Korean Foreign Language High Schools -- Heaven for Korean Students?

Oh, come on.

This is in response to the superficial puff piece written by the New York Times on the Korean school system. While the Times generally practices great journalism, the depth of inquiry in this piece was woefully inadequate, especially considering what a contested and troubled topic the education system in Korea is -- well, if you know very much about Korea, that is. (HT to the Marmot's Hole for posting on this one first!)

I taught at Daewon for a year-and-a-half before quitting in the middle of my contract (having an F-4 helps with that) because of me finally being faced with two roads -- participating in evil, or maintaining my sense of ethics. Beyond that, I can't elaborate. I've already waxed about it at my blog here and here.

Their rival institution, Waedae's boarding school in Yongin, recruited me once they learned I was quitting. I worked there for a year before choosing not to renew my contract after the Ministry of Education made it illegal for a foreigner to teach a non-language-based subject based pretty much entirely on a hack-attack job done on my school by a reporter from the Kyunghyang Shinmun because I was teaching an AP US History class taught during normal school hours. A disgrace to the nation! That made the morning radio news nationwide. Lovely.

I now teach at Ewha Girls Foreign Language High School, which is small and very much not a pressure cooker. I teach American History to about 20 girls, not 120 test terminators, which makes my life markedly easy. I'd never teach in a Daewon or Yongin again, since the kids' life is a living hell.

The reason I think the NYT article is superficial and lame is because it's just a recycling of the PR stats. The problem with these schools is that they apply the best aspects of the Korean system (test assassination) to the requirements of getting INTO American colleges (SAT, SAT II subject tests, and now the AP's which have become de facto required). The kids do remarkably well on these tests. But when they get to the American schools, they are woefully ill-prepared. But the schools don't have a vested interest in caring about that -- they just want their kids to get INTO famous schools, and it doesn't matter how they DO at them.

Daewon is one of the few schools that actually has the clout and money to attract sparkly foreigners and lets them teach a few "discussion-based" classes, which are, though, linked to an AP test of some kind. Still, though, most of the FLHS system in Korea is basically tests, tests, tests. One of the struggles in the FLHS has always been to actually teach them something substantial, rather than for the tests.

Now, I am in contact via chat and Facebook with many of my former Daewon students, whom I first met 3 years ago. They agree that their first year in American college was like getting hit with a Mack truck; I had always told them that it would -- "it's true for native speakers attending their own American colleges, so it'll be triple-true for you." They always kinda rolled their eyes. Now, they get it.

Anyway, I did what I could to prepare them, and it was always a struggle, fighting against the stream. Other teachers fought the same battle, and usually got attacked by the Korean teachers for it. Most of the foreign teachers at these schools quit after a year. When I was in Daewon and Yongin, I was not the first teacher at either school to quit before the year ended. Turnover rate is nearly 100% per year for foreign teachers. And Daewon paid an hourly rate of $100 per hour, average part-time teaching load 12-15 hours per week. How bad must it have been for people to quit, or not renew their contracts? Don't just do the math -- try to imagine the extreme suck of one's life to consider quitting a job that paid sometimes as much as $6,000 per month for (technically) half-time work.

Won't find that in the NYT article.

Nor this pic of my Daewon kids taking the chance to do what they have so little time to do, which is sleeeeeeeeep.

Basically, your life sucks at these schools for 3 years, but the kids and parents swallow their pride and ire, since it is the fast-track to America's best schools. Period. That's the exchange. But it absolutely brings out the worst of the Korean school system in a soul-crushing nightmare of pain that many students realize only gets them to the door of the institution they wanted, but has woefully under-prepared them to make it through.

I can't believe the Times was comparing the SAT scores of Exeter and Daewon, playing into the "Asian powerhouse" myth. Scores aside, a school like Exeter prepares you to think, gives you a spectacular education. Because you're not spending all of your time sitting in a chair.

