Mokpo update

I'm still in Mokpo working for Mokpo National University but I won't be here much longer. Only a couple more months. I took a job at my favourite school, Seogang College in Gwangju. I'm really looking forward to moving there. When I worked at Seogang back in 2005 I really didn't want to leave. I was downsized. So now that they're bringing me back, (upsizing me?), I'm pretty happy. And from the sounds of things, they'll be almost the same as they were when I was there. I'll get the full vacations in summer and winter probably. I may have to work a couple of weeks out of the 10 week holidays. So that won't hurt at all. And I'll get extra pay if I do I think. I'll be making pretty much the same money, (actually quite a bit more), for a 12-hour week instead of the 22-hour week I work here at Mokpo U. And if I want, (and boy oh boy do I want!), I can get a letter of release to work at kids camps during the breaks. You can get like 3 grand for 3 weeks at one of these camps. Plus my normal salary will be coming in AND I won't be spending any money cuz I'll be at the camp. Those are SWEET months! I can probly get two of those a year at Seogang. And the staff are really cool at Seogang. They respect me enough to let me do my thing, and that's all I ask of them.

I told my supervisor here at Mokpo U. last monday that I want to go back to Seogang in September. I'll need a letter of release from them in order to do that because I will have to leave half way through my contract. This is the first time I've ever done this so I'm not sure what to expect. I'll just expect lots of crazy, silliness. That way I won't be as surprised or angered when it happens. And if it doesn't, I'll be pleasantly shocked. It's called Korean self-preservation.

I haven't yet heard anything on that front. But on another front, all the teachers received a memo last week outlining stuff like the grading scales we have to use and things like that. It's really serving to downgrade our positions from professors to day care workers in my opinion, but that's Korea. Showing up is far more important than learning, even at a national university here.

Let me splain. If I'm interpreting this letter correctly, (the explanation makes no sense at all), I am supposed to give 60% of the students in all my classes 80-100%. To me that's all A's. But I think maybe those might be A's and B's here. Either way NObody will have classes that have that kind of ratio I'll guaran-damn-tee you. I'll let you know what kind of percentages I got in my classes, i.e. the REAL marks, when they are tabulated.

But these are the kinds of sacrifices we make as teachers in Korea to try to fit into a fledgling education system. Some teachers feel they have developed a way to get around this by making all their assignments, tests, homework etc. mind-numbingly easy so that it really LOOKS like students are earning those high marks they are going to end up with. I don't favour that kind of crap myself, but have been encouraged to practice it by several employers and fellow teachers. I don't support this sort of anti-education. It's immoral, unprofessional and unreasonable. But I'm not going to try to change the Korean system. At the end of the term I submit the real marks to my school and let them do whatever they want with them. If they give me a curve like this, sometimes I can make the adjustments for them.

What I WON'T do is take credit for this nonsense. It certainly isn't MY idea! So when the school I work for starts asking me, or requiring me, to sign phony marks or attendance, or affix my signature to any document outlining fraudulent grading systems, it gets my hackles up a bit. I must admit I was a little surprised to see a document from a national university here that said we are expected to pass students who have good attendance and have done all the assignments. No matter how well they've done those assignments. I was also a little surprised to be handed the document and told to sign it right away without reading it because what was on it wasn't very important. But only a little. This was not the first, or even the SECOND time I've had this happen to me.

So what I did was I sent an email to the "Vice-Director of the Foreign Language Education" department at Mokpo U. outlining what I've just written here. And something happened that truly DID surprise me! I tell you, just when you think you've seen everything here in Korea, they throw you a change-up. It keeps life interesting anyway.

The Vice Director's name is Lee Jong Kun. He wrote me an email saying that it is NOT the policy of Mokpo U. to pass people as it was outlined on the memo and he said the person who circulated the memo will be talked to and a new amended memo will be sent out. Just the fact that Lee Jong Kun had a week earlier given all the foreign teachers a letter of introduction inviting us to contact him and/or offer any suggestions to improve the English program was a breath of fresh air. But when he actually REPLIED to my email and told me this news, I must admit I was impressed. This gives me hope for Mokpo U. I hope he makes Director before he changes his philosophies.

Anyway, I'm meeting with him this week to talk about the program at Mokpo U. I don't really know what that may entail but I hope I will receive news on my letter of release. Even though this is a bright spot at Mokpo U. it still isn't close to enough to make me stay.

So, I have two days left in the official semester. I'll be giving my final exams Monday and Tuesday next week. I am hoping to have my letter of release before the week comes to a close but who knows? Things haven't been blindingly prompt at Mokpo U. to this point.

I will be cloistering myself in my quarters for the rest of the week trying to mark the finals, add up all the various marks that my 190 students have worked for throughout the semester and figuring out accurate assessments of each of my students' English abilities, only to have them changed. But to me it's well worth it to maintain my academic integrity. I will give every student his or her REAL grade if they ask me for it. But they never do. I know it's extra work for me to do this and it seems almost fanatically honest but I just don't want to develop any bad habits. I intend to return to Canada someday and teach in an education system that, (hopefully), hasn't yet turned into the diploma issuing adult daycare system they have here. But I see scary signs that Canada might actually be heading in that direction.

But before you think things are cut and dried here. Or before you think I think that, I understand some of the reasons why things are like this in Korea. In fact if I were like the Minister of Education or whatever the equivalent in Korea might be, I'm not so sure I would even change things. There are reasons why the education system is the way it is here and it'll take a lot more posts to explain them. It may make me look like a creep to explain these reasons too. There would be plenty of people who would question my sources and they would be clever to do so because my experience is almost all I have to rest on. And that just wouldn't be scientific enough for most people. But be that as it may, I have taught at every level in the Korean education system and I have a pretty thorough understanding of it. And I maintain hope that Koreans will someday make it right. I will relish the chance to relive these stories about the crazy old Korean education system after they make things right. I think that day will come. In my lifetime I believe.

As things are now, we have to make do with what we have. And being the conscientious teacher that I am, I feel confident that I've given my students the best course and the best marks that they can hope for within the present system. As my student evaluations always reflect. HOLY! Toot toot tooot toooot tooot toooooot!!!

So after a two-week break I'll be teaching July and August here too. But as far as I know the courses won't be actual university credit courses and may involve teacher training or children's camps. I don't yet know.

And what, you might ask, will I be doing on my two-week break? I have decided not to go anywhere since I won't be finishing the contract here at Mokpo and that will cost me a month's pay. I'll be staying in Korea and looking for a place to stay in Gwangju. Probably doing some banking and DEFINITELY watching lots of Kia Tigers games too. I STILL think they're gonna make the playoffs this year. Maybe even win it all. Although the SK Wyverns look pretty solid. We'll see.

Bye for now.