A Review of 전남 제일 고등학교

This past year I was an English Native Speaker at 전남 제일 고등학교 (aka Jeonnam Jeil Godeung Hakkyo). The school is one of Mokpo's language school and specializes in English, Chinese and Japanese. Funny enough the Japanese course is taught by a Japanese native speaker although since she administers the exam (let alone creates it) I suspect that she is more qualified than a native speaker like me.

Contract
My contract looks similar to this one. I didn't post it but feel free to compare it to other contracts.

Staff
The staff is at the school is friendly and professional and it's safer to have my care packages delivered to the main secretary than to my apartment. I would even use the word warm despite the fact that my only communication consisted of brief nods and 안녕하세요's as I pass each member in the hall. Even the principal is a kind and friendly man (I am allowed to skip teacher meetings) but smart enough to use the vice principal as his enforcer. The English department consist of eight English teachers placed at two per grade level. Despite the horror stories from other schools, the English teachers here have a decent understanding of English. They all have various degrees of proficiency but decent English is the rule not the exception at Jeonnam Jeil; if you were to dropped the entire English department in Big City America most if them would thrive while only one or two of them would die of starvation.

Lunch
For ₩50,000 per month you can purchase meal tickets redeemable at the school cafeteria. The food is unfortunately not very vegetarian or vegan friendly and sometimes you really lose out with the only edible things being rice and kimchi. The past native speakers was also a vegan so I know that the school understands the concept but the cafeteria has never offered me a vegan alternative, even if it was rice without the sprinkled chunks of ham. My predecessor soon opted to go home for lunch but I've kept going since it works with my schedule. In protest I've supplemented my lunch from the local Kimbap Nara place just beside the school and stopped paying for meal tickets. Cashing in the meal tickets is done so on the honor system so surprisingly nobody really noticed or really cared when I pick up a tray without putting a ticket into the bowl. I'm not really proud of this fact, it's just the system that evolved over the year.

Accommodations
My school did not pay for my apartment so there's nothing really to review about it.

Schedule
I was a supplementary teacher and taught, according to the confusion between my contract and my main co-teacher, either English culture or conversational English. Regardless, each week I taught 50 minutes of something to 8 classes of Grade 1 and 8 classes of Grade 2. I used an online calendar to manage my teaching schedule and vacation times.
Since the only one who really looked at the calendar was me there may be some mistakes, but for the curious it gives you an idea as to what my schedule was and how my year was structured.
There are some notes to my schedule:

• My predecessor and I never taught any winter or summer camps.
• You will be required to supervise English exams with the co-teacher.
  
• The high school semester is different than elementary and middle school semesters; the starting and end dates of the summer vacation was slightly off by a week so vacationing with a friend may cause some problems.
• The principal requires that you be at school at 8:30. If you don't you will be invited into his office for a discussion about your problems. So I have interpreted this to mean that I leave when I am finished my classes, even if that means at 2pm. Since I have yet to be brought before him for a second time I gather that this is not a problem. Actually as long as you walk out with purpose and greet all teachers in the hall, they won't even think twice.
• You are required to be in school during 3 days in February for Graduation Week. You will not teach during these days so as along as you make announcement your arrival at 8:30 am you're free to vanish. Although I didn't, feel free to negotiate a removal from these days by way of a family wedding or two; nothing is going to happen during this week.

Lessons
As to what I taught I was given absolutely free reign, something that I think is a bad idea and have posted about it before. I was expected to make my own lesson from scratch with no connection to the students' actual proper English education; my work is stored at waygook.org and the lessons are indexed on the side bar.

I started (as do other native speakers) a few months into the school term. This means who ever is going to replace me in the upcoming month should know that I've basically gone through the entire lesson collection with the Grade 2's but since I've only had the grade 1's for a couple of months. I've only done:

• Introduction
• Classroom Rules
• Classroom English
• Konglish
• Adjectives
• Sports
  

Now people like using my lessons but if my replacements are better than me (i.e. know what they're doing) then they should probably do their own thing. The only things that I introduced to the students were the concepts of a themed lesson, powerpoint games, and South Park. This is an education program with no measurement or accountability; no one will care what you do.

Classroom Management
Classroom management is something that I learned on the spot while teaching in Korea. All native speakers have these problems and they vary according to school and teacher. For my replacement here are the class rules that each student should and does know:

• Students are required to bring their pen and dictionary to class. If they forget they are sent out of the class room to get them.
• I do not allow food or drink in my class room. If they are eating or drinking I tell them to go outside in hall with the garbage can and do not come back until they are finished. I continue the lesson without them.
  
• If students are misbehaving I kick them out in the hall where vice principal or co-teacher will deal with them privately. I continue on with my lesson trying not to skip a beat.
  
