Korean Job Discussion Forums

wonkavite62 · Joined: 17 Dec 2007 Location: Jeollanamdo, South Korea.

I am a fairly experienced teacher, but I have been handed a sudden dismissal notice today, and I am in shock. I want to check out precisely what I am entitled to legally, and see whether the school is trying to pull the wool over my eyes. I have a fair idea of what I should get, but may be unaware of some things I am entitled to.
Here's what happened. At the private middle school, where I teach, I was handed a written dismissal. It is basically a list of complaints about me as a teacher. Most of them are very petty, even absurd. A couple of things I did that I regret, so that matters. The dismissal notice has no final date of work, no time by which I must leave the school, no place for my signature, nothing to say what my final salary will be, or anything. To me that's odd.
I came to this school at the end of February. I got bad vibes from the start. What should I expect: a release letter? I don't expect a reference, but will ask. Is there anything else I should expect. Rules may have been changed.
Its a private middle school, which means that I work normal public school hours, have a summer vacation and a summer camp. My actual teaching hours are short, but it feels oddly stressful. However, the time table is often changed at a moment's notice and much more often so than in the public school I last worked at. That, if anything is the real source of the problems I had.
As an older teacher, do I have any chance of finding work at a hagwon now?

ttompatz · Joined: 05 Sep 2005 Location: Kwangju, South Korea

CentralCali · Joined: 17 May 2007

JohnML · Joined: 05 Jul 2015

Sorry to hear that dude. There are plenty of older folk working jobs on here so whilst it'll be harder to find a position it's not at all impossible especially if you have experience. Heads up man!

wonkavite62 · Joined: 17 Dec 2007 Location: Jeollanamdo, South Korea.

No, I didn't sign any counselling advice or warning letter. Nothing like that. I have asked for a letter of release. My co-teacher wants to consult a dictionary on what that term means.Maybe I will get one. If not, I will have to leave Korea, I think.

trueblue · Joined: 15 Jun 2014 Location: In between the lines

gongbuhae · Joined: 14 May 2016

sounds to me OP rubbed his school the wrong way.

trueblue · Joined: 15 Jun 2014 Location: In between the lines

talentedcrayon · Joined: 27 Aug 2013 Location: Why do you even care?

All the OP asked for was advice. He (or she) wants to know his rights.

OP, ask on LOFT (Facebook group for foreigners with legal troubles in Korea). LOFT will get you more answers than Dave's.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/520811644598894

It's unfortunate they didn't talk to you before firing you. To me this signifies the problem probably wasn't directly with you. Maybe they just didn't meet their recruitment targets this semester... So they needed to scrape the bottom of the barrel for reasons to fire you.

Unless you showed up drunk or something, in which case, it's understandable that they would cut your body up into bite sized chunks and feed you to their pet monitor lizard named Jake.

wonkavite62 · Joined: 17 Dec 2007 Location: Jeollanamdo, South Korea.

I got the release letter, both in Korean and in English, with the school's official stamp. My final date is the end of August. The last guy mentioned LOFT. Thanks, I will look into that, as they can advise me better than some of the people here. Thank you for mentioning them.
LOFT can advise me further.

trueblue · Joined: 15 Jun 2014 Location: In between the lines

wonkavite62 · Joined: 17 Dec 2007 Location: Jeollanamdo, South Korea.

Yes, of course. I received the LOR, so I won't be pursuing a vendetta. But I thought LOFT might be able to advise me if I needed to go onto a D-10 visa (I hope I don't) or current requirements for changing jobs, doing a visa run, etc. For example, do I need to cancel my current visa here before I work in another province?
I have got the LOR which is the most important thing.

trueblue · Joined: 15 Jun 2014 Location: In between the lines

wonkavite62 · Joined: 17 Dec 2007 Location: Jeollanamdo, South Korea.

I just wanted to add, for the benefit of people who tell people like myself who complain about constantly-changing schedules, that "that's Korea," and that it's my fault if I can't handle it. Especially changes I am not told of and which arent on the notice board. YES, maybe it IS my fault for not having Edgar Cayce's prophetic powers. Maybe it IS my fault for not being able to channel the answers from the infinite? As an ESL teacher in a foreign country, I should be able to adapt myself to constant changes to my timetable, especially SECRET changes.
However, I do know that if I were your boss, and if I played around with the schedule to this extent, and didn't tell you, then you would be furious. You would call me unprofessional. You would be right.
I just wanted to add that I have also worked at a normal public school. I worked at a hagwon too. The timetable was never this crazy, and I would at least be given some notice of changes. Often when I reached my desk, there would be post it notes describing the changes. Even the hagwon gave me some notice. But their normal timetable was relatively straightforward. Not so at Youngseon Middle School. At that school the timetable is fallacious.

Voyeur · Joined: 19 Jun 2003

I used to try to make my school 'better' and complain about things that seemed ridiculous. I'd even be professional, courteous, and constructive about it.
Finally, a senior manager at my company (a foreigner) called me and told me to shut the hell up--nicely, of course. He said that I only get one vote: with my feet. Stay or leave, but things in Korea will be the way they are going to be. It sucks when a situation you like and have invested in turns against you, but usually there is no fixing it. One simply decides if they can live with the new normal, or not.
Of course such advice is easy to give, and hard to live. I still forget myself from time to time. But whenever I do, that hard truth about teaching in Asia reasserts itself. Truth is, there are often things at play that one doesn't know about and that Asian bosses won't tell you about. You just never know if what seems ridiculous really is. And even when it is, the ridiculousness may be being generated far down the causal chain. Even your immediate supervisors may think it's crazy, but they are reacting to the crazy as logically as they can. And they can't commiserate with you and express their true feelings or they might get in trouble for showing disloyalty.