. They can offer 2 million to them all and see who snaps it up.
Situation 2: 3 schools want to hire one teacher. Teacher can choose an offer that suits him or approach a hagwon about raising the offer to beat a competitor.
If there are more hagwons than teachers, demand will drive wages up. |
Bullpucky. You're dreaming. The idea that we would somehow demand, deserve or ever get more money because there are fewer foreigners BREAKING THE LAW IN KOREA makes very little sense to Koreans that have set wages at what they think is a level attractive to LEGAL foriegners from the Magic 7 countries. This is practically extortion, what you are proposing!
You: "If you don't control your borders, more of us are going to come here and BREAK THE LAW. Look at us, aren't we great? We didn't BREAK THE LAW again! Aren't you impressed by how little we BROKE THE LAW? Give us more money!"
Your boss: "You want a medal? Here's twice what I give workers from my home country that speak a language I like and understand, who will show up on time and stay late, don't smoke pot, drive drunk or chase my daughter around Sincheon. For free. Now beat it, kojengi."
Sure, Koreans can get a 16 year old girl to give them a massage in the Philippines but Koreans prefer to pay more for an 18 (maybe) year old girl right here in Korea. It's the same with us. The English massage we give costs money here and now. Perhaps you can get it for less in another country, more power to you. Just because there are people in other countries, or people illegally living and working in grey areas in Korea doesn't make you worth more.
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| What is it, do Canadians have group PMS or something? The reaction to Derreks comments |
Derrek, as much as I like him, has a problem with Canadians. He has even, by his own admission, gone so far as to approach Korean government officials telling them about all the evil things that Canadians are doing here. Then he is surprised that we take it personally. We do. Americans are restriciting Canadian travel to America right now, some of them think that they can come here and twist the Koreans' arms enough to restrict Canadians here as well. I've said it before, it's an imperial attitude that utterly disregards the relationship between the two sovereign nations of Canada and the Republic of Korea. Don't laugh. Americans have long had little respect for the governments and cultures of either of these countries and see them as buffer zones wtih dispensable populations between themselves and more powerful adversaries. It's more of the same.
To recap, the last three people busted with fake degrees in Korea were from which country? |
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Teufelswacht
Joined: 06 Sep 2004
Location: Land Of The Not Quite Right
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| Posted: Thu Apr 14, 2005 10:24 pm Post subject: |
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 Sorry, couldn't help myself.
Us vs. Them, Us vs. Them, Us vs. Them
"We're good, they're bad" nya, nya, nya
Are you sure you and Derrek aren't somehow related? Yours and his thinking seems to be two sides of the same coin. Wouldn't you two be more comforatble in the Current Events Forum?
Thanks for giving merit to my first rant. I appreciate it.
I guess what I'm trying to say was best said in a movie I saw once. Two men of different races were caught in a bad situation - one turns to the other and says "Hey, we're ALL ni@@ers on this hill." Something to think about.
Take care.
Teufelswacht |
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Hollywoodaction
Joined: 02 Jul 2004
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| Posted: Fri Apr 15, 2005 3:14 pm Post subject: |
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| Daechidong Waygookin wrote: |
| SuperHero wrote: |
| Derrek wrote: |
| Great... so they can bust a few guys who turned in bogus degrees. Now start cancelling the long-term multi-entry tourist visas for Canadians, and I'll be impressed that they're trying to do something. We all know that's where 70% of the problem lies... illegal teachers who are teaching here on Tourist Visas. |
Get over your anti-canadian thing already. |
I agree with Derrek and Im Canadian. I have no solidarity with people just because they are Canadians. If a teacher is caught teaching illegally, it threatens my and my family's livelihood. Canadian, Ameican, English, whatever. It makes legal teachers look bad and has consequences we cant forsee. They SHOULD cut the Canadian tourist visa down to a month. Its ridiculous as it stands now. 6 months!? WTF do you need a 6 month visa unless you are illegal? |
Well, my mother stayed for more than three months when my son was born. Does that make her bad?
Last edited by Hollywoodaction on Fri Apr 15, 2005 3:20 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Hollywoodaction
Joined: 02 Jul 2004
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| Posted: Fri Apr 15, 2005 3:16 pm Post subject: |
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| canadian_in_korea wrote: |
| .could it be....that perhaps you don't NEED a university degree to teach english as a second language... |
Actually, all you need to get a tutoring license, if you are Korean, is a high school diploma. |
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hari seldon
Joined: 05 Dec 2004
Location: Incheon
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| Posted: Fri Apr 15, 2005 4:21 pm Post subject: |
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| Daechidong Waygookin wrote: |
...Its supply and demand, silly.
Situation 1: School has several teachers to choose from. They can offer 2 million to them all and see who snaps it up.
Situation 2: 3 schools want to hire one teacher. Teacher can choose an offer that suits him or approach a hagwon about raising the offer to beat a competitor.
