Last week I received an email from the DMOE. DMOE means Daegu Metropolitan Office of Education. They are my boss. They send lots of emails and most of them remain unread in my inbox because I can get the general idea of every message based on other native English teachers' angry hate-filled status updates on facebook almost immediately after they are sent. It was another slow day at Gangdong so I opened this one up and studied the contents. They were willing to pay me 50,000 won for three hours of my time on Saturday afternoon between 3 and 6pm at a local Daegu public middle school. My normal Saturday afternoons between 3 and 6pm are nothing of great importance to me, usually spent making aimless laps around my apartment or staring helplessly at all those Korean books I got when my hopes were so high. I quickly replied an affirmative response as to not be beaten by all those other money-hungry foreigners and come 2:15 Saturday I was en-route to my appointment.
My job was, naturally, unclear upon arrival and I didn't learn about what I needed to do until five minutes before I needed to do it, so the first hour at the school was spent chatting with the other foreigners there whom I have never seen before in my life. I don't know how many people I was expecting to be there, but I was expecting at least one person I knew to attend. Surely I'm not the only loser with nothing to do on Saturday afternoon.
"Yeah I've been here for five years," I hear as I invade an in-progress conversation.
"I won an award for outstanding English education twice at my school," says another.
Sensing my presence I am asked the question which lead to the conversation taking place.
"Why were you invited?"
"Invited? Here? I don't know. I have white skin, two thumbs, an American passport, and a pulse?"
The uncomfortable conversation was one of the gloating persuasion. Who was the most qualified person in the room. I was clearly not up to par. I soon learned that, yes, I was chosen by the DMOE to be at this event. I still didn't know what exactly it was but I overheard someone say it was a contest of sorts, judging Korean English teachers' elementary school lessons. Before I'm able to discover my purpose of invitation, or before I'm able to talk with the one familiar face that walked in, I'm shoved adjumma-style to a table and given instruction on what to do.
"Teachers teach five minute. You grade. A, B, C. English level. You grade. A, B, C. Let's go."
Now I'm at the back of a classroom sitting next to a principal and vice principal behind rows of empty seats as fifteen Korean English teachers nervously scuffle their way into the room, present five minutes of one of their lessons to an imaginary class, and run like a bat out of hell back into the hallway. I have a paper in front of me and I do what I'm told. Listen to their English, give them a grade, smile. It takes about an hour to get through all of the teachers and at the end, when I finally have time, I have a short conversation with the principal next to me.
"What do they win?" I ask.
"Win?"
"Yeah. Isn't this some sort of contest?"
"Ummm..." She seems a bit perplexed. "I guess they win teacher's certificate."
These 15 Korean English teachers were not yet Korean English teachers. They were going through the final step of their long and hard licensure procedure. They received three grades and could not get a 'C' in any of them or else they had to do what they did today again until they passed. These three grades came from a 30-year veteran Korean English teacher now a principal, and 20-year veteran Korean English teacher now at vice principal, and a nearly one-year experienced native English teacher that still bribes his students with candy in exchange for classroom order.
Speaking of productive people working hard to deserve what they earn, and mildly of gloating, I have every intention to do something productive with my ever-growing weekend. Extended from five days to six this morning, I hope to learn more about the lifestyles of the elusive hagwon teacher. Staying awake past 10pm, sleeping past 7am, and enjoying what Daegu has to offer on various weekday nights. I will have much information to share, fellow public teachers.
