Job front.
I'll be homeless soon. My current employer will only tell me that my final date is sometime between 12 and 20 October. I don't really want to be there any longer than I have to, but in exchange for a visa release document, I'm also agreeing not to be paid until my last day on the job. So, the sooner I leave the sooner I'll have some dough. However, I will be sans casa as soon as I leave the job, and won't have another until someone else gives me a job. I have an interview at one of the most famous elementary schools in Seoul, but the job wouldn't start until February. I can't go without a house or job for that long unless I live as an illegal for a few months and teach English lessons on the side while masquerading as a full-time tourist. The other option is holing up in Thailand or someplace like that where I can live on $50 a week until the job opens up. Or, I can settle and get a job teaching conversational English to businessmen - and I should be able to find one of those jobs whenever I want.
Unfortunately, contracts here only exist in year-long increments. So, do I settle for something that's still really cool and cushy (roughly 4.5 hours of teaching conversation classes [no prep], with 4 weeks vacation) or do I wait until February and take a job at a school where Korean celebrities send their kids (slightly less teaching time with 3 months vacation)? The latter option is in a hippie school that doesn't believe in walls.
At any rate, I have an interview tomorrow (Friday) night at 9, at this swank-looking conversation place. I seems a little plush, so if offered I'll probably take it. They take their employees to Hong Kong and Thailand every year as a bonus, and there are all kinds of other ways in which they pamper their staff.
Unfortunately, contracts here only exist in year-long increments. So, do I settle for something that's still really cool and cushy (roughly 4.5 hours of teaching conversation classes [no prep], with 4 weeks vacation) or do I wait until February and take a job at a school where Korean celebrities send their kids (slightly less teaching time with 3 months vacation)? The latter option is in a hippie school that doesn't believe in walls.
At any rate, I have an interview tomorrow (Friday) night at 9, at this swank-looking conversation place. I seems a little plush, so if offered I'll probably take it. They take their employees to Hong Kong and Thailand every year as a bonus, and there are all kinds of other ways in which they pamper their staff.
posted by Mark Hernandef at 9:59 PM
3 Comments:
From personal experience, teaching in a school without walls really, truly sucks.
I'd go with the cushy conversation one.
I totally agree with Valerie! I taught Saudi, Korean and Columbian college students when I was finishing up my degree at CSU (at the age of 50). The Koreans had no sense of humor! I always used Jabberwocky in my classes to show how we have fun with English. Korean's wanted grammer and more grammer like the grammer pill could make them clever English speakers. I always got "bonuses" from the Saudis and the Columbians. I stopped taking Korean students. They struck me as xenophobic. Go with plush and take advantage.
Ah, no way man. I'm totally staying put. If I could boil down two years of graduate study in folklore, it's as simple as "people don't suck." Not "people" on an individual level, because I've certainly met some individuals who totally suck, but "people" as a whole. Koreans are pretty rad - with the exception of people who spit in my path for being a foreigner and the like - and in the interview yesterday the future-boss said "your students will want to take you out to lunch and dinner all the time. Will you be able to oblige?" I've never said "fuck yeah" in an interview before, but fuck yeah!
Using Jabberwocky is a great idea. A way of making it fun for Koreans - who, yes, do love grammar and are, at least superficially, very serious people - might be to have them guess the part of speech for each word.
Next-job's teaching philosophy is that their students already have a really good grasp of grammar. Their students learn 15 words a day, and I'll be teaching a conjugation system for conversational ease. They seem to have really realistic expectations for language acquisition - both the boss and the students - which is rare in an employer here.
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