Korean Job Discussion Forums

[cellphone]

Been working at a hagwon outside of Seoul for about 3 months. They paired me up with a co-worker woman who is basically the 'subtle' office back stabber, but more on that later.

My situation is sort of an ambivalent paradox which is why it's quite confusing. The plusses

-school has good history of pay on time
-office staff never go out of their way to yell at teachers or blatant disrespect (i.e. never some of the nightmare stories you've read about);
- in fact if and when they have a problem with a foreign teacher, they'll never say anything to your face
-foreign teachers are left to themselves.

Which is a big part of the problem. I feel I'm given little to no support as some problems have arisen. But what makes it so bad is that the problems have been little things, like personality conflicts, or small little gossips, or miscommunications.

I have two other foreign teachers, but they've basically been 'useless' as far as comraderie or help on specific issues. When they aren't busy being your enemy, they'll pitch in an idea or two but otherwise it appears neither one of them like me and I wouldn't doubt some of the things they say are misleading or slightly harmful, as they've both been in Korea for more than a few years each, while I'm rather new at the E2 visa system and it seems like they have no relation to the new guy at all.

Seems pretty clear that my main Korean co-teacher is not only almost useless regarding 'team' support but she won't hesitate to go off into another office with the "management" and unload some hypocritical gossip about you or anyone she feels.

My boss/management has been silent, but they are increasingly playing 'spineless' or giving me the cold shoulder -- they're NEVER clear about why they do that, which only makes it more frustrating.

But the only major concern I have, besides feeling like I'm left out of the office politics as pretty much everyone else is 'a part of the group' except me, is I'm even more concerned about my future in Korea as this is an E2 visa.

Now the school supposedly is about 'better business', but it's clear they can develop head games and grievances too, and there's more on that so plz read on.

In late December, after a student or two made some bogus complaints about me, which later didn't even materialize into much anything (and by the way no one supported me on), I basically asked my two managers if they want to replace me with another teacher which they said no. Then approx Jan 13 I basically put in a verbal resignation and asked that as a good business agreement I would ask for may pay and a good letter of release and would be happy to continue work for just a bit more until they safely find another teacher. Their first reply was "well we thought your classes are going well."

Here's the somewhat strange part -- they said that if they write a release letter, they are still not sure if immigration will actually approve of the letter and furthermore they said they want to "write a detailed explanation of WHY they made the release letter" (i.e. by the sounds of it write their personal opinions on me) and just as well they asked me WHAT school would I be going to next so they could 'talk' with future people. When I told them 2 or 3 times a release letter could really be a simple couple of lines, they only finally relented. (This is especially concerning because in the past, my boss made a bogus low-blow shot by saying or asking "maybe you don't have an aptitude to work with children" of which I can tell you, I certainly don't agree. He also made that comment shortly after my K coworker did an unloading gossip about me, as I can see where his source is.)

Currently, today again my Korean co worker in her ever-so-fake way said something to me, of which she caught me in a stressed and tired state and our exchange was less than 'superb' by her demanding standards, and once again I heard her ranting in the hallway about me.

I can add that it appears the bosses for some reason support her well.

Questions.... I don't want to find myself fired and exiting Korea so I want to ask because I am still new in this racket. Is this just another day, is practically everyone going through this and should I not even think or worry about it? In my feelings, I feel like they are going to try to screw me in the worst way possible -- like not only I might get fired, but they would try to purposely ruin my future existence in Korea.

On the one hand I feel like there's this horrible wave of hate coming from them in secret, but they're even making it worse by, instead of just telling me to my face what they think, it's like they just want to build it all up so far that either I the teacher would just break, or they'd have all this 'evidence' (bogus complaints, gossips) that even an innocent teacher couldn't survive in it. On the other hand I'm wondering, is this just another day at the office, is most everyone going through that sporadically or regularly and should I just put it behind me, or is this indeed bad news?

There's plenty of little "classroom" gossip but that covers the basics well.