• Students do not touch the air condition or heating machine. If they are cold or hot they have one opportunity to ask me to turn the heater or air condition on during the ritual "Hello. How are you?' If they respond 'Fine thank you and you," they've lost it and they'll suffer. Usually one student will pipe up saying "Teacher! Cold!" I stop class to explain that when I asked 'how are you' they replied 'fine.' I'll repeat the exercise, writing down on the board what they should say to me, until I get a clear majority rule of what they want. Having spent summer and winter with me the the grade 2 students know this all too well and they'll usually ask the smart kids in the class to help them with the words.
• There are student mug shots files that list the students, their photos, and their student numbers, organized by class. I use these for attendance and have arrange the student's in-class sitting chart based on this list. I.e. in table 1, I have student 1 through 6, in team 2 I have 7 through 12, and so on.
• Volunteering is sometimes painful for my students but they know to expect it. My classes are usually full with 30 students so I'll never get to all of the kids. Instead I take advantage of the team tables and ask each team to choose a captain of the team. If they gang up and choose the quiet kid then I give the quiet kid captain the choice to choose the volunteer. If they squabble I give them the option of kai-bai-bo while I count down to five on my hand. If they're still squabbling at the end of five I randomly choose one kid and give him the option of front of the class or in the hall. Fortunately I have never had to give this option since my counting down to five, in conjunction with the rest of the class counting down to five, encourages one of the team members to step up.
  
• I keep cell phones and do not give them back after class. I don't pretend that I'm calling Canada or pretend that I'm calling their mothers, I just keep them, ignore whatever pleas the students have. I'll usually give them to co-teacher during the day and let them deal with it but I show no sympathy to the kids.
• I do not and have never done candy. I have started giving them titles of Genius Team and if the students themselves introduce this concept in class, Rock Head team.
  

While my rules maybe strict I can pull it off though my patented friendly way of mocking the students and feigning surprise when they say something intelligent. On my first class I got many "Teacher, smile?" But on my last class I got many "I love you, angry teacher."

Co-Teachers
Jeonnam Jeil has some great co-teachers but that doesn't mean that I've been free of problems. Co-teachers know and understand that they are required to supervise my class. And by know, I mean that I have no problem of making misbehaving kids the vice principal's problem; the vice principal in turn will openly wonder why I am dumping misbehaving kids in his office by way of yelling at the English department. I had eight co-teachers who were responsible for co-teaching 2 classes with me this year. That sums up to two hours out of their week and, in comparison, lunch took up five hours out of their week.

But on average most of the teachers were excellent, arriving and even participating as a co-teacher in my class. The process to get the problematic co-teachers to come to class evolved through the year and ended up in this format: Before each class I would fire off an instant message (my school has an in-house instant messenger system, aptly name School Messenger) to the specific co-teacher, reminding them to come to class through a "Could you help me teach this class?" This was the best Korean way of handling this since I was explicitly asking for help in a documented way (school messenger keeps chat histories) that would be readily available come the next meeting of the vice-principal and the English department. Now in exchange for coming to my class, if they came to me and asked me to be excused from this lesson because of work, then I granted immediately. Or if I knew I was having a easy lesson I told them to not worry about coming to class.

The most productive way that my class ran was when the co-teachers acknowledged me as the dominant teacher but supplemented my explanations (on games, vocabulary, etc.) with Korean while keeping the kids in the back row from misbehaving. Again I've talked about this before, but a good example of this relationship happened when a student stood up in class one day. I stopped whatever I was doing and watched, along with the other students, as she walked over to the co-teacher and asked her something in Korea. The whole class looked on as the co-teacher gestured towards me and replied 'Did you ask Native Speaker?' She sulked back to her seat and we all waited while she said in broken English 'Teacher may I go to the bathroom?" I did and class resumed. Going back to classroom management, I have a rule that I will let students do whatever they want, provided they ask me in English. They're not allowed to open the window or go to the bathroom without first asking me first; nobody has realized that if they asked me 'Teacher, I am feeling sick, may I go home," I wouldn't hesitate.

Teacher X.
While I can safely say that I had a perfectly professional relationships with all of my co-teachers my only real negative opinion of working at Jeonam Jeil came from working with the one teacher who was assigned to be my handler. On paperwork each native speaker has one co-teacher and Teacher X was mine; in addition to being one of my eight co-teachers the teacher also had to file the paper work for my airplane ticket reimbursement, etc. Looking back on the year I realized that X was a classic example of a person with the largest ego with the least ability. Now it would be unfair to paint the teacher as a one dimensional cartoon character but at certain times X acted like something lifted out of TV.

The teacher had applied for and received the job of handler not because of X's experience, but explicitly for her lack of experience. X (and I guess the school agreed) that this would be an excellent attempt for the teacher's English to improve by way of a personal tutor. Any consideration for my well being was obviously not a part of the decision process.

In the classroom Teacher X was my worst teacher. X would try to come across as an English expert in front of the kids but both the students and I could see that X wasn't. For example X was the only teacher who was afraid to ask me a question about English in front of the class. All of the other teachers both male and female, older and younger, would never hesitate to ask me the difference between two words or ask me to explain or the clarify something I had said in class. Instead X would vanish into the back office and research the word on Naver. This process took five minutes so that when X decided to return both I and the class had moved on to another part of the lesson. And this happened many times during a class.