And if the Times reporter actually thinks THAT school approves of rock bands (or the cheerleading squad that was summarily crushed by the principal when I was there) or anything non-academic that isn't a 1-hour-per-week weekly meeting so the kids can put it down on their college apps as filler without it technically being a lie, I've got a bridge on the Han River to sell him.

And now, more grist for Daewon's PR and human test factory mill, since the NYT writer didn't think to insert nary a dollop of critical social context into the sweet and savory soufflé he was baking. Intentional or not, this piece on Daewon couldn't have been written better by a well-paid PR firm.

Comments

[jandkshiday]

Yeah all of this stuff is true. If I ever have kids, I would never send them to a Korean school, even if it is an elite test taking school. On the other hand though, I don't think that the NYT article paints a rosy picture of these schools, and I don't think that people reading it will come away with the impression that they should send their kids to Korea to get into the ivy league. If I were in America reading this I would think, "Damn, we've got to get our act together." If this is what people are putting themselves through to get into college, how can American students compete? The truth is that Americans can, but it is much easier if your are in a part of the country that has an anal SAT test prep course type of culture where parents actually pay for that type of thing. In places where the term "book learnin" enters the lexicon when someone reads a Denny's menu students can find themselves at a disadvantage.

[Lori]

I'm a Korean PhD student, majoring economics in a US university now. I've been 15 years out of that picture (NOTE: in Korea, You don't have to go to a FLHS to be a part of the picture.), and it is really frustrating that things get worse, not better, than my years.

Different from the previous comment, my grimmer prediction is that sooner or later, that picture will be far more widespread in the States, tailored for the US system by those "experts". Look what's happening in New York and California these days. This 'superficial' article from NYT actually added one more evidence to this belief.

[mavsman15]

I reposted the article on my blog www.mikemcstay.blogspot.com and added the following...

For those who know me, Me and Mike will never see eye to eye on a lot of things in our lives. We have different backgrounds, different ideas, different in many ways. In some things, we see exactly alike and this is why I have posted these 2 articles.

I would so much love to be able to teach history and to be able to help my students pass an AP exam or CLEP or DANTE (for college credit). I did Not know that it is now illegal to teach during school hours AP classes. To be honest, I am not surprised.

Last year I taught at a middle school of site and I loved it. Some of these kids were very smart and I could see them in Very good Korean High Schools. My supervisor told me that Woosong can not send any teachers because it is now Illegal. I am trying to teach English and the new South Korean President wants to increase English in the schools and now both of us Mike can't teach AP History nor can any of us teach in the school during normal class hours to help increase the English Knowledge. Seriously WTF?

At time I feel like John Adams, in 1776 musical, teaching here in Korea.

"Is anybody there? Does anybody care?
Does anybody see what I see?"

They want to me to quit; they say
John, give up the fight
Still to this failed English idea I say
Good night, forever, good night!
For I have crossed the Rubicon
Let the bridge be burned behind me
Come what may, come what may

[yamanin]

It's worth noting that the NYT article wasn't written by their usual Korean correspondent, Choe Sang-hun, nor even by Norimitsu Onishi, who often comes from Japan to write highly insightful pieces about what's going on in Korea. Instead, it was written by Sam Dillon, who is the Times' education correspondent. Looking over his past articles, they seem to be ALL about the education system in the US. So while he might be very good at his job in general, he obviously knew nothing going into this about the reality of Korean education, nor would he have had the language skills or cultural knowledge to be able to probe more deeply. Hence the superficial nature of the article, which does read like it was spoon-fed to him by the Daewon spinmeisters.

I too worked briefly at Daewon. Let's just say it would take far less time to list the things that they didn't lie to me about. The location of the school -- that's basically the only thing they said when they offered me the job that was true. There's absolutely no way I would have gone to work there had they told me at the beginning what they expected, but since I had already made personal plans and needed the money and visa, I had little choice when they went and changed the terms on me (which they did on Day 1). Luckily, after one semester I managed to find a real job in my profession (which is not English teaching, which in any case wasn't what I was supposedly hired to do at Daewon) and quit. Of course, I had to lie to them to get out of my contract, but then since they lied to me about everything else, I figured it was only fair.