[the eye]

wow, cellphone, i feel for ya.
it sounds like you have a real draining situation.

one thing that seems to be common in korean working relationships is some degree of behind the back shenanigans. especially for you the lowly foreigner, who will never be part of the group. it's a fact.
i have never had to endure it to the degree you have described, but i think most people on this board can attest to some similar experience.

in my experience, when i knew things were going well, i noticed that there was absolutely no positive feedback. conversely the only way i ever became aware that my performance wasn't up to standard, was when the general air of tension surrounded my dealings with management and korean staff.
it wasn't until something completely major arose, that i would hear about it face to face.

one thing, tho, with regard to the release letter you asked for, you cannot be released from a job by going down to immigration alone with a letter. you were wrong when you told your director you could be released that way.
if you give notice, you must accompany your director to immi and apply for the release together. the only way you can take a letter and get results by yourself, is if they fire you.
in this case, you can take a letter saying that they fired you and that will release you from your E2. the school must notify immi that they fire you within 72 hours.

now back to the job front.
i'm wondering if, you having been here for 3months, whether you are experiencing your first bout of homesickness. it can strike around this amount of time.
it did with me.
while you may not 'miss' home, per se, it may be manifesting itself in the emotions you feel about your situation.
yes, they all sound like they are all being major pricks at work, sure, but is there a chance that you are making more of it than it should be.

after all, according to what you just wrote, the boss has never criticized your teaching.
and when you asked if they wanted to replace you, they said no.

if they wanted to fire you, they could do it easily,as you have not passed the 6month benchmark. they could fire you without notice, or warning, and you would also have to pay them back for your airfare.
after 6months, firing you is not so easy to do according to labor law.

i think that is what they meant by wanting to write their opinions in that release letter you asked for. they were probably confused by your request in that the only letter you can take to immi on your own is a termination letter. and since the business did not NEED to let you go, they had to stipulate some reason for 'terminating' you.

i want to focus on this 'homesickness/culture shock" mumbo because i hear a constant echo of paranoia in your post. yes, they are not cool at your job, and yes they may be backstabbers and all that...but if they wanted to get rid of you, they could do it in a flash.

even if they did fire you, they can't ruin any future you may have working in korea. the only way they could do that is if you broke the law.

i find the only way i can get feedback around my place of employment is to use the old Kim Dae Jung sunshine policy. In other words, play the nice to their face routine, even tho you want to strangle them.

maybe you need to sit down with your boss and try to clear the air and any misunderstandings that exist between you. then, you can get a better feel for where you stand... in...or out.

with regards to your foreign coworkers, forget 'em. they are happy in their bubbles.
do you have a good foreigner base around you? that;s what you need!...and a hobby too. i mean that in the most sincerest of ways.

[cellphone]

glad to get some feedback. was out trying to take a walk this evening and just couldn't shake the stress.

actually I was in Korea for several months before I started to do work, was doing the goshiwon thing and living cheaply, pretty much on my own dime, but then decided to finally find a hogwan. right now I don't think I'm going through homesickness so much anymore in as much as 'profound adjustment difficulties.' since this is my first contract in Korea, in a way it's like being new, to how Korea works and also, what is what and who is who. like I don't know anything. but yah those difficulties are semi-related to homesickness but perhaps a different branch, not like the emotion of yearning for home, but more the frustration and then feeling how unfair it is, trying hard and harder but then sort of failing. so very new to the system, but used to the daily living.

Having a workplace you feel you don't fit in is like having salt on the wounds.

regarding what you were saying near the top, about doing very well but not getting good praise; and also doing under par and building up an air with management... well it almost seems like I'm getting both! throw in the fact that the main boss is known to be the type who refuses to say things to your face and it only leads me to suspect even more possibility that things are rolling against me. and unfairly!

on the one hand, yah there's been a few random students say bogus things, and OF COURSE it was held against me so strangely that it almost makes you want to laugh, but on the other hand with the K teacher saying things about me, as well as the sort of increased straight face, smugness and closed door behavior I'm getting from my two uppers, I can't help but really think they not only are more against me but are simply just waiting for me to dig the grave. what's worse is that it seems so unfair.

