Brief Intermission: Interview

I did an interview with a local Orlando newspaper. I am going to copy the transcript as I think it is very informative.


Kevin: You mention on your blog, ‘The Wind Is Blowing’, about receiving your E2 work visa stamp and signing a full-year contract before starting your trip out to South Korea. Was there any particular group or organization that was able to assist or walk you through the process of looking for work in a foreign country? Did someone help you in your planning/finding a school to teach in, or were you on your own to discover/apply to each possible school?

Joel: Indeed I did have outside help. The agiency I used is called "Teach ESL Korea" (http://www.teacheslkorea.com). I know there are other good agencies friends have used such as "Footprints" (http://www.footprintsrecruiting.com). These agencies help you from the time you turn in your application till the moment you are settled into your school. Usually the way it works is you look at all the requirements and turn in an application. Someone usually emails you back with the current status of the teaching market and asks you a few questions. When they know what type of job in what level you are looking for they start looking at schools for you. When they find a school that needs a native English speaker they email you back with the schools info and a sample contract. If you like it they set up an phone interview with the English co-teacher (native Korean) at that school. If everything goes well then you are hired! After sending off a bunch of documents to the school you wait for the Korean Government to issue you a E2 visa number. Once you have that then you can apply and set up an interview with a Korean Consulate in the States. Once you have a interview date you let the recruiter know and they book you a ticket less than a week after your interview date. There are also other places like Dave's ESL cafe (http://www.eslcafe.com/) where a job board allows you to apply yourself. However, I would recommend finding and using a agency to find a job as some of the paperwork is very,very,very confusing and they can fight for more vacation time for you and such.

Kevin: What subject will you be teaching in South Korea? What is the school and city you will be teaching at?

Joel: Most of the jobs people find overseas are teaching English jobs (unless you get into a international company or Peace-corps). The job I found was at Baek-hak Middle School located in Yeoun-cheon-hun. It is a smaller rural town and the kids feel ashamed that their English is not at the level of a bigger school. This is why I chose a smaller school in a smaller town because I have a better chance to make a positive difference in these young peoples lives.

Kevin: Aside from the satisfaction of living/learning a new culture and location, were there any major financial benefits/arrangements that made South Korea your choice of location to teach at?

Joel: South Korea spends most of it's government income on education. As it is in many Asian countries the kids are pushed very hard to get a good education. With English being such a widespread language and quickly becoming the language of business many schools are willing to pay good money to import native English speakers. Salaries change depending on your background (more money for graduate degrees, experience and majors of education/teaching) but they start you out at a good rate. I currently get the starting pay of 1,900,000 Won (or about $1696.70) per month with a 100,000 Won bonus of being in a smaller town (plus more paid vacation days). Usually bills (electric, cell, internet, water) come out to $100 a month, depending, and as everything else is cheap living expenses come out to around $600 a month. What I'm getting at here is it is very possible to save $1,000 a month here! You also get 11 days paid sick leave, 24 paid vacation days (I get 30 because of the rural area), your airfare is paid for on both arrival and departing (after a years contract completion) and you get a month severance bonus upon completion of the contract.  

Kevin: Were there any other countries that you considered pursuing a teaching position in before settling on South Korea?

Joel: Like most people I looked into Japan. However I have a friend there and saw both how hard he fought for a rural position (forget Tokyo) and the high cost of living in Japan.  With experience it becomes easier to land a job there but the pay is still nothing compared to Korea. I then looked into the Peace Corps for the tuition reimbursement but after talking to some people in it I realized that trying to get them to pay off your student loans is like pulling teeth for years on end once your complete your two years. Plus the pay sucks if it exists at all. When looking for ESL jobs you have to think rationally. Which areas really need to learn English? All of the  Western Europe areas are out, most islands are out and Eastern Europe nations cant even escape poverty. This leaves mainly the Asias. Out of all those I ran some numbers and figured out that to pay my student loans Korea was my best bet. 

Kevin: Do you have any concerns/reservations with the current and future state of teaching positions within the United States that drove you to look elsewhere for employment?

Joel: I am a Finance/Statistics Major and while my GPA was not the best I scored in the top 25% of the nation on my Major Field Tests. I have plenty of Managing experience and a diverse work history. After three months of looking (not including job fairs in college) I was broke and had no possibilities. We all know the American job market is bad right now so instead of struggling to find any sort of job that I wasn't overqualified for I decided whats the rush? Why not go have a once in a lifetime adventure and get paid, well, for it!

Kevin: How has your room/board been taken care of for the duration of your stay? Did you pick out your own place or was it taken care of as part of the contract?

Joel: I live about 30 minutes outside of the town I teach in. The city I live in is called Jeongok and is a medium sized city with all the ESL teacher living in it. They put me here so I would not get homesick as easily. They also pay for my apartment. Each apartment comes with a bed, rice cooker, tv, cable, internet (Fiber), couch, dresser, table, washer, gas grill and a fan. These are all in your contract and you must have them. I also got lucky and they put me in a three story building with eight other ESL teachers living in it. They take care of their teachers in Korea. 

Kevin: Can you say yet whether or not the school you are teaching at hosts many foreign teachers, or are most teachers there native to South Korea?

Joel: Every single teacher here is a native Korean. I have one co-teacher who speaks fluent English but the rest barley speak any. My co-teacher is the English teacher for this school and we work together on lesson plans for the week or fun activities. Typically there is one native English teacher to a school but some of the larger ones have two native English teachers. 

Kevin: Do you have any friends or acquaintances that have also decided to pursue teaching outside of the United States after receiving a US degree, whether South Korea or elsewhere?

Joel: That is exactly how I found out about Korea! I have two friends from Florida (one from Orlando and one from Lakeland) who currently teach in South Korea.

Kevin: Ates had mentioned to me something about the number of applications having grown exponentially between the year you applied and the previous year? Can you tell me at all about this? Do you know what the figures of growth in application size actually were?

Joel: In March of 2009 there were 200 positions open for the GPEIK board. 150 people applied so everyone got in. In March of 2010, when I applied, there were 189 openings for the GPEIK board with 800+ people applying. (Real quick explanation. GPEIK board is the government board that places teachers in a certain providence, or state. This one was for the Seoul region. You can find individual schools without them but it has always been the easiest way to apply for a job.) Because of the huge increase some of the schools are starting to get stricter with their prereqs for being considered for a job.   

Kevin: Are there any assumptions and/or knowledge you might have about why there is a particular growing trend to teach in South Korea?

Joel: I think all the things I have said above make it a very attractive industry. Also, without going off on a huge tangent, I think we are entering a new age of globalization and this is the beginning signs of it.

Kevin: Have you been to South Korea at all before? What kind of preparations have you made to learn the language and customs of the culture before moving overseas to fill our teaching position?

Joel: I have been over half of the world at this point in my life (I am 24 for the record) but I had never been to any of the Asian countries. Not knowing how to prepare for such a diverse and different culture I turned to the internet. There are plenty of websites out there, including some of the websites I mentioned above, that prepare you for a culture that is almost 180 degrees of our own. I won't bore you with all the small details but there are plenty of multilingual people here that are more than willing to have language exchanges or let you pay them for Korean lessons. I would try to learn as much as I could of the language before I came here but it is not necessary. They do not want you to speak any Korean in the classroom as it forces the kids to learn.