Another example of this teacher disrupting my class was the way X helped the students. Most teachers understood that when I asked a question to the students I expected the students to respond in English. If they didn't know the answer the students knew full well how to say 'I don't know' so that I could re-ask the question and I could keep the class going. The most annoying thing that a teacher could do was to tell the students the answer. Teacher X would do this and usually it was the wrong answer. This infuriated me to the point that when I saw this in class I pointed to the whispering teacher and scolded X in front of the whole with 'Cheater! Cunning!' The students laughed and so did Teacher X, unaware whom the students who laughing at. I've talked to X many times about this counterproductive behavior but the teacher refused to see it as such, under the belief that the students needed the opportunity to practice English. It was through these experiences with Teacher X I've learned that for some Koreans age caries more weight than anything, including common sense.

Now if the problem with Teacher X was limited to just the classroom I could deal with since I would only have this particular teacher twice every week. But outside of the classroom it was worse and I should have recognized it immediately but assumed that it was the culture shock that everybody was telling me about. For instance on my first day X told me that I must write an introduction, memorize it and give back to the teacher. I did learned that the X's real intention was to memorize whatever I wrote and present Xself as translating 'on the fly' to the rest of the staff while I introduced myself during the morning meeting. I have had so many of these moments that I'm going to limit them to my top five incidents with Teacher X.

Incident 1
Last year all native speakers had to deal with the new security requirements. This included a verification of our university transcripts and our criminal background check; however since many of us had submitted them through the provincial office they had already been verified and processed and we were exempt from process, as told by our liaison at the provincial office of education.

Despite my insistence that X should call the office of education for clarification Teacher X refused to believe me when I said that I was exempt from this process. We danced around this issue for a couple of weeks and in the end I had to get the provincial office to call the teacher. To Teacher X this was an act of rudeness since I was bypassing the school's authority and embarrassing my co-teacher and the school. I know this because X felt like giving me a lecture afterwards. The incident launched a couple of rants performed in front of friends but the important point to learn is that this kind of thinking is detrimental to the well being of a native speaker or the image of the Jeollanam-do Education Program; basically if the native speakers are not allowed to phone the board of education during matters like these then they are isolated and open to abuse. I tried to argue my case but again you do not win arguments with Teacher X.

Incident 2
X was sent to a teacher camp for a month and I thought that I would receive a little time off from dealing with her. Unfortunately X telephoned me constantly with English questions and sent me essays to correct. I wouldn't have minded except for X's special instructions that I should not tell anybody and it should be secret. Well, naturally I did tell somebody, one of my friends who had been a native speaker at a workshop before she told me that this kind of thing is all too common. So I politely refused citing my fears about it being illegal, and while this was something that X denied, X did stop sending me request for corrections.

Incident 3
I was constantly used as a novelty (and this sums up X's view of our relationship) pet. This is one of the most insulting aspects working at Jeonnam Jeil. X would introduce me to Koreans who were X's friends but couldn't speak English, in effect making me wait a hour or so while X sat and gossiped. The awkwardness was compounded when X, in X's most perfect example of uncomfortable vainness would ask, 'how do you think about figure?" implying the friend, acquaintance, or whoever's appearance. X expected me to say 'she is beautiful' or 'he is handsome' or something like so that X would laugh and clap her hands as if I had just yipped and yapped for a treat. It was a suffocating relationship. In the school I had to eat my cafeteria meals with this teacher, alway sit beside X in meetings and assemblies, and always include X when I talked to the other teachers. Somewhere along the lines of 'taking care of me' X automatically assumed a relationship level of intimacy that stepped over many professional boundaries. The other co-teachers labeled X as my 'mother.'

Incident 4
One week X happened to overhear a student asking me about teaching extra English classes. X immediately jumped into this and told the student something to the effect of no, it is illegal. That same week X asked me to help the gym teacher (who was also the coach for the national gymnastic team -- well, maybe, I couldn't understand what X was trying to convey). The students were so busy training that they were unable to attend school and they needed an English teacher and my co-teacher volunteered me. I didn't quite understand this situation but it was completely outside of my contract and I politely refused. X kept on countering my refusal with words like 'duty as native speaker in this country' by this time I had become wise to X's ways and the insistence of reinforced my refusal. X left visibly disappointed.

Incident 5
Early on in the term X came to me and asked me a favor and feeling sorry for her, I ended up loaning X ₩2,000,000. X wouldn't tell me what the money was for and to this day I still don't know. This was the most stupid thing that I would ever do in Korea, but I was still under the impression that X was in control of my winter and summer camps, those little bits of extra work in your summer and winter breaks that stop you from month long vacations. Two weeks later I got the money back and everything was fine. But as a note to my replacements it is important that you do not do this and do not feel pressured into doing this--even if X tells you that he or she knows how much money you have.

(Incidentally I have heard many stories about Koreans lending money that they do not have. In Korean society it seems that people have yet to learn financial responsibility and will go into debt to preserve the image that they are visibly affluent.)

Bonus Incident
X made me 'correct' my comments during the exit interview (i.e. teacher feedback form) and I was not allowed to see what other teachers wrote about my performance.

