Originally written 10-04-2007 16:25 here: http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/opinon/opi_view.asp?newsIdx=11302&categoryCode=165
By Andrei Lankov
As every foreigner knows, the “English boom” in Korea has continued for decades and shows no signs of receding. But how did it begin? When did Koreans begin to learn the language? And why? Read More »
November 08, 2007
For the first time in Korea, an English teacher has been deported for a crime he committed before coming here, the Justice Ministry announced yesterday.
An American whose name was not released was deported, the Justice Ministry said, after a previous conviction in Los Angeles of possessing and distributing child pornography was uncovered. Read More »
Original: http://koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/opinon/opi_view.asp?newsIdx=12987&categoryCode=197
Dr. Doane (Principal): Peg, as of this morning I’ve moved Philip from your English class.
Miss Narwin (English teacher): Why did you do that? Read More »
Original: http://koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/opinon/opi_view.asp?newsIdx=13370&categoryCode=162
By Jeffrey Miller
Late last year when I was back in the United States preparing to come back to Korea to teach at Woosong University in Daejeon, one of the things that I had to do before I could get my E-2 teaching visa was to have a criminal background check done.
Read More »
Original: http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200707/200707030018.html
Seoul Metropolitan Police arrested two Canadians for working as English instructors with a fake bachelor’s degree and booked seven other foreigners and Koreans either on the same charge or for employing them. To work as an English instructor, foreigners have to get an E-2 visa permitting them to teach English in Korea. The visa is granted to applicants who have either a BA from universities in English-speaking countries or an English-language diploma from universities in non-English speaking countries.
Of the arrested Canadians, one studied only at an adult education center affiliated with a college after finishing high school. While working part-time in a fast food restaurant in Canada, he bought a fake U.S. bachelor’s diploma for US$300 on a U.S. website in August 2003. He came to Korea at the end of that year and started working as an English instructor for a private language institute in Songpa-gu, Seoul. The other graduated from a Canadian junior college and then worked in a factory. He came to Korea on a tourist visa in 2001 and paid US$500 to a Korean broker to buy a fake Canadian bachelor’s diploma in August that year. He worked as an English instructor at a language institute in Anyang, Gyeonggi Province since January 2004.
Meanwhile, police have arrested an Australian English instructor who made headlines last month by telling his Korean ex-girlfriend he was infected with the AIDS virus when she broke up with him.
(englishnews@chosun.com )
Six native English instructors from a well-known language institute in Gangnam were arrested for smoking hashish, an illegal narcotic. Some of the teachers allegedly taught students while high on the drug.
A 24-year-old Canadian instructor allegedly bought the drug from a source in a bar popular with foreigners in Itaewon after moving to Korea in 2005. The teacher is said to have smoked the drug five to six times a week. Read More »
The application process for an E-2 teaching visa will be tightened up in December.
original: http://www.koreaherald.co.kr/NEWKHSITE/data/html_dir/2007/11/07/200711070060.asp
According to a Ministry of Justice press release, foreigners who apply for teaching visas will have to submit a criminal background check and a medical check, and must undergo an interview at the closest Korean consulate to their home town. Visa runs to Japan will also be scrapped. Teachers must now receive and renew visas in their home country. Read More »
Too many people come to the country assuming it will be like the West. Come on, but if you came to Korea, you came with the notion that things would be different–wasn’t that the goal in traveling thousands of miles to live in another culture? Too many people want the ways of conducting life to be similar to the U.S. or other western cultures. I, for one, have complained we need more things in English, but that’s about it. Other than that, I realize that I will be tested, frustrated and also confused very often. If I can’t handle it, I shouldn’t be here in the first place. Now that I’ve accepted all this, I am one of the happiest people I know in this country. I wish you luck in either having that before coming here or developing it while you are here. The Koreans are wonderful people…it just sometimes takes time to see it. I haven’t met more passionate, more understanding (at times), more loving or more fun people in the world…as a culture as a whole throughout the world. My 2 cents….
You need a lot of salt crystals to make a mound, but when you see one salt crystal, you know it’s only worth so much. Well, a lot of these complaints online and positive comments should be taken similarly. Don’t let the one comment here or there be turned from a mole hill into a mountain. I provided links to other Black Lists to let people have resources when looking into their future places of employment. Read More »
