How to Teach in Korea in 3 Easy Steps

A steadily increasing number of you have asked me how you too can teach English in Korea. I suppose there aren't too many jobs floating around in the United States or something.

Well, at the moment there are a lot of "Teaching English as a Foreign Language" jobs in Korea.

First, the basics. There are three sorts of TEFL jobs in Korea:

1. Public Schools
2. Hagwons (privately owned academies)
3. Universities

Next, the details.

You do NOT want to teach at a hagwon.

I don't quite understand why anyone does. Hagwons are where parents send their children after school in a desperate attempt to boost their child's chance at success, at the cost of their child's happiness. My students attend classes from 8:20 am to as late as 11pm. They're exhausted and not especially prepared to learn when they're falling asleep on their desks. From a pedagogical perspective, I'm not sure if hagwons are effective or not, but, as someone once said, "Just because torture works, doesn't mean it's right." Which is not to fault the teachers (and my friends) who work at hagwons: some just didn't know; others are merely meeting market demand.

So, though the public school day lasts only six hours, the after-school school day can last until 10 or 11pm for a third grader. After school and during vacations children attend hagwons -- private academies. As my friend Lauren writes (she's so much better at expressing indignation):

"During vacations, students go to their academies (one for every subject), taking extra classes all day long. And then of course have homework all night. This is on top of the homework assigned by their public school teachers for vacation. They literally have no break from studying. From the time they are 6 until the time they finish high school, they will be studying continuously without one break - they do these classes during the summer vacation too. It's absurd. How do they not crack and go crazy?! No wonder there is little excitement in my students during our classes. It's because they're just off to more classes after I'm done with them."

Lauren continues, "On top of the normal subjects they study, they also generally study 2 instruments, art, and sometimes Chinese or Japanese on top of English. Beyond that, I have students (13 years old) studying computer programming. Every night of the week she tells me she spends 2 hours working on her programming homework. SHE IS THIRTEEN."

As far as actually teaching at a hagwon, it's not the best situation. There are a few excellent hagwons, but most are run by Koreans with little international experience. They're running a business and you're their commodity. They'll pay you about what a public school pays you, but you'll have to teach twice as much (up to 40 hours a week), either in the early mornings or after school into the late evenings. Hagwons are notorious for dodging their responsibilities to you, like paying your pension, deducting the correct amount of taxes, paying you on time, offering you a clean, sanitary, furnished apartment.

Yes, I'm describing the worst possible scenario -- not all hagwons are hellholes. Some are reputable, friendly and treat you well. But it's not worth the risk, especially when there's such an obvious alternative.

You DO want to teach at public schools.

Public schools are not profit driven. That makes them immediately better.

• You'll teach 22 hours a week at the maximum, though you may be required to stay at school a full 40 hours a week. I've heard of people using that time for naps, for side projects, for reading, for dying of boredom, etc. How you use your free time is up to you. I recommend getting a laptop and reading all the free books available from Project Gutenberg.
• Your pay will be at least equivalent to the hagwons. Public schools pay you on time. My base wage is 2,000,000 won a month.
• You'll get anywhere from 2-6 weeks vacation (I've heard of people getting 8 weeks). Some districts pay that vacation, some pay part of it, some pay only two weeks of it.
• You may have to work summer or winter camps, but they'll pay you overtime for that. I made an extra 500-600,000 won off of camps this winter. That's on top of the base salary.
  
• They get a budget for hiring you, which includes paying for an apartment. Hopefully you'll be placed in a new apartment, like the teachers in my city were.
• You teach the state curriculum with a co-teacher, which means any curriculum development you do is voluntary.
• You're not contributing to student exhaustion, because public school is compulsory. The better you teach, the less need for a hagwon the parent perceives.

Universities require experience / certifications / advanced degrees. I'll let you know about those if I ever find out.

I recommend Footprints Recruiting to help you find a public school to teach at.

A few more tips:

• Do your own research. I spent probably 20 hours researching everything I could find about Korea and teaching here.
• For more information, look around on Dave's ESL Cafe. The forums are full of advice and good and bad experience.
• When you still have more questions (which you should, because even after all that research I was still unprepared for Korea), contact me.

My 2007th year of Western Culture

Inspired by Kyle, I offer a brief sketch of my past year to serve as a sort of Christmas letter and a reminder to myself of just how much I live.

In January I moved out on my own for the first time. I joined two roommates unlike any friends I'd known before. Casey sketched beautiful art on canvases littered about the room and taped emptied beer boxes to the wall in the shape of a palm tree, and bats swooping. Miles interned for the public defenders office and echoed the grandest music against my wall.

For Jan term I studied Chaos Theory applied to leadership, permanently changing the way I perceive individuals in groups. An example: when fish swim in those pulsating schools, veering from dolphins while never losing cohesion, they do not do so by any complex communication network or ordered steps like a marching band. Each fish acts as an individual guided by a few simple principles: go the same direction as the other fish, at the same speed, and don't bump into any other fish.

In Spring I undertook a pesca-ovo-vegetarian diet. I only eat meat if a host serves it, or if it would be rude to refuse it. My body had more health than ever. I also studied and accepted philosophies of community and pacifism. The philosophies' complexity befuddles me; even now I wrestle with conflicting desires for sustenance and mobility without harming others' with my food and fuel needs.

I continued my transformation into a proletariat by helping design a protest at Whitworth. It occurred on the 8th of May and its effects are continually visible. I interned at the Center for Justice. I didn't get much done, but I learned more about me (don't give me paperwork. It bewilders me).

I totaled my car. USAA, the insurance company, didn't pay for the whole car, so I'm still paying for a car I don't own.

In Summer I moved to New York City. I lived in Washington Heights and worked three food jobs. Clinton and Mike showed up the first week of August, but Mike left after three days. Clinton and I spent the rest of the month bumming around (I quit my jobs) and exploring. I left for a week on August 7th to visit Emily in Maine. I got to volunteer on an Island through Ripple Effect. I hitchhiked in four states when I left Maine, traveling through New Hampshire and Vermont and back into New York.

Fall I took a number of required courses, but did the bulk of my learning through blogs, outside readings and thinking. I wrote for the Whitworthian again.

I attended two conferences on sustainability and eucology on November 1, and November 2-5. The latter, Powershift '07, occurred outside D.C.. After panels and workshops on various topics like eco-pedagogy, green investing, mountain-top-removal and faith-based environmentalism, 3000 of the conference attendees proceeded to lobby meetings with most of the representatives and senators in congress. I met with aides from Maria Cantwell, Jim Reichart and Patty Murray's offices. I presented my learnings to Whitworth's Sustainability Committee.

On to 2008!

At it again

I'm blogging again, but over here.

I will likely begin writing on this blog again once I move to Poland. This and a travel blog? I don't know.

My interests right now: ecosophy, Herman Hesse, human collaboration.

As I finish at Whitworth, I feel ill-prepared to continue onto grad school. However, I feel ready to go.