So after these incidents (and more) I developed a unfortunate habit of immediately being filled with dread every time X wanted to talk to me in private. These incidents do create a harsh impression of X and some part of me wants to believe that there are some redeeming qualities about this teacher. After all it would be unfair to describe X as evil, but X's way of thinking is so far removed from my own--and my other Korean teachers--that working with the teacher proved to be one of the challenging aspect of my time here. I don't know what kind of paperwork X has to deal with concerning me (X will not let me know, informing me that I should not worry about it) but during my term with X I learned to become as independent as I could. The result is this blog and the information that is gathered by learning Korean, asking questions to other Koreans and other native speakers in Mokpo.

And it has to be noted that I was the first foreigner that X had to deal with and I hope that X has mellowed a little thanks our interactions. But, again, I found X to be the kind of person who is insulting without intention and unable to recognize discomfort in other people. While crazy is a word that may be better on the flip side, lack of patience may be equally applied to me. Throughout this year correcting Teacher X's social faux-pas all the time became too exhausting and in the end I gave up and started to avoid the teacher as much as possible, wishing that X magically would 'get a clue.' This is not the best way to handle this situation, but I lacked the drive and ambition; the effort involved in proper mediation was too much for me and my one year in Mokpo.

Out of Five Stars
While Teacher X was the main problem at 전남 제일 고등학교 it would be unfair to the other members of the school, most notable the other members of English department, to simply say 'avoid this school.' The English department and it's members keep the school from failing my (one and only) school review.

Working at 전남 제일 고등학교 gets a 3.5/5 rating. It's an acceptable rating that acknowledges the staff, the students, the teaching resources and even the teaching environment while noting that there are still some areas in need of major improvement. Of course there are schools worse than mine, schools that are more strict and are more antagonistic towards their native speakers. And of course then there are those schools that will make you join the volleyball team.

Educational Nomads

The previously mentioned Indian Wave is in Korea, although in a slightly different form from what's going on in Japan:

An increasing number of Korean children now study in India, where they can learn English more cheaply than in the U.S. or the U.K. Parents are also impressed by the reputed strengths of Indian education in math and science, making the country an affordable alternative to the traditional destinations for Korea’s “educational refugees.”

Of course somebody beat me to breaking (well, blogging about) the story; Seoul Buffoon has already weighed in with his experience and has noted this amusing side effect:

At half the cost, the kids can get a decent education conducted in the English language. But of course, there is a caveat. They will end up speaking with Indian accents!

In fact my partner was there for two years (thats where I met her and followed her to Korea) and she speaks English with an Indian accent! Infact if she speaks in English on the phone, the person at the other end may actually think that she is an Indian!! Joking ofcourse, but the point I am trying to make is that if Korean parents can “tolerate the Indian accent” it works to their advantage.

I find this interesting since I'm now forced to reconcile the contradiction between the parents who send the kids off to India and the parents who are blind to acknowledging anything other than American English. I spell colour with a U even though I'm told that it's wrong.

But there's something else about this article that caught my eye: Educational Refugees. It's the first time that I've heard that term but to me the word refugee is loaded with so much tragedy and suffering that to use it to describe children of affluent parents and their personal education choices is very questionable. I'll grant that there maybe some validity when used as a commentary on Korean education but this goes too far and turns the affair into a sad hyperbole. For one, I'm sure that the Chosun isn't being hipster ironic and for another these Korean children are not being left behind:

As a high school teacher and guidance counselor, I am currently dealing with the fallout of [The No Child Left Behind Act] as I try to find schools for students who are not doing well in our school. We are a "failing school" that is "in need of improvement" and heading toward "corrective action." Yes, our test scores are low. But they are low because we are a transfer high school, meaning that we take in students who are being pushed out of other schools that need to meet AYP and these "weak" students will prevent them from doing so by scoring abysmally on the tests. The mission of our school is to educate these second chance kids, NCLB be damned. However, on occasion we do have students that need to tranfer to another school. And this is what happens: nobody wants these students. There are hundreds, probably thousands of students that no school will take in because those students are a "liability." The schools that have been educating these second chance kids for decades and trying to open up other possibilities for them are now being punished for doing so. NCLB hangs over schools like ours menacingly. We have been educating students that no other school wants for 25 years. When schools like ours disappear or are "restructured," what alternatives will kids have?

In this comment the Educational Refugee label has some merit since these children have no other alternative in the mainstream education culture. In another example, I found this website that uses the same metaphor albeit entrenched in a Christian motif:

Quite often, they start their homeschooling because of some negative causes, such as their children getting bullied in public schools. They are always in need of various kinds of help and encouragement from outside. Sad to say, many Japanese churches are not cooperative to the homeschoolers in Japan Homeschoolers often do not receive cooperative or positive reactions from other church members, and this can be detrimental for their Christian life. Even some of them are "persecuted" by other church members.

Even though I don't agree with subject matter, this contemporary use of Educational Refugee seems appropriately well placed, reinforcing the notion that Educational Refugees are members of society targeted for exclusion. This then poses the question: Are the Korean Kids being alienated by the national educational policies? I would say no. It seems like they (or their parents) are instead opting out of the educational system to gain that extra educational edge:

The OECD recently released the results of its Program for International Student Assessment (PISA). In the survey, Korean students finished first in reading skills, fourth in mathematics, and 11th in science. When the report was released, Koreans made a fuss about the science ranking plummeting to 11th from top place six years earlier. But the foreign press still regards Korea as a nation of excellent students. Despite the students' outstanding performance, Korean parents are uneasy about the country's education system. They covet an "advanced education," setting their eyes on overseas schools. They are aware that high scores don't necessarily reflect real abilities or skills. Nonetheless, they are so worried that they send their children to private crammers and continually push them for higher and higher scores.