being new means I have that fresh, energetic go-get-em approach and that I want to make sure I do as well as I can. which makes it only seem that much more unfair.

regarding all the ambivalence. yah, on the one hand they said 'no' when I asked if they wanted to replace me. but then basically I thought it might be because they're just getting their money's worth out of the new teacher. and their inability to take a stand could mean let the new teacher mess up more so any actions would be easier, or else they'd be more justified.

regarding the nervousness you mentioned, yah I'll keep it in mind and I hope you're right that I'm being overly nervous.

hmm I see, when they mentioned writing 'reasons' a release letter I thought they were implying they might try to get crooked on me. I didn't know immigration needs explanations for a release when a teacher isn't fired.

[Blind Willie]

Give your notice. You're less than mud there. No air-clearing is going to help you now.

Take a trip outside of the country for a week to clear your mind. I'd suggest Japan, it's a fun place if you got the cash.

Then get a new job and learn how to be a good office politician. Kiss ass with everyone: Korean and foreign. THAT'S the secret to doing well in Korea. You are not a teacher (And if you are, you shouldnt be in a hagwon), you are a businessman working in an office. Education truely is secondary.

[Derrek]

Sorry to hear it's going rough for you, CP....

For what it's worth, a letter of release doesn't need to say a darned thing about why you are being released. There used to be a copy of one on www.efl-law.com in English. I used it when I left my last job, and had a friend translate to Korean. The place signed it for me, since neither of us were sure I'd need the release given that I was on a 6-month probationary visa due to getting busted for illegal teaching at another school. By the way, "SEAL" means that Do-jang thingie they make red ink-stamps with.

Here it is:

LETTER OF RELEASE
Letter of Consent to Release Foreign English Teacher
Name of Teacher:
Nationality:
Passport No.:
Address:
Telephone No.:

The above-person has been working at our school/academy from __________ to _______________ in the position of Foreign English teacher. We hereby give our consent to the transfer of said person to work for another English school/academy.

Dated: _____, 2003
Name of English Academy
Address of School
_______________________________
Representative
/SEAL/



Now in Korean (if this works):

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�ܱ��� ������� �絵 ���Ǽ�
������ �̸�
����
���ǹ�ȣ.:
�ּ�
��ȭ��ȣ:

���� ����� ���� �п����� _____ ���� _______ ���� ������ ���� �ϼ̽��ϴ�. �׷��Ƿ� ����� �� ����� �ٸ� �����п��̳� �б����� ���� �� �ִٰ� �����մϴ�.


��¥: _____, 2003
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_______________________________
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[the eye]

Cellphone,

the release.
if you give notice, your employer must agree to let you go. and you both go down to immi together. no reasons necessary, just fill out the release letter that Derrek posted.

if you are fired, you can go to immi alone. but to expedite the process, it helps if you can take a short letter saying they have fired you, and that your are thereby released from your visa.

after reading your reply, i have to agree with Blind Willie.
maybe you should put in your notice, wait for a new teacher, and make a fresh start.
you have 9 months to go. no sense in stressing yourself out with a bunch of attitudes.

in an unrelated aside...
yesterday, two of my students told the boss that i tried to cut one of their face's with one of her little box cutter knife thingies.
one girl was cutting up a handout i gave them with questions on it. i was explaining the vocabulary and saw her cutting it.

i have all kinds of discipline problems with this class. elementary 6 smart asses. their english is excellent, but this particular girl has other problems.

i stopped, walked over to her and said "what are you doing?" she started to close the knife and reach across her little bratty friend's desk to put it in a pencil case..
i continued saying "This is a study paper, not play paper. If you want to cut something, cut your own things, ok?"
as i'm saying this, i reached for the knife to keep her from temptation, at the same time she was reaching to put it away. i was moving slow, because it was a knife, but when my hand touched it, it fell to the floor.

next thing i know, during a break, 2 classes later, i am getting dirty looks from the korean teacher who takes over that class after i am finished.

apparently i tried to cut the girls's face with that knife.
the two girls said that's what they saw.

korean student's, their parent's and some korean teacher's think we are animals. i rarely recieve the same consideration or respect from my students regarding their behavior or how they speak to me.

anyway, my point is...in such a situation like this...what's with the dirty looks? immaturity carries right on into adulthood, i see.
open your judgemental trap and ask me what happened.

