Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Cathy OB]

Has anyone had any experience working at an English Village? Are there any that anyone would recommend?
Thanks

[Dude Love]

-Seoul English Village is overall a great place to be but the head teacher is so repulsive in so many ways. He takes an otherwise enjoyable experience and makes it intolerable. The one is Suyu offers a better package anyhow.

[Cheonmunka]

What's this place in Suyu. It's not up a road that heads to a buddhist temple on Pukhansan is it?

[mmstyle]

Repulsive?

How is it working/living on campus, etc.?

[UncleAlex]

After having seen the film 'The Village' I stay away from those eerie
places.

[Dude Love]

Overall it's not bad here but yes, the head teacher is habitually rude, vulgar, dishonest and regularly makes a fool of himself with his ridiculous illusions of grandeur and yelling at staff and kids.
As for the job itself, it isn't particularly difficult but won't really contribute to your professional formation. The job posting says it's centrally located which is completely false. Teachers' rooms are on campus yet we're not allowed there during free periods. There are also pointless meetings every single day outside of working hours. Of the 35 foreign staff members hardly anyone renewed after a year and I'll be happy to finally leave this place. The Suyu village pays much more for a nearly identical contract.

[jacl]

[Hotpants]

If you are on Stephen Krashen's mailing list, you may have recently received the following message referring to the status of such English 'villages'. If not, I'll paste it here because it's interesting:


English Villages: Not a Good Investment
Sent to the Taipei Times, April 19, 2006

The Taipei Times has published two articles recently
on the Paju English Village, one of ten in South Korea
(��English village in Korea,�� April 18; ��English only
in South Korea��s teaching towns,�� April 5). These
��towns�� are, we are told, real communities in which
only English can be spoken, a place where students of
English can go to practice their English and feel like
they ��have left Korea behind.��

The Korean government enthusiastically supports
English Villages because they feel they will diminish
the number of Koreans who go abroad (or who send their
children abroad) to improve their English, a drain on
the Korean economy and a better bargain for parents,
who pay about $1,5000 US or about $50,000 NT for a
four week course for their children. According to the
Taipei Times articles, the Korean government paid $90
million US (about $3 billion NT) just to set up the
Paju village, which employs 70 staff and 100 full time
teachers, which probably means a payroll of at least 5
million US dollars ($160 million NT) per year.

But the two articles leave some important points out.
First, the villages are not real. The buildings are
simulations of banks, post offices, airline offices,
etc. and the interactions are simulations: The
��residents�� of the English village in Korea are
actually English teachers trained to play different
roles, such as policemen. (An ad for English teachers
for the Seoul English village mentions that the
teachers will also be trained to act as doctors! See
http://www.eslcafe.com/jobs/korea/index.cgi?read=16024.)

Second, to my knowledge, there have been no formal
evaluations of the English Villages. We have no idea
if they are really helping children acquire English.

Third, contrary to the claims that they save money,
English Villages are very expensive. The Paju school
has a maximum capacity of 550 students. If the other
nine schools have a similar capacity, that means the
schools can deal with about 6000 children per month,
or 60,000 per year. A total of 12 million children
are in school in Korea, with at least six million in
grades in which English is taught. Thus, English
Villages can, at best, impact one percent of the
children who are in English classes.

In other words, Korea is paying an enormous amount of
money to provide an untested English experience to
just one percent of its school-age children, an
experience limited to children whose parents can come
up with the tuition money. Other countries should
think twice before investing in English Villages.