So it looks like it's safe to say that the Chosun's usage of Educational Refugee is a good example of mediocre journalism that's thankfully outside of the current emotionally charge atmosphere. Except that I found Rieko Fry's PhD thesis Japanese children abroad: Politics of education for kaigaishijo and kikokushijo with this breif history in it's introduction:

Business expansion in the 1960s and its associated international strategies have meant that many Japanese company employees and their families were sent abroad on long-term assignments. The children who accompanied their parents on such assignments and then returned to Japan were first described as 'educational refugees' and were regarded as culturally ambiguous, socially marginalized and academically disadvantaged. The Japanese government considered that special measures were needed for these children, as they had missed out on the standard education that they would otherwise have received. Consequently, it introduced various educational options so that they could reintegrate smoothly into Japanese society and its educational system. Later, in the 1980s, when 'globalization' became vital to Japan, the attributes associated with such children were recast and they began to be regarded as 'valuable national assets' for their supposed rich cross-cultural awareness and bilingual abilities, the very qualities the government sought in the new generations of Japanese.

Interestingly enough the term was at first referencing an internal demographic, much like the left behind of No Child Left Behind, but soon became a fashionable (i.e marketable) quality. I can only guess that this is the same logic behind the Chosun's usage; the term has mutated within the Korean monoculture to a point of direct contradiction with it's dictionary definition. Simply put, Education Refugee is now Konglish.

But then I find this story and learn what it means to be a true Korean Educational Refugee:

The educational exodus from Korea has created not just success stories. The number of students who give up on their studies overseas and return to Korea is increasing, from 8,019 in 2001 to 13,586 in 2005. Some soon pack their bags again because they can no longer adapt to their home country either.

So it seems clear enough: the Konglish definition of Educational Refugees is an umbrella covering all Korean nationals who acquire education outside of Korea. This is a mislabeling since these students don't become Educational Refugees (by measure of the rest of the word) until they return home and experience the alienation brought upon by their foreign education -- much like Seoul Buffon's Partner but of course to a larger and less humorous degree -- and acquire a new designation in the Korean monoculture: The Educational Nomad.

First Day of Korean High School

The new term has started at my school and everywhere else in Mokpo's public education system. The first thing that I noticed was the subtle shuffle of my previous year; I've swapped one English teacher for another from a neighbouring high school, I've lost some of my memorable students, and I've gain a completely new crop of freshmen and women. And my first day didn't really involve any teaching since it was dominated by a welcoming ceremony and orientations but it was chock full of Koreanism that went unexplained:

• The class schedule is not finished; the real timetable is TBA
  
• The classroom lists (my crucial mug shot sheets) are not finished. Again, TBA.
  
• New school equipment like class room computers have not been delivered. Unfortunately we had to ship the old computers out before we left. When will classroom get a computer? TBA.
  
• My Internet connection has not be fixed since I reported it broken a couple of weeks ago and I cannot get a definite answer of when it will be working again.
• My classroom average classroom temperature is 7C
  

On the positive note I get to start over with the confidence of a battle-hardened veteran. They know that this is my house now:

• I have made the new freshmen stare at me in awe. They tell me I am handsome.
  
• I have made the new freshwomen fall in love with me. They too tell me I am handsome.

And on some other notes:

• Grade 1 classes are now sex-segregated; it keeps the hormones at bay (I guess) but my worst memories involve the same-sex cliques.
• I can reuse all of my lessons on the Grade 1s.
• Since I do my blogging at school, updates will be sporadic until I get my Internet fixed.

Working in a Mokpo Winter

Galbijim gives Mokpo a winter temperature of -5℃ but to a foreigner who is living in Mokpo this simple statistic doesn't explain the whole story. North Americans and other westerners will probably bring an assumption to Mokpo that they will work within a heated (or aleast well insulated) work environment. That assumption is sorely misguided.

From a very unscientific survey of foreigners here it's clear that proper heat conservation is a concept foreign to Koreans. Windows are opened and promptly forgotten about. Taking off your coat is only done in the bathroom. And while your school does have heating it will only exists in certan locations, most notably not where they put you.

My office temperatures hovers around 3℃ and with my little space heater I can bump that temperature reading up to 7, maybe even 10 if I'm lucky and stand directly in front of it. But I am incapable of heating both feat on the ground and hands at the keyboard unless I curl up in a fetal position on the cold cement floor. Normally I would suck it up like I did during December, but these past couple of days have been brutal. For graduation week I was explicitly instructed to come to school despite having no classes to teach. I have nothing to do except 'prepare lessons' using facebook, gmail, and blogger.

Today my space heater was failing miserably. After a couple hours deciding which I value more, my toes or my fingers, I abandoned the space heater, my computer, and the general sad existence that is my office and headed to a known source of heat, the main staff room. There I found a little corner and started reading the book I normally save for the bus, subscribing to the illusion that I'm on call for any native speaker emergency that could rear its ugly head. Time passes and then I took it up a notch and broke out the Nintendo DS. This helped me get to lunch at which point I leave and don't come back.

