Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Saxiif]

This is intended as a resource for people (including me) to get a better sense of what is out there.

Kindy Hagwon: just teaching kindy, some of these places are much more serious than other and some attempt real English immersion for the little kids.
Pros: No lesson planning.
Cons: Fingers shoved up your ass.

Kindy/Elementary Hagwon: Hagwon with elementary and kiddies.
Pros: Gives you a bit of a change of pace.
Cons: High likelihood of split shifts, fingers shoved up your ass.

Standard Elementary Hagwon: standard hagwons, varying greatly in quality from glorfied babysitting to curriculums that actually make sense.
Pro: So damn many of them its easy to get a job teaching at one of these places just about anywhere.
Con: Game teacher, game!

English camps: Don't know much about these
Pro: ???
Con: ???

Gimmick Elementary Hagwon: Hagwons trying to do get more kids by doing some kind of gimmicky curriculum. Some of these include doing science experiments with second graders or teaching them the difference between different forms of American town government.
Pros: They have different ideas.
Cons: Often the ideas don't make any sense.

Korean Curriculum Hagwon: There's a hell of a lot more of these than most foreigners realize. I think that they outnumber the kind of kiddie hagwons that most foreigners teach at. They generally teach every subject in the Korean public school curriculum and help kids cram for the specific upcoming test and thus they follow the curriculum of the Korean public schools very closely. They usually have lots of middle school and highschool kids, big class sizes and have very few foreign teachers or none at all.
Pros: ???
Cons: ???

Public Schools: This market is expanding quickly and is good for giving waygooks more options.
Pros: Public schools don't go bankrupt, usually better hours/more vacation.
Cons: Having to wake up in the morning. Ugh.

Test-prep Hagwon: There's lots of these and most waygooks don't know about them since most of the staff are gyopos or American-educated Korean citizens. They help get students ready for American school entrance exams by teaching them SAT and TOEFL stuff. They usually only hire Americans from at least fairly prestigious schools (if you're not Tier One in US New & World Report most of the SAT test prep places don't want you) and often hire people who haven't graduated yet.
Pros: 30,000 won/hour is the standard starting salary, which is a hell of a lot better than making 2 million/month. In the summer you can make 4 million/month doing this easily. Since the work is very seasonal and there's a high turnover if you stick around for more than a year or two you have a good shot at getting promoted by default and making some more $$$.
Con: Very seaonal work, boring as all hell to teach.

Unigwon: Non-credit English classes in universities.
Pros: Get to teach older students without horrific split shifts, usually good hours.
Cons: Usually don't pay that well.

University: Teaching position in universities.
Pros: Get to teach older students without horrific split shifts, usually good hours.
Cons: Usually need some sort of actual qualifications

Adult Hagwon: Usually teach conversation classes to adults. A lot of people get tired to herding kids who these places can get teachers fairly easily.
Pros: No screaming kids.
Cons: You'll probably be given split shifts from hell.

Corporate: working for a company to teach the staff English. I have no idea what qualifications one needs to get one of these jobs.
Pros: Lots of $$$ apparently.
Cons: ???

Will edit in information about the kinds of jobs I don't know much about as people post...

Any ones I missed?

[Pak Yu Man]

This is intended as a resource for people (including me) to get a better sense of what is out there.

Kindy Hagwon: just teaching kindy, some of these places are much more serious than other and some attempt real English immersion for the little kids.
Pros: No lesson planning.
Cons: Fingers shoved up your ass.

Kindy/Elementary Hagwon: Hagwon with elementary and kiddies.
Pros: Gives you a bit of a change of pace.
Cons: High likelihood of split shifts, fingers shoved up your ass.

Standard Elementary Hagwon: standard hagwons, varying greatly in quality from glorfied babysitting to curriculums that actually make sense.
Pro: So damn many of them its easy to get a job teaching at one of these places just about anywhere.
Con: Game teacher, game!

English camps: Don't know much about these
Pro: Easy to find, good first time experience
Con: Dorm rooms with kids. Hellish schedule

Gimmick Elementary Hagwon: Hagwons trying to do get more kids by doing some kind of gimmicky curriculum. Some of these include doing science experiments with second graders or teaching them the difference between different forms of American town government.
Pros: They have different ideas.
Cons: Often the ideas don't make any sense.

Korean Curriculum Hagwon Ipshi Hakwon: There's a hell of a lot more of these than most foreigners realize. I think that they outnumber the kind of kiddie hagwons that most foreigners teach at. They generally teach every subject in the Korean public school curriculum and help kids cram for the specific upcoming test and thus they follow the curriculum of the Korean public schools very closely. They usually have lots of middle school and highschool kids, big class sizes and have very few foreign teachers or none at all.
Pros: better schedule, usually evening/night only
Cons: [color]apathetic kids(more so than regular schools)[/color]

Public Schools: This market is expanding quickly and is good for giving waygooks more options.
Pros: Public schools don't go bankrupt, usually better hours/more vacation.much less change of hakwony things happening to you
Cons: Having to wake up in the morning. Ugh.

Test-prep Hagwon: There's lots of these and most waygooks don't know about them since most of the staff are gyopos or American-educated Korean citizens. They help get students ready for American school entrance exams by teaching them SAT and TOEFL stuff. They usually only hire Americans from at least fairly prestigious schools (if you're not Tier One in US New & World Report most of the SAT test prep places don't want you) and often hire people who haven't graduated yet.
Pros: 30,000 won/houror more is the standard starting salary, which is a hell of a lot better than making 2 million/month. In the summer you can make 4 million/month doing this easily. Since the work is very seasonal and there's a high turnover if you stick around for more than a year or two you have a good shot at getting promoted by default and making some more $$$.
Con: Very seaonal work, boring as all hell to teach.

Unigwon: Non-credit English classes in universities.
Pros: Get to teach older students without horrific split shifts, usually good hours.
Cons: Usually don't pay that well.

University: Teaching position in universities.
Pros: Get to teach older students without horrific split shifts, usually good hours.
Cons: Usually need some sort of actual qualifications

Adult Hagwon: Usually teach conversation classes to adults. A lot of people get tired to herding kids who these places can get teachers fairly easily.
Pros: No screaming kids.
Cons: You'll probably be given split shifts from hell.

Corporate: working for a company to teach the staff English. I have no idea what qualifications one needs to get one of these jobs.
Pros: Lots of $$$ apparently.50k min an hour or don't bother. I've had 100k and hour gigs before
Cons: Same schedule as an adult school


helped you out a bit. My information is about 5 years old. Prices seem to be the same anyways.