Stephen Krashen
Professor Emeritus
University of Southern California




English village in Korea
TaipeiTimes, April 18


Speaking Korean is not allowed at the Paju English
Village, a huge English camp near Seoul, South Korea,
that immerses its students in an all-English
environment. But this is more than just a language
camp. It is a real community made to look like an
English village where hundreds of people live, eat,
sleep, shop and learn.
The Paju English Village is built on a 277,000m2 piece
of land, and is the world's biggest English immersion
camp, boasting its own bar, bookstore, bakery,
restaurant, bank, theater and even a city hall.
Electric buses drive along the main street, which
branches off to classrooms and houses for 550 Korean
students and 70 staff, as well as 100 teachers from
various English-speaking countries. Korean is outlawed
and even written signs are not allowed.
"We wanted to create an environment where students
feel they left Korea behind," said Jeffrey Jones, head
of the Paju camp.
Tens of thousands of young Koreans go abroad every
year as they try to learn to speak English. In an
attempt to reduce the outward flow, and to provide
another choice for people who can't afford the trip,
English villages are starting to appear across South
Korea. Ten of these villages have already opened since
2004, and at least four more are expected to open
soon.
Jones said the village allowed its Korean residents to
speak in Korean only twice a day over meals, while
making them speak English the rest of the time.
The Gyeonggi Province government, which owns the Paju
camp, pioneered the huge immersion language program in
South Korea by building the first English-only village
in 2004 at a cost of 85 billion won (NT$2.88 billion).
(AFP)



English only in South Korea's teaching towns Taipei
Times, April 5, 2006
"English! English!" said Nathan Glensne, an American
teacher, gently scolding a Korean schoolgirl who broke
rule No. 1.
Speaking Korean is banned in this English-only village
that has sprung up somewhat incongruously from the
paddy fields of this rice-growing region north of
Seoul as part of a linguistic experiment pioneered in
South Korea.
"The rule is to speak English," said Chicago-born
Glensne to his shy and giggling pupils as they
shuffled between their kitchen tables and his desk to
ask in English for cooking materials to make Mexican
nachos.
"Sometimes the kids are a bit sneaky. They go behind
the teacher's back and tell their friends something in
Korean."
The Paju English village is more than a language theme
park. It is a real village of bricks and mortar
modeled on an English village where hundreds of people
live, eat, sleep, shop and learn.
It sits on a 277,000m2 plot of land, the world's
biggest English immersion camp, boasting its own
brewery pub, bookstore, bakery, restaurant, bank and
theater along a main street that leads to a big
domed-city hall.
Electric trams run through the main boulevard, which
branches off to classrooms and houses to accommodate
100 teachers and 70 staff from various
English-speaking countries and 550 students. Korean is
outlawed and even written signs are banned.
"We wanted to create an environment where students
feel they left Korea behind," said Jeffrey Jones, head
of the Paju camp.
Jones, former head of the American Chamber of Commerce
in Korea, said Koreans really need a change to their
English education which focuses too much on grammar,
reading and vocabulary.
"They spend a lot of time learning English. They can
read probably better than I can, but they have trouble
speaking," he said. "One of the things we do here is
we break the wall of fear. They learn not to be afraid
and they learn to speak."
Tens of thousands of young Koreans head overseas every
year in the quest to speak a language that is valued
in a country that relies heavily on foreign trade.
In an attempt to reduce or even reverse the outward
flow, and to provide an alternative to people who
can't afford the trip, English villages are sprouting
across South Korea.
Ten such state-subsidized villages have already opened
nationwide since 2004 and at least four more expect to
be up and running soon.
Jones said the village allowed its Korean residents to
talk in their native tongue only twice a day over
meals while forcing them to speak English the rest of
the time through a tight student-teacher ratio.
The exotic village environment appeals to many Korean
students. "It is really wonderful to have first-hand
experience in English," said Kim Su-jung, 14, one of
200 middle school girls on an 80,000 won (US$82)
week-long program.
At the bank, Lim Chan-ju beamed after completing an
assignment to withdraw US$20 using English only with
the American clerk.
"I don't think my English-speaking capability has
suddenly improved a lot here. But I feel English now
is more interesting and I am more comfortable with
it," Lim said. "I hope I can come here again."
The Gyeonggi Province government, owner of the Paju
camp, pioneered the mammoth immersion language program
in South Korea by building the first English-only
village in Ansan on the country's west coast in 2004.
It spent 85 billion won (US$86 million) in building
the Paju camp and set aside 15 billion to 20 billion
won to run it, said Kim Joo-han, the executive
director supervising the program.
Students appear to be keen to acquire the skills
needed to succeed in a highly competitive South Korean
society.
"Korean students are very eager. They have a lot of
enthusiasm. I think there's a lot of pressure to learn
English," said Tara Hornung, a 28-year-old Canadian
teacher.
.In South Korea, students begin learning English in
third grade, aged nine, and continue all the way to
college. It is common for students to spend extra
hours on English at private institutes after school.
Many choose to go abroad, usually with their mothers,
while fathers stay behind in Korea to finance their
costly overseas tuition.
A total of 192,200 South Koreans were studying abroad
last year, according to the Ministry of Education, 60
percent in English-speaking countries.
The real figure could be considerably higher, experts
say, because some go abroad without an education visa.
Foreign study costs Koreans billions of dollars,
according to the government.
Local media put the figure at around US$10 billion per
year, but the Bank of Korea estimates the figure
conservatively at US$3.37 billion last year, up from
US$1.07 billion in 2001.
"It would be much bigger if the undeclared small
amounts of remittances were included," said Lee
Sun-deok, an official handling current account data at
the bank.
Parents view it as money well spent. English
proficiency has become increasingly important for
Korean job seekers. Interviews conducted in English
are common at big-name companies like Samsung
Electronics, Hyundai Motor and LG Philips.
But a visit to the English-only village comes cheaper.
A four-week English village program costs 1.4 million
won, while a three-week language course in the US or
Canada costs at least 5.1 million won, according to
YBM Sisa Overseas Education Service, which plans
overseas education trips.