End rant.

Accessing Restricted Websites at School

I can't read this article from the Seattle Times on my school computer. I don't know why but it is blocked by something call Cleanpass that (after some researching) is operated by ITOP. Now, it's not the first time that I've worked at a place that has had some Internet restrictions, but it is the first place where I can't understand the logic.

There's already tons of information on the Internet for bypassing web filters, but the key words that you want to learn are Anonymous Proxies. Anonymous proxies are computer servers on the Internets that you can hide behind. And by hide behind I mean that instead of your computer directly asking for information from an Internet server, your computer now asks the proxy to ask for you. By doing this you can also ask the proxy to muck about with whatever information is involved in the transaction but for accessing restricted websites we just want the the proxy to re-write the URL so that the filter doesn't match it on its offensive site list. Other stuff, like cookie management, advertisement blocking, etc. are aspects for the truly paranoid.

So in the end, and just from a Google search, I can access that Seattle Times article via, Zend2 (article), YouHide (article), or Proxify (article).

전라남도 목포 상업 고등학교

Jeollanam-Do Mokpo Commercial School or Mokpo School of Commerce (전라남도 목포 상업 고등학교) is the former name of Jeonnam Jeil High School but despite the name change it is still active, at least on the Internet, and through events like an alumni concert that included the current school band, guest alumni performers, and other, uniquely high school things.

Winter Heating

For some reason Koreans seem proud of their four seasons. Maybe it's pride is too strong a word, but Koreans at my school take extra care to inform me of the special days when one season starts and the other season begins. It's a little bit eerie since the only other people that I know who do this are Wiccans.

Of course conflicts occurs when the foreigner perceives a season starting too late or (in my case) too soon. For example, no matter how cold it gets in November the school will not turn on the heating system until December.

Although the temperatures are approaching the freezing point, Koreans do not push the little button that magically warms the room. Whether the venue be school, work, a store, or a restaurant, Koreans are either completely indifferent to temperature preference or everyone is too cheap to warm up the air to be a little more comfortable. It kind of reminds me of my Dad and how he wouldn't turn on the furnace until December, but to the extreme! "Just put on a sweater." Sorry Dad. It is so cold inside that no one bothers taking off their winter jackets once they get inside.

For a little perspective this isn't a case of bring a sweater to work, my school is so poorly insulated that there are literally gaps in the windows where the wind whistles through.; my average English classroom temperature is 10C. I walk around the school to find that windows are left wide open. Given all of the other examples of Korean Komfort, I can't understand the mentality towards winter heating. I'm not alone questioning this logic:

First off, I can't feel my toes and am super cold because there is no real heating system in my school and I have to wear open toe slippers at work. There's only heating in the office and maybe the classroom, not sure if the heat is just from the number of students haha. The rest of the school is freezing and as everyone complains about the temperature, pretty much every window is wide open. Sigh...my friends and I have been saying that when in Korea, take anything that seems the most illogical and apply here because that's how it seems to work haha.

The Korean SATs

Today is the day all high school students take nation wide university entrance exams, the equivalent to the American SATs; Michael Hurt's Seoul Glow has a nice report of what this means for the students, the schools, and even the nation of Korea itself:

Corporal Punishment

Despite the legality of corporal punishment, it is still used in schools. A couple of weeks ago the Digital Chosunilbo ran a piece on one case that went too far and was captured on video:

The video and accompanying news article has made it's way around the Korean internet; waygook.org has a nice thread on the incident, but Gust of Popular Feeling (which also gave us the brilliant A brief history of scapegoating English teachers in Korea) has a nice history of Kamera Kaptured Korean Korporal Kunishment.

School Festivals

School festivals are a staple of Korean student life, premises for Korean romantic comedies and a usual topic for expat bloggers. (Jeonnam Jeil is no exception) The festivals are usually day long events, organised by the students for the glory of performing in front of the school principal. The other students and teachers are invited to attend as well, but really if you've seen one festival you've kind of seen them all. There's the recognizable elements, like the school band or even the taekwando team demonstrations, but then there's the uniquely Korean elements, like the cross-dressing dance off set to the music of the latest girl band:

In fact it seems like it's a crucial part of Korean identity to (publicly) dance to sugar pop songs, as seen by this:


And this:


And even this:


It's easy to start up your own Wonder Girl tribute dance group thanks to the Internet and the original, karaoked version:

Teaching English In Korea

The Daily Kimchi has a nice summary of landing your own teaching gig in Korea. The article seems to be focused on Hagwon employment, the private schools that (I'm convinced) some Koreans see more as a fashion accessory than a useful, extra curricular activity. I teach in the public sector where the programs are mediocre and laughable compared to what goes on in an hagwon.

