Korean Job Discussion Forums

[wylies99]

Foreign Tenure Professor Quits SNU Without Notice
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2008/10/117_32610.html
10-13-2008 18:02

By Kang Shin-who
Staff Reporter

A foreign tenure professor at the state-run Seoul National University quit the school during the semester without giving prior notice and is refusing to return to the job. Andrea Pearson, 45, American professor of the department of archeology and art history at Seoul National University (SNU), abruptly left Korea late September. Majoring in northern Renaissance art, with research interests in gender and sexuality, Pearson came to SNU a month ago for the position of tenured professor.

Her fellow professors, school staff and students remain perplexed. ``We have no idea right now how to deal with this situation. We have been unable to contact her yet,�� SNU spokesman Chung Min-ho told The Korea Times.

Yi Seon-bok, dean of the department also said he had nothing to comment on. The professor, who stayed alone in the school�s faculty dormitory, apparently emailed her assistant professor that she had difficulty in adapting to life here and was unhappy with SNU over working conditions.

She was quoted right after being hired in SNU newspaper as saying ``I am delighted with the hard work students put into their studies, and was particularly impressed that even the students who were only auditing came to class fully prepared and completed all of their assignments.��

Some SNU professors point out the university has been negligent in a screening system to recruit quality professors and only focused on attracting as many foreign professors as possible. Currently, SNU has some 80 foreign professors and among them, 20 faculty members have permanent professorships.

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[wylies99]

Anyone know what happened? Anyone know why this made it to the Korean media?

[Teelo]

Just another midnight runner to add to the list.

[Yu_Bum_suk]

[bassexpander]

If she reads this board, she could contact me and do an interview over Skype for my site.

Nice how they attempted to save face by essentially calling her a poor hire. Surely there could be nothing wrong with what they did.

[bassexpander]

Gender issues and sexuality... I wonder if she was squelched in what she was allowed to do with that, and became upset? This is a pretty conservative country -- or has a very conservative face, anyway.

[Bigfeet]

Wow, a tenured Ph.D professor pulling a runner.

[PRagic]

She was an Associate Professor at little-known Bloomsburg University. SNU may have granted her full tenure to sweeten the deal, but the article is not clear as to her exact status. She may have been an Associate Professor with tenure track status, not a full professor. Either way, this is an interesting turn of events. I saw it in a Korean paper, initially written by a Reuters reporter, yesterday.

http://departments.bloomu.edu/womensstudies/faculty/pearson.html

[Bramble]

It must have been a slow news day ...

[Draz]

[wylies99]

[Bread]

Is it common for Korean universities to give tenure immediately?

[jvalmer]

Who knows? It could be anything.

In high school, a French Teacher just took off a few days before the start of the semester. It took the school a week to find a replacement. Rumor is that she went back to Quebec to chase after her former boyfriend. Or that her father died and just didn't feel like coming back. The rumor mill lasted a few days and then we forgot about her.

[soviet_man]

[Teelo]