They are dropping like flies!
It's hard to know who to sympathize with... In one corner we have the teachers, who want to quit their contract, but they know if they tell their boss they could get monetarily penalized. In the other corner we have the hagwon (language school) that wants to keep its teachers and protect its investment, so they try to make it hard to quit. When a teacher leaves without notice then its a mad scramble over the next few days... trying to find replacements quickly is hardly ever an option, there is such a dearth of English teachers in this country, so the hagwon must call up all the students (maybe over a hundred people) and tell them "Sorry, your teacher fled the country so you can't have a class." Or in the best case scenario, there is another teacher who will work overtime to teach the class, but maybe the student really liked the teacher who left... But if the teachers were to tell the hagwon that they planned on leaving at a certain date... ending their contract early, then the hagwon might not pay them, and deduct a bunch of money from the final paycheck.... Sigh, all around it is a bad system.
Well, as I'm sure you can tell we just lost two teachers in the same day. I love my students, I don't hate my company, and I liked the teachers who left. So I'm not really taking sides here... its just bad all around. Losing one teacher without warning is bad enough, but two is a serious headache... but I totally understand, people shouldn't feel shackled to their job, and its good that these teachers are doing whats best for them... something we should all be doing.
But, maybe..... just maaaaybe, something good can come of this. Morale has been rather low on our floor lately for numerous reasons... one chief reason we feel powerless to do anything about... but... After the two teachers didn't show up to work (but they left a letter explaining that they won't be back) the Director of the company came down to have a meeting with all the foreign teachers. He wanted to know what was wrong... This is what the Enron guy should have don't before the sh*t hit the fan. Well, we told him as much as we were comfortable showing him, and he promised us a new contract in the next few weeks that we would be much happier with, and implied some other changes might be in the works too.
Pretty much everyone felt like "I'll believe it when I see it." I was just really happy cause he bought us food (I guess I'm easy to please... let me speak my mind and give me some food!) But my co-workers are right, lets not count our chickens before they hatch. Time to continue contacting other places... maybe this contract will be all its cracked up to be, but maybe not... and If it isn't then I cant see staying with a sinking ship... even though I really do like the ship... damn 정! That says "jung" and 정 is the Korean idea that we grow comfortable with people we are around a lot... even if they are not nice to us, or we move far apart, there is still that feeling between us... Its hard to explain... but I have 정 for my company and especially my co-workers and students, so making the decision to look at other places is not easy... and thanks to my study of the Korean language, I now have a word to explain how I feel :)
Anyway, Have a nice night. The Internet is back on at home, so I can post more pics when I get the time :)
It's hard to know who to sympathize with... In one corner we have the teachers, who want to quit their contract, but they know if they tell their boss they could get monetarily penalized. In the other corner we have the hagwon (language school) that wants to keep its teachers and protect its investment, so they try to make it hard to quit. When a teacher leaves without notice then its a mad scramble over the next few days... trying to find replacements quickly is hardly ever an option, there is such a dearth of English teachers in this country, so the hagwon must call up all the students (maybe over a hundred people) and tell them "Sorry, your teacher fled the country so you can't have a class." Or in the best case scenario, there is another teacher who will work overtime to teach the class, but maybe the student really liked the teacher who left... But if the teachers were to tell the hagwon that they planned on leaving at a certain date... ending their contract early, then the hagwon might not pay them, and deduct a bunch of money from the final paycheck.... Sigh, all around it is a bad system.
Well, as I'm sure you can tell we just lost two teachers in the same day. I love my students, I don't hate my company, and I liked the teachers who left. So I'm not really taking sides here... its just bad all around. Losing one teacher without warning is bad enough, but two is a serious headache... but I totally understand, people shouldn't feel shackled to their job, and its good that these teachers are doing whats best for them... something we should all be doing.
But, maybe..... just maaaaybe, something good can come of this. Morale has been rather low on our floor lately for numerous reasons... one chief reason we feel powerless to do anything about... but... After the two teachers didn't show up to work (but they left a letter explaining that they won't be back) the Director of the company came down to have a meeting with all the foreign teachers. He wanted to know what was wrong... This is what the Enron guy should have don't before the sh*t hit the fan. Well, we told him as much as we were comfortable showing him, and he promised us a new contract in the next few weeks that we would be much happier with, and implied some other changes might be in the works too.
Pretty much everyone felt like "I'll believe it when I see it." I was just really happy cause he bought us food (I guess I'm easy to please... let me speak my mind and give me some food!) But my co-workers are right, lets not count our chickens before they hatch. Time to continue contacting other places... maybe this contract will be all its cracked up to be, but maybe not... and If it isn't then I cant see staying with a sinking ship... even though I really do like the ship... damn 정! That says "jung" and 정 is the Korean idea that we grow comfortable with people we are around a lot... even if they are not nice to us, or we move far apart, there is still that feeling between us... Its hard to explain... but I have 정 for my company and especially my co-workers and students, so making the decision to look at other places is not easy... and thanks to my study of the Korean language, I now have a word to explain how I feel :)
Anyway, Have a nice night. The Internet is back on at home, so I can post more pics when I get the time :)
1 comment:
Sorry to hear there are problems at work. Hopefully they will come up with a contract that you will all like.
Otherwise ...I hear there are some teaching jobs in the US ;)
Love Mom
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