Rafael Sabio's commentary English Education in Korea: It's Time for Accountability does an excellent job of highlighting how useless the English education system is, starting with the price tag:

Is it not a wonder why over 10 billion USD was spent on English education in South Korea in 2006, and yet there has been no noticeable improvement in the English education system

He then goes on to accurately point out how the Ministry of Education is a poster child for inefficient government programs:

Nowhere does the Ministry of Justice state that an instructor of the English language must have some type of teaching certification, experience, or relevant credentials in order to teach.
...
Today, Koreans wishing to teach English as a foreign language are required to have only a bachelor's degree in any discipline. In other words, a Korean can teach English without really knowing the language!

And of course there's this little gem that brilliants explains why the current divide of public and private education is so great:

With all of the "interesting" television shows and documentaries based on the "terrible teachers of Korea," one would think the government would take action and correct this problem. Instead, they sit back and do nothing. Why is this? Why would a government that cares so much about its people not fix something as important as its education system? My guess is….the money.
...
It is understood that the academy (hagwon) associations exert a lot of influence over the government. Furthermore, because it is such a lucrative business, hagwons are seen as a wonderful source of revenue.

The article is not without criticism but it does echo other critiques of English education in Korea and gives a good idea of why English Education is on the election agenda.

Word Search Generators

There are tons of them on the Internets, but I like this one for since it can create a word search out of a randomly selected subset of a words. It sounds nerdy but it's great for making a bunch of same same, but different word searches for word search competitions.

Naver Local

In a previous post I talked about Korea's apparent isolationism in the online mapping community. For some reason Google or Yahoo provide map data for everybody but Korea and we're are stuck with the homegrown alternatives: Congnamul & Naver.

At first I was all about Congnamul. It looked prettier and had important things, like Starbucks, already iconified on the map. From a consumerist tourist's point of view it's incredible helpful; however after trying to deal with Mokpo specifics I'm starting to swing back towards Naver, largely thanks to Naver Local.

The Paradigm Shift

I automatically plug in street addresses for any mapping systems but, here in Korea, only the losers in the post office use street addresses; real Mokponians remember locations by their names. In fact the whole notion of street address is still a fairly fresh idea in this relatively small city;. Luckily the folks at Naver handle both. Take, for example again, everybody's favorite high school where we can use:

1. 전남제일고등학교
2. 전라남도 목포시 용당동 937-1 번지

as the map's input. Both will get you this map but the location name will snag you the bonus of an entry in the Naver Local directory (which usually includes the phone number, embedded map, and other tidbits of useful information). Before I favoured Congnamul over Naver because Congnamul allowed you to link to maps but Naver Local's information is linkable and completely surpasses that of Congnamul.

Channy Yun Revisited

This too was previously mentioned, but I'm digging his magic enough to post about it again: Channy Yun is the guy who did the Naver & Google Map Mashup that gives you the Naver street map on top of the Google satellite view. I used this for my school maps and it really helped. The only problem to the site is that lacks any of Naver's search functionality. I had to scroll around, zoom in, and find the school myself.

I can make up for the Mashup's short comings by taking advantage of the its usage of Naver's coordinate system. Using the example of 에베레스트 (our favorite Nepalese restaurant in Seoul) we first find the Naver Local entry and get the Naver Map map url:

http://maps.naver.com/? x=31296500 & y=55271800 & title=Everest

We cull the X & Y parameters from the url (removing, for some reason, the last two digits) and create our own Mashup link.

http://map.creation.net/getMap? x=312965 & y=552718 & title=Everest & z=2

Giving us the all of the business information, maps, and satellite imagery that complete strangers would need to find the restaurant.

The Abandoned School

Almost every patch of free soil in Mokpo is converted into a make-shift garden so it's very surprising to find a school that has been closed and left to deteriorate for a good number of years. This school is known to the local foreigners as the abandoned school.

From what I've gathered, the abandoned school was built during the Japanese occupation of Korea and was Japanese exclusive. After the war it was changed to Mokpo Jeil Girls High School (목포 제일 여자 고등 학교 aka Mokpo Jeil Yeoja Godeung Hakkyo), but eventually the school moved over into its current location in Ha-dang and no one has been back since.

The closest land mark is the Mount Yudal Post Office (유달우체국 aka Yudal San Ucheguk) and is useful for unconfusing taxi drivers who insist on taking you to Ha-dang.

The Mokpo School Map

The Mokpo Office of Education website has a list of schools, complete with listings of the elementary schools, middle schools, and high schools in Mokpo, and more importantly a map dotting their locations. Of course if you haven't master Hangul, these list may be more scary than useful. So what can we do?

The data that we need is all there, and we just need to convert it into a useful format. For example, if we translate the elementary schools, middle schools, and high schools lists via Google's nifty translation button, we get a better understanding of what exactly is being displayed. But since we have more tools at our disposal, we can go further; if we romanize the data via kawa.net, translate some of the common words, and map the street addresseses, we get ourselves a quick reference table, listing locations of each school in Mokpo, complete with clickable map link.