If there are more hagwons than teachers, demand will drive wages up. |
I would add that raising the effective barriers to entry for teachers by screening out forged or unaccredited degrees and requiring criminal record checks would reduce the supply of candidates for E-2s and pressure wages further. |
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Derrek
Joined: 15 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Fri Apr 15, 2005 4:28 pm Post subject: |
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| Hollywoodaction wrote: |
| canadian_in_korea wrote: |
| .could it be....that perhaps you don't NEED a university degree to teach english as a second language... |
Actually, all you need to get a tutoring license, if you are Korean, is a high school diploma. |
Don't forget to add that you don't even need to speak English.
I'll even go so far as to say that you can teach in a Private High School as an English teacher and not have to speak English much. |
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chronicpride
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Fri Apr 15, 2005 9:46 pm Post subject: |
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| hari seldon wrote: |
| Daechidong Waygookin wrote: |
...Its supply and demand, silly.
Situation 1: School has several teachers to choose from. They can offer 2 million to them all and see who snaps it up.
Situation 2: 3 schools want to hire one teacher. Teacher can choose an offer that suits him or approach a hagwon about raising the offer to beat a competitor.
If there are more hagwons than teachers, demand will drive wages up. |
I would add that raising the effective barriers to entry for teachers by screening out forged or unaccredited degrees and requiring criminal record checks would reduce the supply of candidates for E-2s and pressure wages further. |
No. It'll make directors less pickier about who they choose to hire among the pile of resumes/photos that they have in their inboxs. In the past, the trend has been to filter according to the photo and citizenship. Any drop in supply of teachers will mean that they will start taking longer looks at the guys that they would previously turn their nose up at for petty reasons, before they start increasing salaries. The teacher supply end of things has a long way to go down before we see any wage pressure. |
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hari seldon
Joined: 05 Dec 2004
Location: Incheon
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| Posted: Fri Apr 15, 2005 10:00 pm Post subject: |
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| If their competitors are offering attractive and charismatic teachers and they want to compete, they'll need to offer the same. |
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chronicpride
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Fri Apr 15, 2005 10:19 pm Post subject: |
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| That example could work on a street with a couple of competing hogwans, who are offering the exact same program, schedule, material, value, benefit, and cost to the students that they are fighting over. And also if the students and parents have zero loyalty or �� with the directors of the schools that they attend. Only then, you would have a recipe where this conceivably could occur. |
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Tiberious aka Sparkles
Joined: 23 Jan 2003
Location: I'm one cool cat!
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| Posted: Sat Apr 16, 2005 12:10 am Post subject: |
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| Derrek wrote: |
I'll even go so far as to say that you can teach in a Private High School as an English teacher and not have to speak English much. |
Very true.
Sparkles*_* |
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T-dot
Joined: 16 May 2004
Location: bundang
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| Posted: Sat Apr 16, 2005 12:42 am Post subject: |
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If there is a big crackdown, alot will remain unchanged except for illegals (deported), gyopos (will pretty much own the P/T job market) and Hagwon owners (will now broaden their hiring preferences).
I think salary will go up, but most likely for competent teachers who are in Korea at the time of the hiring process. |
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Yu_Bum_suk
Joined: 25 Dec 2004
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| Posted: Sat Apr 16, 2005 7:23 pm Post subject: |
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| chronicpride wrote: |
| hari seldon wrote: |
| Daechidong Waygookin wrote: |
...Its supply and demand, silly.
Situation 1: School has several teachers to choose from. They can offer 2 million to them all and see who snaps it up.
Situation 2: 3 schools want to hire one teacher. Teacher can choose an offer that suits him or approach a hagwon about raising the offer to beat a competitor.
If there are more hagwons than teachers, demand will drive wages up. |
I would add that raising the effective barriers to entry for teachers by screening out forged or unaccredited degrees and requiring criminal record checks would reduce the supply of candidates for E-2s and pressure wages further. |
No. It'll make directors less pickier about who they choose to hire among the pile of resumes/photos that they have in their inboxs. In the past, the trend has been to filter according to the photo and citizenship. Any drop in supply of teachers will mean that they will start taking longer looks at the guys that they would previously turn their nose up at for petty reasons, before they start increasing salaries. The teacher supply end of things has a long way to go down before we see any wage pressure. |
Since you worked in recruiting, I'm interested to know how many directors said 'I want him' and it turned out that 'him' wasn't available for whatever reason. I know that this happened in several cases with me when I was the 'him' they wanted, and I look like a scraggly bum - a completely unkempt longhair with earrings - on my passport photo. |
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Blind Willie
Joined: 05 May 2004
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| Posted: Sat Apr 16, 2005 10:02 pm Post subject: |
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| Pyongshin Sangja wrote: |
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| What is it, do Canadians have group PMS or something? The reaction to Derreks comments |
Derrek, as much as I like him, has a problem with Canadians. He has even, by his own admission, gone so far as to approach Korean government officials telling them about all the evil things that Canadians are doing here. |
Derrek's silver lining, so to speak, is that he wears his bigotries on his sleeve. Usually he leaves speaking on them for his Gollum sock, but sometimes he gets confused and posts as himself. But him letting us know what a tool he is up front is somewhat courteous of him. |
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