[Derrek]

And do it in both Korean an English.

I think the Korean one is the valid one.

[Zenpickle]

[cellphone]

Appreciate the release letter copy/link Derrek and Zp. I'm not even there yet but hopefully it will be useful.

Eye... well my own stress level isn't going down and frankly feeling like I don't want to be there one more day unless perhaps they give me an official date they can find a new person for a smooth transition. On a side note, one of the foreign teachers is bothering me with discomforting attitude. Both of them just don't relate to me whether it's about new guy vs. experienced, or personal lifestyle. They both seem to think my experience is a bit of a joke. Otherwise i have no clue what's on in their minds and don't think i will. I don't know if this is all a simple big misunderstanding that isn't so bad, or if it really is underlined with bad will. But to me I've already explained the way it sure seems, and that's having the big impact for pretty much the last 3 months that isn't going away at all.

One manager mentioned to me on Friday they finally contacted the school headquarters in Seoul to find a new teacher but 'they haven't gotten back to us yet.' Unfortunately my office staff are known for not getting things done quick, for sure.

Agreement versus fired. One thing... that immigration thing sure doesn't make sense huh? I mean the guy that does everything right has to go through the extra trouble of convincing his former boss to go all the way to immig. While the guy who just gets fired can do it alone with no pleading to his boss.

Also, I'm far away from any immigration office, nearest one they use is like 1 hr+ car ride away on the highway (i know, we went once). looks like I am really going to have to do some bargaining to get my boss to go there again with me all for the purpose of release. One office person lives near there so that might be my only chance to work a deal on getting them to go together, otherwise what other way could I tempt them to go?

Also, let's say my stress got so high that all hope is loss, as it's a real possibility lately. I wonder what the ramifications would be if I just got fired but still went through with the release letter. (maybe just tell a co-worker or someone bothering me to just 'piss off' or otherwise just really let them have it for once). guess I could still stay in country and look for another job? i wonder, because those are real possibilities with stress and discomfort being high and a few people around the office that sure either don't seem to be aware of it or else do, and enjoy it. But whatever the case I need to look at both a smooth release versus a quick cut with less than favorable conditions.

anyways, thank god it's saturday. will post more if anything happens.

btw on that scissors incident, yah i can sort of imagine. the accident, the hurt feelings, the teardrop, the child who knows they were in some sort of wrong but needed a way to get out of it, and then the complaint to someone who would accept their view, perhaps? hmmm... that's what it sounded like as I read it.

[the eye]

getting fired will certainly suit your needs for a quick escape, but immigration doesn't look on it favourably.
not that it would happen again at your next job, but if it did, immi would have a hard time granting a third visa.
so, while it seems like the guy who gets fired has it easier, that's not the case in the long run.
if you want to use this route and have the boss fire you, then don't DO anything to deserve it...just ask him to write a letter like i mentioned could be done. he could write a letter terminating you for "managerial" reasons for example. he can then phone immigration to confirm and thus cancel your visa. or you could have immi phone him.

a better way to make your exit, is to wait until a new teacher is found. when one arrives, your boss MUST make a trip to immi to apply for the new visa.
you can accompany him and be released from yours at the same time.
in order to open a new visa, your school must cancel an existing one. each school only gets a set number of visa slots depending on how many students they enroll.

i would favor the second alternative.
you can still tell those dolts to piss off on your way out the door.

[Derrek]

FYI...

Don't burn bridges if you don't have to. Just don't.