[Hotpants]

I think the concept of English 'villages' is a very interesting one. In theory it sounds like an ideal program for both parents and kids alike. However, it's hard to see how they can attract the best quality instructors to such programs. With a few years behind me now, I really don't think I could muster the va va voom of an entertainer-cum-'teacher' (although all teaching jobs in Korea seem to require that ghastly edutainment factor.) It has all the makings of a holiday camp, with a very claustrophobic feel for the mature teacher. I wouldn't do it whatever the pay.

[Unreal]

My supervisor told me lately that they wanted to start an English village at my school, which I thought sounded pretty cool...until I heard that the model they're basing it on is the one in Jeonju and he said that none of the Korean teachers (I'm not sure about native speakers) signed on for another year there because they didn't even get weekends off. They asked my supervisor to do it but he refused because of the lack of time off. So instead of giving people time off they are giving willing teachers more "promotion points" for those who want to fast track their teaching career in order to lure teachers to the village. I think the idea is good but the implementation (at least of those I know of) is still distinctly Korean.

[Hotpants]

Yeah, I don't know how they can sustain enough staff. For anyone who's done just one summer camp, it's hard to imagine having to repeat it every month thereafter...

Then again, if you read the article, it does say that the referred camp had an 'onsite brewery/pub'. I wonder if teachers are allowed a bevvy from it to recuperate... For me, permanent intoxication would perhaps allow me the perfect excuse to slip into the various roleplay characters needed for the village...

Perhaps the next step is running a program to allow kids to stay at their teachers' homes

[seoulsista]

I would love to hear from one of the Paju teachers. Anyone out there?

[Yu_Bum_suk]

My school district has one and I know all the foreigners and one Korean who work there. Overall it seems like a good place to work and, if in or not too far from a major city, would be an excellent place for a first-timer to start. They do get some elementary kids, which aren't my cup of tea, and most from what I gather don't bring in high school kids.

The one huge draw-back that I'd find to such a job is getting to know a small group of kids really well over a week and then never seeing them again.

[hcmm12]

If anyone has more information on the Paju Village that would be great. I have an interview with them later this week and I have been having a hard time finding information or reviews from teachers because of how new it is. Thanks in advance.

[akisara]