"The country where murderers and drug criminals teach English"

[Update]

I added a few comments at the bottom of this post.

[Original Post]

This editorial appeared in the Daejeon Ilbo on March 25 commenting on the 'never-ending' crimes of foreign English teachers:

The country where murderers and drug criminals teach English

In Korea the illegal and law-evading activities of foreign language teachers are never ending. Some thoughtless teachers get into trouble because of their illegal and law-evading activities and now gang activity and murder have shockingly been uncovered. It’s incredible that such a brutal criminal and drug addict could play such a role and teach English to young students.

A Korean-American teacher who was exposed and arrested a few days ago was wanted by Interpol for murder. In 2006 he killed a Korean American in the U.S. and fled to Korea where he habitually did drugs and taught children. Another Korean American named Lee who worked as a teacher at a famous hagwon in Gangnam was arrested in a similar case. An LA gang member who was deported for attempted murder and came to Korea, he worked as an English teacher and was arrested for smuggling, dealing and taking drugs. In 2008 a teacher on the FBI’s most wanted list for murder was arrested, and thirteen English teachers were arrested for gambling and habitually doing drugs. There are also foreign teachers who get into trouble because of their disorderly private lives or molestation.

It’s not easy to keep problematic 'low quality teachers’ like these out . Under current law, for hagwons that employ foreign teachers the owner must report the teacher’s personal data to the education office within one week. For people from English speaking countries to receive a conversation-teaching visa (E-2), they must submit criminal record and infectious disease certificates and their addresses in Korea. However, for foreign teachers who have come to Korea fake diplomas or documents are difficult to verify. Moreover, there is no system to filter out undeclared instructors and instructors from non-English speaking countries.

At the end of July last year there were 21,498 E-2 visa holders in Korea. If we include those illegal teachers who came to Korea on tourist visas there are 50,000 foreign teachers. At Seoul public schools, among native speaking English teachers 16.2% are licensed teachers, and only 38.8% have TESOL or TEFL certificates. Teachers at private hagwons fall far beyond this level.

In the era of globalization, the need for foreign language education is an undeniable reality. As long as foreign language education is unavoidable the entire system should be improved. We must find a way to raise quality standards and block law-breaking foreigners at the source. At this time, we also wish that we could confidently check the conditions of private foreign language hagwons in Daejeon and Chungcheongnam-do.

So, we're told that "It’s not easy to keep problematic 'low quality teachers’ like these out," which is then followed by unrelated information about registration of teachers and the E-2 system (incorrectly - infectious disease certificates and their addresses in Korea must be submitted to get an alien registration card, not the visa) and talk of fake diplomas and ‘undeclared instructors and instructors from non-English speaking countries" who cannot be "filtered out" (forgetting that there are over 1,000 non-English teaching E-2 visa holders). There is nothing about F-4 visas, however which is the visa those caught in these most recent cases were on. As always, Korean Americans are treated according to the "Korean American + 'good' or 'successful' = Korean, Korean American + 'bad' or 'criminal' = American/foreign" equation. The editorial betrays a total lack of knowledge about these visa issues, and seems like it was just a chance for the writer to crusade against the long-standing 'foreign English teacher problem' and their 'never-ending' crimes in order to 'protect children.'

We're also told that there are '50,000 foreign teachers' if illegal teachers on tourist visas are included (are there even that many of such illegal teachers these days?), which is 30,000 above the number of E-2 visa holders. It's quite an exaggeration, and one meant to frighten (golly, are there really so many possible 'brutal criminals and drug addicts' out there?).

Then we're told that, "At Seoul public schools, among native speaking English teachers 16.2% are licensed teachers, and only 38.8% have TESOL or TEFL certificates." While it sounds similar to comments in this article attributed to Song Kwang-yong, the president of Seoul National University of Education ("Currently, only 20.5 percent of native English speaking teachers (at schools) have teaching licenses (according to data from the Education Ministry, November 2008)"), what's interesting is that neither a Google or Naver search turned up any other article referring to those stats except this one.

The article lists examples of "never-ending" crimes by foreign English teachers ('끊이지 않고 있다' is not an uncommon way to describe them - see here). Not to excuse the crimes that are committed, but something that should be pointed out is that few groups could be scrutinized in the way foreign English teachers are by the Korean media and come away looking good.

'Jibberish'

The French foreign language teacher scandal of 1984

Prelude 1: The 1983 Law "Limiting Aliens' Residence Period" and banning "unqualified" foreigners from working.

Part 1: Le Monde and what came before
Part 2: Korea is "Ali Baba's" Cave
Part 3: Seoul Should not be a Workplace for Parisians
Part 4: In private foreign language classes, there are a lot of ‘fraud teachers’
Part 5: Jibberish
Part 6: 'I Want to Strike it Rich in Seoul Too' - Continuous Job Inquiries by the French
Part 7: Foreigners Enjoy Better Life With Mother Tongues
Part 8: Foreigners and Foreign Languages
Part 9: Sickening Face
Part 10: Barking Up the Wrong Tree
Part 11: The First Sanctions on Foreigners Working Illegally
Part 12: All Private Lessons by Foreigners Prohibited
Part 13: Institutes Asked to Hire Eligible Foreign Teachers
Part 14: "Seoul Wind"
Part 15: Foreign Language Teacher Shortage
Part 16: Troublemaking vagabond foreigner story finally airs

Part 5: "Jibberish"


On August 21, 1984, an irregular column in the Donga Ilbo titled 횡설수설 ("Jibberish," or "nonsense") provided its own commentary on the subject of unqualified foreign language teachers. Many thanks to Ben Wagner and Kim So-eun for help with the translation:

'Jibberish'

There is a phrase "Beautiful/American conversation". Of course, it means the direct English conversation taught by Americans, but to hear it in passing it gives off the idea that the person who teaches such conversation lectures is nothing but a “beautiful woman.” At any rate, this “Beautiful/American conversation” symbolizes our country’s foreign language institute fever as there are about 70 official institutes and around 500 private foreign language institutes in Seoul alone. Among these there are not enough [qualified] teachers and a fair share of hagwons have latched onto any Tom Dick or Harry [to hire as teachers].

