Most people interested in teaching ESL in South Korea are warned against working at a hagwon for multiple reasons which you can find here. Instead, they’re advised to find a public school position because it offers more security among other things.
However, sometimes public schools aren’t a good fit for various reasons. You may not have the necessary documents or you may want to work in or near Seoul, where public school positions are hard to come by.
Fortunately, it’s not the end of the road if you can’t get a public school job because even though there are plenty of bad hagwons, good ones exist as well. You just need to be smart and more calculative in your job-hunting process to find one.
Here are 6 tips to help you find a good hagwon job.
Table of Contents
1. Use as many recruiters as possible
Some people may only use one recruiter and some others may use a handful. But it’s best to use a lot. The more recruiters you use the more jobs you’ll come across, which increases your chances of finding a good position.
Apply to as many as possible because not all of them will get back to you. I’ve seen people say they even applied to more than 20 recruiters, which gave them a good amount to use from those who replied.
I know that contacting a lot of recruiters may tire or overwhelm some people, especially because some recruiters have a Skype interview with you before you even talk to the staff at a hagwon that meets your requirements. But it’s worth it if it finds you a good hagwon job. Don’t go too overboard though.
The best thing you can do when talking to multiple recruiters is to be firm with what type of job you want and in which location. This is because some recruiters are just looking to place you anywhere irrespective of your wishes so they can get paid.
If one of your recruiters keeps setting you up with jobs that don’t fit the requirements you specified then cut your losses.
2. Look on Multiple Forums and Job Boards
Dave’s ESL Café is a good place to start looking for jobs. Some job ads are directly from the school and others are from recruiters.
There are other Job Boards such as ESLROK, WorknPlay and Craigslist as well as forums such as Waygook.org. Some people may even post open job positions on the Teaching in Korea Reddit, but it’s mainly dedicated to giving advice.
3. Join Multiple Facebook Groups
Sometimes current ESL teachers in Korea post open job positions in Facebook groups because it saves the school from paying for a recruiter or job ad. Recruiters post job opportunities in certain Facebook groups too.
These are great opportunities because you can easily message the teacher who posted the job and ask them about what’s the workplace like straightaway.
You can also make a post asking whether anyone’s school is hiring in these Facebook groups too.
Notable groups include:
Apart from these, you can also join the Facebook groups of certain cities if you want to work in a specific destination and see if anyone has posted job positions there.
4. Research the School
Try googling the name of the school you’re interested in working at or searching its name in the above-mentioned job boards, groups and forums.
There’s a hagwon blacklist too, where you can read bad reviews of hagwons. If you find the school you’re interested in on the list, then it may be best to consider another position.
Apart from this blacklist site, you can also join hagwon Kakaotalk Groups, the Hagwon Black List Subreddit or the Hagwon Blacklist Facebook Group. There is some particularly useful advice on the Facebook group, including ways to contact current Native English teachers at the school without the director/owner of the school knowing.
You can also try seeing if the prospective workplace hires too frequently for its Native English Teacher staff size. For instance, if there’s a small number of English teachers and the hagwon frequently posts jobs then the school may have an issue with employee retention, perhaps because of bad work conditions.
On the flip side, if the school has quite a few native English teachers then this could just be routine.
5. Speak to Current Teachers at the Hagwon
You may find out crucial information from current teachers at the hagwon you’re interested in if you talk with them. This could be over Skype or via email.
Sometimes hagwon directors set you up an interview with a current teacher while they’re also in the room, or you may have an interview with both the director and a current teacher. However, this is a bad sign as it gives the teacher very little room to honestly talk about the school.
Bear in mind that this tip may not always work as current teachers may lie to you because they’re afraid of getting penalised by Korean defamation laws or they may need to find a replacement for their position so they can leave.
Ideally, it’s best to speak to multiple teachers who worked at the school if possible, especially those who have already finished their contract. You could even try to find some past teachers of the school on sites like LinkedIn.
6. Properly Review Your Contract
The contract you receive after you accept the position can tell you a lot about the school. You should see whether the details of the pay, working and teaching hours etc. you discussed in the interview or through forms of correspondence are the same in contract.
You should also make sure your contract mentions that you’re an employee and not an independent contractor, which is illegal on an E-2 visa as it doesn’t comply with tax and labour laws.
Another thing that needs to be in the contract is mention of the school matching your pension and National Health Insurance contributions.
However, sometimes hagwons use contract templates with weird clauses they don’t even know are there. In this case, the way the hagwon director reacts to you insisting on changes in the contract could tell you about whether you want to accept the position or not.
Conclusion
Hagwon positions are not always bad. Hopefully, these tips will help you find the good hagwon job you deserve.
