Just got a phone call minutes ago from SMOE saying that I no longer had a job with them for this coming year. I expect a few people on this forum will get this as well.
Reason was they have budget constraints and are cutting all the lower level applicants and not placing in as many school. And they are doing this a week before it starts?!
Bearing in mind, I've already recieved my notice of appointment. Is there a clause in the contract to allow this? Lol
At the moment, this leaves me stuck without a job and around £500 down from all the costs. This sucks.
They said they will keep me on file to apply in either March / August 2010.
From a second poster:
It's not just low level placement people who are being dropped.
I have a MA in Teaching (English), certification in English Language Arts and TESOL in my home state, and 6 years of experience - 4 of it in Korea.
And my recruiter just emailed me saying I was dropped because I wouldn't be there the first day of orientation -- which isn't even likely true.
He had told me on Monday that SMOE had FedExed my visa number. I had told him that I knew the turn around time in the consulate in Atlanta is one day. You drop the stuff off and pick it up the next afternoon.
MY two DHLed packages to Seoul by fastest method got there within 3-4 days. I could have likely made the first day of orientation - 2nd at the latest.
Now I'm back at square one with a mother-in-law who needs help and was expecting me to arrive next week.
----- and so goes the ESL industry in Korea...
The same poster continues:
A couple of weeks ago when people started posting that EPIK had shifted 100 contracts over to SMOE and that SMOE was dropping people who already had a signed contract due to overbooking --- was the time my recruiter got back to me that SMOE now wanted a specific form letter from the hakwons I worked at 10+ years ago.
I immediately said it was highly likely one or more of them wouldn't send such a letter, because the schools had changed hands or closed and one boss (where I did finish a contract) was an ass --- I didn't use that specific language --- I just said I'd likely not be able to get all the letters).
So, I said why not give me a lower level contract to sign? That should make SMOE even happier...
They didn't do that until after a couple weeks delay and at the end of last week.
I could still make orientation on time if they had really FedExed the visa number material on Monday as I was told.
I think this is just a case of poor planning on SMOE and EPIK's part.
Par for the course in the ESL industry in Korea.
I feel sorry for the people who had gone ahead and bought tickets over. Especially those who did so after getting the visa who might now be dropped.
From a third poster:
I was dropped after I sent my contract out (never received NOA). I thought that was the only time they made their cuts. I'm sorry to those that have recently been cut. Good luck to all of you in finding jobs. I felt as though everything fell apart when I got cut, but within 2-3 weeks, I received 3 job offers (2 asap positions and 1 starting in January). It's just a matter of deciding which one to go with now.
16 comments:
I was told by a recruiter that EPIK received 3000 completed and qualified applications for the 500 positions. Up until this round of hirings, they were never able to even get enough qualified applicants to fill all the jobs they wanted.
EPIK, G-EPIK, and SMOE have the demand now. So they can now discard and reject applicants for any number of small reasons.
If people want public teaching jobs they should plan on having all their paperwork completely in about three months in advance and everything has to be flawless. Or else they might just consider you more trouble than you are worth.
Very interesting... I'm glad I am already here...
ROK Sojourn
WOW - a 1 in 6 chance nowadays instead of the virtual lock on a job? I'd guess that'll spill over into the hagwon scene if you're already here, and into next semester's recruiting if they're not.
They may be able to be picky, but here's hoping this mindset of dropping people willy-nilly will work beyond next summer (by which time the recession will be history and people aren't looking to a foreign country for employment as strongly)...
I don't want to go into Dave's ESL if I don't have to, so let me ask here.
These are people who have received signed contracts from SMOE and have signed them and returned them themselves, and after all that signing they are being told, "Sorry, no more job!"?
If so, I'd like to know the language of the contract, particularly how it deal with failure to meet the obligations of the contract holders. SMOE might like to think they can do this, but if their contract implies some sort of financial or legal obligation, the courts might not see it this way (and yes, the Korean courts frequently take the side of "foreigners" in matters of law).
If these are people who started applying for jobs a few weeks ago and then got quickly told yes, but now are told the jobs aren't there, I'm a bit less sympathetic, but if someone has been planning this kind of move for several months — with all the real and opportunity costs involved — I find that very disturbing.
This news is indeed heart-breaking. As a job hunter i know how hard it is to pass the first round of interviews. To be cancelled after all everything(well...)
"These are people who have received signed contracts from SMOE and have signed them and returned them themselves, and after all that signing they are being told, "Sorry, no more job!"?"
Yes.
Some people are being told this as late as the day before their flight leaves.
And the other screwy thing? According to the contracts people are quoting, EPIK is no longer paying for the flights... the teachers pays their way over, and is later reimbursed "out of their year end bonus". So they pay the severance, but the flight comes out of that money.
Another clause in there says that if they quit or ARE TERMINATED before the end of the first 6 months, the school will demand that "reimbursement" back. Quitting, I can see them saying they want the money back, but if they get fired, too?
So, for those who paid for their tickets and got the call that they don't have a job, they are SOL. They will not be reimbursed for those now-useless plane tickets.
ROK Hound, my question was a two-parter. Do you know anything specific about the language of the contract, particularly how it deal with failure to meet the obligations of the contract holders before work has begun.
As for the paying back of air fare if one is fired before six months, I'm not so sure I consider that unfair, but if I did, I wouldn't have signed the contract.
I don't know about anyone else, but I'm sick and tired of all of the unprofessional antics happening in Korea. I'm convinced that the Ministry of Education is run by a bunch of brainless monkeys.
