Korean Job Discussion Forums

[varbuut]

Hallo dear native speakers/ Korea experts-expats!

A citizen of Latvia (some give us names such as former Soviet Union, too), Europe, speaking. Last year I spent a month in Korea and absolutely loved it and decided to come back. This summer I'll be finishing my graduate studies (non-English linguistics, damn) and, as I have quite a decent level of English (non-degree exchange studies in the States) I've decided to try my luck with teaching English there, probably after doing CELTA this summer here at home (I can still afford that timewise and financially + I have very limited teaching experience so that should do the trick hopefully).

I've been reading the postings here and it seems there's one BIG problem for me: is it really so that the ONLY way to teach English in Korea is if you 1) are a citizen of that little list of English speaking countries; 2) have a university degree from them? While in Korea I talked to a girl who said that a CELTA or the like certificate could be ok even for non-native English speakers to get an English teaching job there. Is that so? Or can one only teach English with E-4 visa and there is no way somebody from a country other than US/UK/etc. could do that? No loopholes? (Private schools, fake degree certificates, anything?)

Thank you/ kamsahamnida!

[air76]

The problem all comes down to your visa...you will absolutely not be able to work legally in Korea. Surely there are plenty of hagwons (private schools) that would hire you illegally, but then you've still got visa issues. All in all I'd say it would probably not be worth the hassle.

A better bet would be to teach in Vietnam. We met quite a few Europeans teaching there (Spain, Portugal, Belgium, Netherlands) without issue. In fact, if you do your CELTA at ILA and then work for them for a year I believe that they pay you back your tuition fee (at least they used to)....check out this school...www.ilavietnam.com They are very Euro-friendly and it's a decent place to work...the pay is OK, they have tons of resources, the management is mostly Australian so you don't have to deal with local management.

In my CELTA course there was a Swedish guy who in interviews tells everyone that his passport is from Sweden but that he actually spend the majority of his childhood in the US. It's a complete lie and to a native speaker his accent is clearly Swedish (plus his writing and grammar was just OK), but he'd been living in Japan for like 6 years teaching.

[Juregen]

As a non-native speaker myself, the only way you are going to have the possibility to teach English legally is by getting an F-5 status.

With an F-5 you will be considered a Korean, and then you just need to have the proper papers in order.

Any other way will be off limits.

[Troglodyte]

Legally, you won't be able to get an E-2 visa to teach English here. BUT that doesn't mean that you CAN'T teach English here. It just means that you can't do it legally. I've met a couple non-native English speakers here who were working for hogwans as English teachers. They had to lie to the owners and say that they were from an English speaking country. Generally the Koreans can't hear an accent (although if they have reason to believe that you have one, they will claim to hear it). But if they know that English isn't your original native language, they won't want to hire you. They seem to have some weird idea that if you aren't born with a language, you can never learn to speak it fluently. Probably they get that idea from the fact that THEY never seem to manage to speak foreign languages fluently.

As mentioned before, you could more easily get an ELT job elsewhere in Asia. In Taiwan, they will hire non-native speakers (some even with an intermediate level of English). And there's Vietnam.

If you want to teach English here in Korea, you'll likely have to do it illegally and every few months when your tourist visa is about to expire, you'll have to make a trip to Japan to get a new stamp in your passport. (Although it's not like there aren't already a lot of NET's that do that as well.)

[Troglodyte]

And by the way, I've never known a hogwan owner/manager that even knew what a CELTA is, much less cared if the NETs had one.

Some schools in China know what it is, especially in bigger cities. The Japanese don't seem to care about it either, but I'm not sure whether they know what it is. It seems to be more well known in other parts of Asia but I'm not sure how much of an advantage it will give you in your job hunt. In Europe and South America, schools definitely know what it is and it's an advantage to have it. South Americans also know about other TEFL certificates and they help in getting a job.

[OiGirl]

Have you considered studying in Korea?

[ThingsComeAround]

I met a good guy from Latvia, he left a few months back because of the snafu arrangements his school kept putting him through.

E-2 is a no-go for teaching English.
Teach Russian or another language. (highly suggested)

or as the above posters said, get a F-2 (marriage) F-5 (permanent) or a student visa and tutor on the side.

[Vox_Populi]

Sorry, no hope for Korea. They have super strict laws about who they can hire and they require a passport from one of the "Big 7" English-speaking countries: UK, Ireland, Canada, US, Australia, New Zealand or South Africa.

Check out Beijing though. The living is great there for an expat. There are some schools who won't hire you because of your nationality, but there are many who will. Spent a week there at Christmas and loved it and I think you will too. Beijing's a blast.

[varbuut]

Thank you, boys and girls, so much for your nice replies and ideas! Isn't it a bit funny - me trying to get inside TEFL market that many potential native teachers say they'll try to avoid?!
I don't think I would feel comfortable pretending to hagwon owners I'm native - and then I have to keep to that storyline to fellow teachers, students - ouch, sounds like a lot of lies! I guess I should really concentrate on some other Asian countries - Vietnam and China are probably options worth considering, thanks again!
(I wonder if I would be able to get a Job Seeker visa (D-10) for 6 months - but then it possibly still leaves me with illegal unemployment option as I still don't have the necessary citizenship anyway.)

[Vox_Populi]

[Murakano]

[ldh2222]

China it is!