Korean Job Discussion Forums

[mrknowitall10]

http://teach-in-south-korea.blogspot.com/

Read the blog if you are thinking of teaching in Korea.

I taught in Korea for 2 years as an English teacher and will be heading back shortly as i miss it all too much!!

http://teach-in-south-korea.blogspot.com/
think i deleted the last thread by accident.

[Dodge7]

what a joke.

[edwardcatflap]

yeah, I'm not sure making being 'openly allowed to drink on a school night' a desirable factor is necessarily going to attract the right sort of people to the job

[Nismo]

Perhaps the mods intentionally deleted it for you because it's quite spammy. If you want to post the reasons, post them here instead of linking to your external blog.

[yfb]

Troll thread. Nothing to see at the blog, move along.

[roguefishfood]

I do agree that saying "no qualifications necessary, come and drink your face off" isn't maybe the best way to attract good teachers.

Being a foreigner sort of eliminates most of the status benefits you'd get from being a teacher.

I appreciate the positivity though. It costs less to live here than in many similar western cities, while that apartment picture is a little overly nice for what most people get, the general standard of living IS good. Everybody (or almost everybody) gets paid more than they need to live with enough left over to pursue travel and hobbies. I don't know about you guys but I've found most individuals to be warm, friendly, and helpful. (Anyway I challenge you to find me a place with NO judgmental jerks. Don't seem to be any more in Korea than there are anywhere else.)

Nowhere is perfect. Both Korea and ESL are rewarding, interesting and fun, and it's totally valid to suggest that people come here with a good attitude and enjoy it. Anyone who thinks teaching English here isn't cushy as heck compared to what most young people are doing these days is kidding themselves.

[plchron]

you are all fooling yourselves into thinking that you are real teachers to begin with. Besides the ignorant parents, no one in this industry considers it a 'real' teaching job (there are a few exceptions). We should all get off our high horses and realize that we are taking money from these people to act like clowns, monkeys, teachers, or whatever the want us to ACT like. Beneath our veneer of fake professionalism it is obvious that most of us are just in it for the money and don't care about our schools well being one way or the other.

[Nismo]

[DIsbell]

As far as the "not real teachers" sentiment goes... don't a lot of your kids end up with pretty decent/improved English? I'm as jaded as anyone regarding the hakwon politics, but I'd be damned if every group of kids I taught didn't end up better than when I got them.

Also, I'm really starting to enjoy Modernist's posts... there's just a heavy-handed cynicism and seething dislike that's conveyed; your own passing notions expressed in the 10th degree.

[matty022]

[creeper1]

^^Looks like the old-timers need some attitude training from Matty022 who joined this site in 2012.

Matty get back to us when you unpack your belongings.

Having said that the blog is mostly right.

Respect for teachers - don't see much of that there these days.

Comfortable living - this one cannot be argued with. High salary in a cheap country.

Women mad for you - not really Maybe I am ugly:?

Friendly people - well some are, some aren't. I will say that they don't try to scam you as much as they do in my current location (China)

No experience needed- This is great for new grads! You can walk into the classroom immediately if you have any type of degree.

The main reason Korea is so great is money. ESLers make bucket loads of money!

Koreans seem to have no limit to the amount of money that they are willing to spend to educate their kids.

Employiing foreingers has been going on for at least the last 20 years. This massive spending has lead to precious little improvement in the general standard of English so the market is stilll huge.

Massive, truly massive amounts of money is up for grabs in education in Korea.It doesn't neceassarily have to be at your main job.

To quote two poster on here

Captain Korea - " I find it relatively easy to make 6 million a month"

TJ - " Almost unlimited earning potential"

[comm]

[matty022]

I arrive in Korea next month, but my comment wasn't aimed at the teaching/living conditions in South Korea.

Most jobs you ever work in your life you probably won't care about the company/clients/customers/coworkers/etc. Unless you're working in a job that you truly believe in and you wake up excited about how you might change the world or someone else's life for the better that day, you aren't going to care about those things and you'll be doing it for the money. You'll wake up and put on a suit/uniform that isn't what you'd naturally wear, you'll go to the building that you don't care about, you'll act like you give a shit, and you collect a pay check.

That isn't unique to teaching/TEFL or any other field, that's the norm.

So my comment was more of a life lesson than anything Korea specific: If you don't enjoy what you're doing, why are you doing it? Find something that motivates or inspires you and do that.

[pegasus64128]

In a way, I'm glad Korea is distasteful to many FT's. It's like a natural filter process so they can eventually grow some, or leave, or some combination of both in no particular order.

[fandeath]

Another view about teaching in Korea,

http://connectkorea.com/why-should-i-teach-in-korea/