I could have burned a bridge with my first hagwon, but they were really quite good and fair to me, although the ending made me a little sad. Three months later, I dropped by just to say, "hi" and my former boss was asking if I could work for him because the wonderboy former movie actor they'd hired was causing major problems because he told some of the kids off (in Korean) and told them never to come back. Truth is, knowing who he was teaching at the time, some of those kids needed a good spanking! I'm not sure the ins and outs of the deal, but the guy was going to be gone in six months, and the boss wanted me to fill in. That made me feel good.

And more important, I needed a letter from him to get this job that I now have. Had I burned a bridge, that wouldn't have happened, or I would have hated asking for it.

[phaedrus]

[captain kirk]

Sure love reading your post there, cellphone. You describe very well, almost 'acutely', the uneasiness (almost as if one was actually there) and 'unreality' about working in a haggie. I say 'acute' (which is a 'bad word' in my opinion; it can imply 'hypertense') with a kind of admiration. I experience exactly the same feelings about management, and co-workers, but I press 'delete' on these perceptions. I mean I let them go. The 'treatment', which you so vividly describe, is real. But I've learned not to dwell on it, since it would drive me crazy. Crazy anxious enough to have it start to mess with my self-esteem. I mean, a foreigner is outnumbered, right? So my 'solution' is to identify the input as bogus/corrupt/tainted/manipulative/designed, 'custom tailored' to wear one down, and press 'delete'. As in, this is not going to work, guys, nice try, hehe. Yeah, like it's a game. And it is, to them.
I've heard a poster respond to someone's being in a state about manipulations (late in the game, he'd been there TWO years) with something like, 'get with the program, buddy, you're a contract to the boss, that's it'.
So, yeah, re; you're asking, after your original post, 'is this normal, are other people experiencing this?'. I'd say yes.
Here's a 'kooky analogy', but it's the best I've got, just came off the top of my head. Do you know those antenna array satellite/radio telescope dishes out in the SW American desert, used for SETI. Well, they're out on a desert plain there, and can all be rotated in synch, thought they're individual dishes, to focus on one area of sky.
Well when 'the contract' walks into the school, from hiring to even the dinner party held in his or her honour after one year of work at the haggie, those folks are like those dish antennas. They are 'unified' in that the general line, the groupthink line, is 'this is the contract, maintain him/her, but give them 'the treatment'. So they track the foreign teacher, the shiny surfaces on task.
The 'treatment' is the result, be it deliberate or not (I don't think it's a deliberate 'conditioning program' on their part, haha), of what you're experiencing. And the effect, if one lets it get to them, is saying to the (who appears to be ambivalent, secretly disdainful) boss, 'well, do you want another teacher, then'. Which feels really awful, doesn't it. But it means they've 'got to you'. One feels 'devalued'. This 'works for them' because there is the severence, and other standard things which, to them, are 'asking too much'. So if the foreign teacher is worn down by 'the treatment', they won't be in a condition to stand up for their contractual 'rights'. Let them slide as the will is 'drained out of them'.
And the foreign teacher becomes a zombie, haha.

[Grotto]

I'm with the Captain on this one.

Hogwans seem to love playing mind games, telling you how they can replace you, there are complaints, the academy is losing students. All of these things are designed to basically shut you up and make you feel that your job is not safe and that you arent doing as good of a job as you should.

Last hogwan I was in kept telling us that we were losing students the entire year. Myself and the other teacher there compared our attendance sheets and some of the students that they had told us left actually only changed classes and that over the course of a year they actually increased their overall enrollment by about 60-70 students.

Its a game, just dont play, if they insist you play insist on proof.

[captain kirk]

Cellphone, I don't know if you've ever thought about this. I do when I see your writing here on the forum about your experiences at your school. That is you portray it so vividly, with a kind of 'objective equanimity', and the sense coming out that, basically, you're saner than everybody you work with. At least the personna in the writing comes off as being more grounded, but not arrogant...just curious. It's really an accessible read. So what I mean is it would be something special if you made a kind of 'ongoing reportage', and kept it. I've never seen anyone portray haggie life so well, really.