[The Metropolitician]

Oh, you weren't the last to quit, from when I was there, my friend. There was also the woman from Harvard, whom they bragged about incessantly but treated like crap (well, we were all treated the same, but since she was older and settled and reasonably assumed to have a lower tolerance for crap, I guess that counts as having received more overall crap). She was smart, Korean, and knew how to back out while saving face. So she developed (perhaps it was real? but suspiciously convenient) a back condition and could no longer teach. Sorry. Gotta go. Bye bye. She "quit" after like 2 months. Guess she was the smart one.

My contract terms, hours, pay rate, and even subject was switched, in a major way, 3 times. I actually really quit when they told me I had to work 40+ hours a week and grade papers for no extra pay at the same rate they brought me on for teaching 15 hours a week. From 15 to 40, plus takehome work. Riiiight.

Then, I worked for an entire month before they told me as I SAT DOWN to sign the contract that they would not be able to offer me a salary, benefits, or any of the things I had been given as the "best parts of the job." I was told 6 million won salary and benefits as a teacher. Having worked as a teacher before, I knew what that meant, and it was sweet. Should have known. They delayed signing the contract several times ("Oh, it's not ready yet") to get me into the rhythm of working there, then pulled the change. Classic bait-and-switch. I was sitting, looking at the director in disbelief, as well as the counselor who had recruited me, saying "This is unaccepable! You lied to me. You lied."

The answer? Quite literally, "Take it or leave it. There's nothing that can be done." The rate was 100,000 per hour, so it looked good. I learned on that day to never sign a deal with the devil, no matter how good it looks. But then again, I had student loans and a nasty photography habit that incurred lots of film and developing costs. So I signed.

I didn't quite turn into Ghost Rider, but I did almost sell my soul. I had to draw the line at XXX (can't say, because I can't back it up and it would be possible libelous), so I quit a year-and-a-half later. I left with my soul intact, but with much higher blood pressure and nearly zero temper. It was after quitting Daewon that I decided to get cats, since they lower your blood pressure a notch or two. I'm being dead serious.

If you think the RECRUITING PROCESS was bad, you should hear about the curriculum! Jeez, I should write a book. No, I really should. After having worked in Daewon, Yongin, and now at Ewha, it would be a pretty good comparison.

A book. Yeah...You know what Khan said about revenge...

[dharmaqueen]

jandkshiday wrote: "If I were in America reading this I would think, "Damn, we've got to get our act together." If this is what people are putting themselves through to get into college, how can American students compete? The truth is that Americans can, but it is much easier if your are in a part of the country that has an anal SAT test prep course type of culture where parents actually pay for that type of thing."

People may not be coming away from this article thinking they need to send their kids to Korea in order to get into an ivy, but if they are coming away thinking that America needs to compete with this method of education, that is equally messed up. This article supports the many systems already at work in U.S. education that are making learning through rote methods and teaching for the test the backbone of an already struggling system. The development of true thought is going down the drain. And if we think the solution is to follow the Korean system then the ability to think is going down that drain faster than I'd imagined. Students here in Korea may know a great deal about how to "beat the test", but when it comes to making real life choices that involve things other than multiple-guess responses (things such as character, academic honesty, building one's own assertions from a base of knowledge, etc.) they have very little solid ground on which to stand. Is that really what we want to be competing with?

[saera]

Thank you for writing this. Koreans are way too caught up in trying to send their kids to the "best schools." All these schools teach are how to take tests, and how to ace them. None of these kids are taught how to think on their feet, to think critically, how to write a paper without making sure that they fit some Collegeboard rubric. It's sickening. These foreign language high schools don't prepare Korean students for what education is like in America.