I think it's time to boycott teaching in Korea. Everyone should move to Taiwan. You'd be able to make close to the same amount of money, and save even more because the cost of living there is lower.
This would
(a) force Koreans to become more competitive and offer better contracts
(b) it would help Koreans understand that they should act in a professional and respectful manner towards foreign teachers
and (c) it would help them to appreciate us a little more.
Just remember: Korean English Teachers make up to 5 million won per month working for the public school system...and most of them wouldn't be able to hold a conversation in English if their lives depended on it!!!!!!
I think it's fair to say that Koreans are in DEPSPERATE need of foreign teachers and should be very careful as to how they treat us.
"For those who paid for their tickets and got the call that they don't have a job, they are SOL. They will not be reimbursed for those now-useless plane tickets."
In fairness, I'm fairly certain low-price non-refundable air fares don't exist in Korea. This could explain, in part, why Koreans do not hesitate to screw with other people's plans at the last minute, also why Koreans think foreigners who have purchased tickets online and become irate when their plans are threatened are merely being emotional and inflexible.
I'm not saying in the history of the world no Korean traveler has ever bought a non-refundable ticket. But I drew blank stares from co-workers when I tried to explain the concept, and older ajosshis have asked me questions about travel to and in the U.S. that make it clear they think there is only one set-in-stone fare for any one route.
I'll go further: Koreans assume 20-somethings live with their parents in their "hometowns" and that only job-seekers (cough: losers) would want to come here. So it probably would not occur to most Koreans, especially senior ajosshis, that foreigners have given up jobs, apartments, pets, even lovers, to come here.
The folks at SMOE likely imagine the incovenience they've caused as simply that of making a phone call to get a refund of air fare. And shame on them for not knowing or else not caring.
And finally, because of Korea's more rigid society, most Koreans do not imagine that today's idealistic young English teacher could be tomorrow's congressman, senator, or business leader. [Insert photo of young Obama in an Indonesian madrasa.]
Koreans would naturally assume that America's future leaders are all "studying" at Harvard other elite schools. So Koreans don't imagine their treatment of foreign teachers will ever come back to hurt (or help) them later.
What's an NOA?
I'm doing light blogging these days because I just moved out of my apartment, am getting ready to fly back to the US tomorrow, and am dealing with Gmail, Google Reader, and blogger acting up. (Maybe interference on the part of these PC Bang computers with google, or something, but it's very annoying.) Anyway, that explains the short entries these days.
I'll direct your attention to some updates on Dave's for those of you willing to visit:
Well, first of all The Midnight Runner podcast interviewed a recruiter who apparently answered some questions. I can't listen to it at the PC room:
http://www.themidnightrunner.com/
And here's a post by all those who were dropped last minute.
http://forums.eslcafe.com/korea/viewtopic.php?t=163971
The more I think about this, the madder I get. I'm used to horseshit from those in the education business here, but this is absolutely ridiculous. This deserves attention in the papers, and I'd strongly encourage anyone who was dropped and who happens to find this thread to write letters to the editors. If I get time when I get back home, I may have to pen something. It's perfectly representative of the thrown-together nature of this business, and of the disrespect shown foreign teachers, their lives, and their plans. I don't know about you, but if my school district dropped me the day before I was to fly out of the country---and had already packed, left my apartment, quit my job, sold my car, given away my pets, and said my goodbyes---Korea would get a big fuck you from me in the future.
"Do you know anything specific about the language of the contract, particularly how it deal with failure to meet the obligations of the contract holders before work has begun."
As far as what people have posted, there is no obligation before the job has started. So sign your contracts and get your visas, but until you actually start the job, apparently they are allowed to yank it from you without consequence to them.
Someone posted that one girl had actually arrived in Korea only to be told there was no job for her.
ROK Hound wrote:
As far as what people have posted, there is no obligation before the job has started. So sign your contracts and get your visas, but until you actually start the job, apparently they are allowed to yank it from you without consequence to them.
Let me take a different tack here. I'd like someone to send me the exact language of the contract — the entire contract, if possible — to run buy some hot-'n-juicy laywers who might see this as a cause worth taking up if a lot of people were adversely and illegally affected.
If people were wronged according to the terms of their contract then something should happen. Lawyers like Brendon Carr might be unwilling to defend individuals who knowingly used pot while in the ROK, but something like this is a different matter.
I'd also like to know some real, hard facts, not speculation.
WORD VERIFICATION: comnitro
Life is unfair and these people certainly got a taste of unfairness. I hope that they tried to get work with other MOEs because the demand is still here in other areas.
This may be a wake up call for those mediocre teachers who think their jobs are safe. Those who treat their time here as just an extended vacation may be in for a rude awakening.
The recession may have been the best thing for SMOE, GEPIK, EPIK and the like. They can now take the cream and jettison the rest. And this recession is going to be a long one. The Obama administration has already said that this will be a jobLESS recovery, if there is any recovery at all in the near future. That means that Korea will have opportunities to get choosy for years to come.
One person sent me a contract and it does not appear that there is any particular protection for something like this, if the designated starting date hasn't already passed.
But then the question is: Are there any teachers who actually paid for their ticket out of pocket with the stated understanding that their school would pay them back? I know some have speculated that there might be some like that, but does anyone know of actual cases?
And what were the stated reasons for the jobs no longer being there? Lack of funds? Unexpected budget cuts? Are these valid?
Even if all of this is above board and legal, it does not sound like SMOE handled it in a professional manner, and they should be taken to task for this.
Post a Comment