Elementary Schools
Mokpo Bukgyo Elementary School	bukgyo-dong 1
Mokpo Sanjeong Elementary School	sanjeong-dong 34
Mokpo Seobu Elementary School	sanjeong-dong 1061-2
Mokpo Jungang Elementary School	honam-dong 463
Mokpo Yudal Elementary School	yudal-dong 8
Mokpo Yudal Elementary School Dalli Island Branch	chungmu-dong 301
Mokpo Yudal Elementary School Yuldo Branch	chungmu-dong 161-1
Mokpo Dong Elementary School	sanjeong3-dong 270-1
Mokpo Iro Elementary School	yonghae-dong 240-2
Mokpo Nam Elementary School	honam-dong 567
Mokpo Seosan Elementary School	seosan-dong 22
Mokpo Seosan Elementary School Chungmu Branch	chungmu-dong 38
Mokpo Daeseong Elementary School	daeseong-dong 212
Mokpo Yongho Elementary School	yongdang2-dong 1028-7
Mokpo Samhag Elementary School	sanjeong-dong 1367
Mokpo Yeondong Elementary School	sanjeong-dong 1080-4
Mokpo Imseong Elementary School	seoghyeon-dong 96-1
Mokpo Daeyeon Elementary School	yonghae-dong 631
Mokpo Ognam Elementary School	ogam-dong 236
Mokpo Sangdong Elementary School	sang-dong 364
Mokpo Buyeong Elementary School	ogam-dong 1024
Mokpo Hadang Elementary School	sang-dong 820
Mokpo Yeonsan Elementary School	yeonsan-dong 1270
Mokpo Sinheung Elementary School	sang-dong 1017
Mokpo Ceongho Elementary School	ogam-dong 966
Mokpo Hanbic Elementary School	sang-dong 887
Mokpo Mihang Elementary School	ogam-dong 1102
Mokpo Seohae Elementary School	yeonsan-dong 1271
Mokpo Yonghae Elementary School	yonghae-dong 974
Mokpo Seoghyeon Elementary School	seoghyeon-dong 1172
Mokpo Hangdo Elementary School	sang-dong 264
Mokpo Aehyang Elementary School	ogam-dong 56-1
Gwangju Teachers College's Mokpo Buseor Elementary School	yonghae-dong 289
Middle Schools
Mokpo Jeil Middle School	yonghae-dong 170-5
Mokpo Yudal Middle School	sanjeong-dong 2-10
Mokpo Ceongho Middle School	yongdang1-dong 970-23
Mokpo Girls Middle School	gyeong-dong, 2ga 2
Mokpo Jungan Girls Middle School	sang-dong 899
Mokpo Hangdo Girls Middle School	sang-dong 327
Mokpo Hadang Middle School	ogam-dong 963
Mokpo Ogam Middle School	ogam-dong 1282
Muntae Middle School	yongdang-dong 183
Hongil Middle School	juggyo-dong 575-1
Yeongheung Middle School	sang-dong 55
Deogin Middle School	juggyo-dong 30
Mokpo Jeongmyeong Middle School	yang-dong 86
Mokpo Hyein Girls Middle School	juggyo-dong 30
Mokpo Yeonghwa Middle School	sang-dong 525
High Schools Schools
Mokpo High School	yongdang1-dong 970-6
Mokpo Girls High School	daeseong-dong 40-1
Mokpo Jeil Girls High School	ogam-dong 983
Jeonnam Jeil High School	yongdang1-dong 937-1
Mokpo Gongeob High School	yongdang2-dong 171-11
Muntae High School	yongdang-dong 383
Mokpo Hongil High School	juggyo-dong 575-1
Yeongheung High School	sang-dong 55
Mokpo Deogin High School	juggyo-dong 30
Mokpo Mariahoe High School	yongdang-dong 845
Mokpo Jeongmyeong Girls High School	yang-dong 86
Mokpo Hyein Girls High School	juggyo-dong 30
Mokpo Girls Sangeob High School	sang-dong 525
Mokpo Seongsin High School	sang-dong 328
Mokpo Jungang High School	daeyang-dong 208

Some notes on the directory:

• There are 53 dots on the map with 63 schools listed.
• Not all school street address resolved in a map link.
• There is some disagreement with the Romanization output of kawa.net.
  
• Some schools (especialy the Branch schools) are located outside of mainland Mokpo.
• Just from experience, I suspect that not all data (i.e. names of schools or streets) is up to date.
  

The Class Room Video

Like the Apartment Video, the English teachers here like to show off their schools, class rooms, and English labs.

Others, like Samuel, go all out and document their school, class room, staff room, staff room with their computer, and their chemically addicted students.

And then there are the students themselves; watch their cuteness fade as you travel from kindergarten, through elementary school, and all the way up to middle school, courtesy of Dawne and Dave.

Etc, etc, etc.

전남 제일 고등학교

The Jeonnam Jeil High School, (formerly known as Mokpo Commercial High School) has a mailing address:

Jeonnam Jeil Godeung Hakkyo
937-1 Yongdang-Dong, Mokpo-Si, Jeollanam-Do
530-360
Republic of Korea

as well as a more traditional mailing address:

530-360
전라남도 목포시 용당동 937-1 번지
전남제일고등학교

with the following phone numbers:

Fax (팩스)	061-277-7088
Administrative (행정실)	061-278-5121
School Affairs (교무실)	061-277-7082, 7083
Principal's Office (교장실)	061-277-7081

and a map/satellite view.

Of course it is also blessed with a small corner of the Internet at jeonnamjeil.hs.kr that also hoasts the school's photo album and (more importantly) lunch menu.