Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Maedhor]

I just started at a school where I'm teaching 27.5 hours per week, which from what I understand is slightly above normal for teaching jobs but not uncommon.

A bit of background: I'm a first-time ESL teacher, and finished a CELTA course last October before job hunting and coming to Korea this month. My main goal was to teach adults, rather than children, so I jumped on an offer that I received to do that here at a hagwon. I was told that I'd be working a split shift, basically 6:40 AM to 10 pm with long breaks in the middle, particularly the afternoon.

Upon arrival, I was told that I'll be teaching a brand new intensive English course to two higher-ups at a big company in Korea. My background and degree is in business, so I'm fine with doing that (and the business English extras they want), but it's a 4-hour class every day. I wasn't fine with the expectation that I develop a curriculum literally overnight (also the day following my arrival in Korea, so still super jetlagged and tired in general).

My shift now is 2-6 pm Monday through Friday, and Monday/Wednesday/every other Friday conversation classes from 6:50 to 10 pm. Actually a good shift to me, but starting next month they're adding Tuesday and Thursday to the mix. 35 hours of contact per week seems like a lot of hours to me, especially since the intensive class requires a lot of lesson planning (and they want me to assign 4 hours of homework each day(!)).

Main point: Is 35 hours truly a lot more than usual? From what I've read it seems to be, and I know in Europe the expectation was 22-25, but I'm brand new here. If so, what is the best way to bring it up to my school? My director doesn't speak any English, so I'll have to go through someone translating no matter what.

I'm keeping up with work for this month, but only barely. It should be easier as I get more experienced, but the lesson plans for the big class eat a ton of time, and my school doesn't seem to factor in planning time to its working hours, which seems questionable to me.

[goat]

This appears to be a typical Adult School job. If it's within your contract agreement, chin up and continue working.

[edwardcatflap]

35 hours is a lot of contact hours but as the goat says, if it's in your contract There's not much you can do about it. If it's not then take it up with the boss.

[PRagic]

Read your contract. It should say that you're on the hook for 30 contact hours a week (120 hours a month), and that for anything over that you'll be paid overtime. Unfortunately, the OT rates are usually crap.

As for prep, new teachers spend a lot of time on this, but once you've spent some time in the trenches and develop your own 'bag of tricks', you'll be cruising through with little to no prep time. Most decent conversation books are pretty self guiding, so then you just need to expand with stuff that's interesting to adults (idiomatic expressions, pronunciation, specialized vocab, etc...).

The business English classes might prove to be a foot in a lucrative door, especially if you're teaching higher up types at a big name company. This is one instance where your business degree is actually an asset rather than a detractor.

Get your cell phone. Get your name cards printed up. Hand out cards like crazy and never change your number. You never know what opportunities might come knocking. Teaching business English can make you a pretty decent side income down the road.

Word to the wise, though; once an English teacher, always an English teacher. If I had a nickle for every business degree holder who came here to teach expecting to move on over to corporateville, I'd have, well, a shit ton of nickles.

Not saying it's totally impossible, just that the odds are very much stacked against you, especially without corporate experience and a big name MBA backing you up. I have a few friends who found a happy medium, though, working as English editors at major financial houses here in Seoul. Great coin, but very few jobs, and very network intensive, so they're not easy to snag.

[Maedhor]

Thanks for the advice, everyone. My recruiter weaseled out of answering my questions about teaching hours vs. planning hours, so I should have suspected something suspicious was afoot, but that's not much help at this point.

My contract is somewhat vague, but can easily be read as teaching 38.6 hours per week. The schedule starting next month is slightly less than that, between 35 and 36, but it's still a chunk more than a standard schedule. I brought it up today since I'm already getting slammed with bureaucratic garbage for the intensive course less than two weeks in (forms upon forms with useless info, like homework completion percentage and "student attitudes" day to day) and I suspect I'll be looped into extra stuff as time passes.

It went about as well as I expected. I said if I teach the extra hours next month, the quality of the intensive course will suffer...but in retrospect that was a stupid argument, since most hagwons don't care at all about course quality. I'm going to be saddled with 35 hours no matter what I do, minimum, so I'm just pondering my options at this point. I like the other teachers, native and nonnative, and, like PRagic said, it's a good foot in the door for business English.

My eventual goal is to do business English; I thought perhaps a corporate job at some point in the future, but I was never dead set on doing that in Korea anyway. I do have a corporate background (although no MBA), working at a really big US financial services company, doing both corporate stuff and proofreading/editing specifically, so I do think I could leverage that into a job here if I networked properly. I'm already doing minor editing jobs on the side pro bono for a student who works at a pharma company.

My current thoughts: try to stick it out for six months and see how burned out I get. The contract says I have to give 8 weeks of notice before quitting, so I figure by the time June rolls around I will have a good grasp of my situation. After six months, they legally can't renege on a letter of release and paying for my flight here, correct?

[CentralCali]

[PRagic]

WHY are you editing ANYTHING for free, especially for someone who works for a pharm company, and especially when you're overloaded to begin with. NEVER. Nip that in the bud. Bad habit, especially since anyone else would be getting 10-20,000 won per page (A4, double spaced, 12 pt font).

Your business editing experience might come in handy if one of those financial editor positions ever comes down the pike.

Sounds like you really signed a dog of a contract if you're on the hook for that many hours. Bummer.

[PRagic]

WHY are you editing ANYTHING for free, especially for someone who works for a pharm company, and especially when you're overloaded to begin with. NEVER. Nip that in the bud. Bad habit, especially since anyone else would be getting 10-20,000 won per page (A4, double spaced, 12 pt font).

Your business editing experience might come in handy if one of those financial editor positions ever comes down the pike.

Sounds like you really signed a dog of a contract if you're on the hook for that many hours. Bummer.

[Maedhor]

[PRagic]

That clarification helps. Sure, roll with the proofing if that's the extent of it.

As for the classes go, do yourself a favor and DON'T tell your boss that your classes are suffering because of your work load. Doesn't translate the same in this culture. You'll be seen as a non-team player and a winer. No offense intended, just a cultural difference.

For your regular hagwon classes, do a bit of winging it. In any academic job, part of the battle is learning how to free up your own time. IF those students say anything or complain, THEN say that you're doing the utmost that you can given your schedule. Here, you're ALWAYS working SUPER HARD and you're ALWAYS tired...when anyone asks you at work. What you're doing personally is your own business.