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I have been working in South Korea now for 4 months. Successfully completing the first 1/3 of my year contract at my Hagwon I feel that I have learned a lot in a short amount of time. For all of you out there who don't know what Hagwons are, they're private schools or (academies) thats main purpose is to tutor children after school in various subjects (e.g. Math, English, Music). Even though keeping children in school all day is part of their culture I wanted to address some of the ups and downs of this course of action.

When I first began to observe the nature of this "All Day Schooling" agenda that these Hagwons provide, I began to draw relationships with my own schooling and those of other American students. After studying these relationships I was able to see that Hagwon Schools combined with their parents overzealous attitudes toward getting their child the best education that money can buy has potential for many different conclusions. Although there are many more outcomes I wanted to discuss 3 main conclusions that are commonplace in the world of the Hagwon.

First "Paycheck + BONUS" - Parents intense urge to over-school their offspring has been around for generations so I can't fault them for that. However a cunning individual can use it to their advantage. Since colleges are VERY hard to get in to there is always a need to teach private lessons. Given your location you could very well supplement or even double your monthly salary by teaching private lessons on the side. But if you remember back to my previous blog entry, I explained that E2 Visas only allow you to work in ONE location throughout the entirety of your year contract. So teaching private lessons is a gamble because it is illegal. So if you are caught that is an immediate termination of your contract, deportation, and a 5 year ban on your allowed presence in South Korea. In the end I say do what you want but don't say that a brotha' didn't warn ya!


Second "A Dime a Dozen" - Since the Hagwon is a private school as opposed to government funded public school there are MANY hagwons that offer educational services. The ratio of hagwons to public schools is around 10:1. That's not to say that this is a bad thing but it warrants a wide range of preference to what After School Academy a parent can enroll their child in. Which leads me into my next conclusion...

Third "Gone like the Wind" - This isn't so much a Conclusion as so much as it is a precursor. Now for whatever reason a Hagwon might have sudden increase or decrease in students. Either way money can be very fickle at times. Thank goodness that my employers aren't shady and they are wholesome people. Which means that I don't have to worry about personal greed getting in the way of me receiving my paycheck on time. Unfortunately is not the case for other teachers working in other private academies who either are not paid on time or even worse, their schools close down because of the lack of funds that this collective migration of students causes.

Now this is the part where selective perception is replaced with my experience of learning about culture and working in a Hagwon myself. In short Hagwons are a Business, and like a business you might see some trends thrive and other trends die out prematurely. And because of this attitude that is kept by the culture I have seen several new attendees enroll or several students leaving around the same time. Seeing this personally I was really unnerved when suddenly my once loud class of 9 students went to a class of 4 in the course of three days. I thought it was maybe something that "I" had done to upset the students or the parents. So I asked my director why did so many of my students had quit the academy? My employer assured me that I was not the problem but the mothers had decided to remove their children simultaneously.

Even though I was relieved that I was not the cause immediately asked myself "Why did the mothers decide this? Why not the fathers? And why all at the same time?"

Luckly these questions can be answered relatively easily. Since Korean culture is mostly homogenous they are first - very reluctant to change and second - they tend to do things collectively. Taking one step further in my probing I found that a most men work very long hours and their wives tend to stay at home. Exposing all of these previous factors about business mentality it was not hard for me to piece together Why this was happening.

In the end it is very hard to combat with a coffee klatch of Korean mothers that make decisions in trends. The power of "Group Think" strikes again! I'm off to study some more. As always Thanks for reading, stay healthy and take care of yourselves.

Joe - OUT!!