There was one penniless “French” young man. He was from “Lyon”. There he was a restaurant delivery boy. Carrying only one shabby suitcase, he came to Seoul, and only because he spoke “French” well he became a French teacher. And with the money he earned his station rose and he married a respectable Korean woman and his good life attracted the attention of a newspaper article. Indeed, last week the newspaper "Le Monde" introduced such "success stories."

There is the story of a young man who traveled without money and in Seoul managed even an apartment using his tongue/voice, and the story of another young man who complained about his lack of hours earning money doing things like recording advertisements in French for a large company, and finally there is the story of marrying a maiden from a good family. Also, last June, a young American man caught in Jongno on "document forgery and accompanying charges” confessed he had arrangements with Korean women and female college students who provided him with food and a place to stay, and for one year he lived without a job, eating and living for free.

At the end of his confession, he said “There are hundreds of foreigners like me, and Koreans are exceptionally friendly to foreigners, especially white ones.” As a joke, he said, "If you go to the United States, even beggars speak English well,” but if the power of foreign language extends this far, it would be difficult to stop people from reflecting bitterly on this [worship of foreign languages] as a great sickness. It’s difficult to tell whether the foreign language boom is a bad thing in itself, or whether [the choice of] a marriage [partner], as a personal matter, can be judged as right or wrong, or whether being [overly] kind to foreigners is something to be criticized. Before any of this can be considered, however, one must stand up and have some self respect.

And yes, there is a Donga Ilbo article from June 1984 about the "young American man caught in Jongno." That will have to wait for another day...

"It Doesn’t Matter Even if English Teachers are Criminals?"

On April 1, the Hanguk Gyeongje published this piece by reporter Cho Yun-kyung:

It Doesn’t Matter Even if English Teachers or Native Speakers are Criminals?

On March 17 in Incheon an ethnic Korean English Teacher was arrested for receiving marijuana cookies through International Express Mail. On the 24th an ethnic Korean English Teacher was arrested on charges of ‘making’ and selling marijuana.

According to a 2009 National Police Agency report on ‘The present state of crime by foreign English teachers,’ 274 crimes had been committed by foreign English teachers in the last three years. These crimes included theft, drugs, violence, rape, etc.

Included among these was a formal university teacher who appeared in re-enactments on many local networks.

There are more than 7,500 native English teachers placed in elementary, middle and high schools nationwide. According to estimates by the The Ministry of Education, Science, and Technology, there are 30,000 native speaking teachers working in hagwons or universities nationwide. However, due to the pressing need and rush for such teachers, a good many of them are unqualified.

In fact, there was a case of an American wanted for murder who was teaching elementary school students. It appears that for criminals from countries were English is their mother tongue, Korea, in the midst of a craze for English education, is used as a hiding place to avoid capture.

Native-speaking assistant teachers who work in schools need only to have graduated from a four year university, and because they didn’t complete a course in teacher training it isn’t verified whether they are low quality teachers or not.

In one instance a native speaking assistant teacher, using a bank note, showed his students the way to smoke marijuana [to roll a joint?] during class.

Cases of foreigners working as English teachers after entering Korea on a tourist visa are punished according to the case’s importance and at the discretion of the Ministry of Justice. Cases that are punished are very rare to the point that [only] those with bad luck get reported.

According to existing law, it is illegal for foreigners working at a fixed place to increase their income by working elsewhere. Students do not know this fact and think it natural to receive private lessons from foreigners. Police revealed that “In many examples of illegal tutoring, the students involved understand this but will not personally report on them and cannot turn them in.”

Many people have a prejudice that they can only learn English in the class of a “blond-haired, blue-eyed” native speaker. Generally, because there is higher demand for white teachers, they are paid more than ethnic Korean or black teachers. Because of this, cases have occurred where white people from Russia, Eastern Europe and other non-English speaking places have lied and pretended to be native English speakers in Korea. The reality is that this is not a desirable basis by which to choose English teachers.

Unqualified native speakers are working in Korea as teachers and our society is paying [the price] for employing unverified native speakers to satisfy the demand for English classes. Indeed, can we ever realize our expectations for high quality English education with these native speakers haphazardly brought to Korea with no regard for their major or skill?

To solve the problem, each step of employment visa issuance should be thoroughly verified. The verification process should not be loose like before. Always concentrating on national security and caution like the U.S., a stringent entry system with several steps, including a visa interview [should be] prepared. We should also, though a thorough verification beforehand, prevent Korea becoming a “funny country where if you only speak English everyone will give you money.”

Also, if there are cases of private hagwons hiring illegal native speakers, strong measures should be considered to halt their operations immediately.

Presently a revised bill proposing changes to the Kindergarten Education Law, Elementary and Secondary Education Law, and the Hagwon Education Law which requires native English teachers wanting to work in Korea to provide criminal records, a medical examination including drug screening, and academic background certificates has been submitted in the National Assembly, but the standing committee deliberations have not even been set up.

In order that we can believe in and entrust our children [to hagwons?] the National Assembly should promptly discuss this revision of related laws.

Let's look more closely at a few things:

The title: "It Doesn’t Matter Even if English Teachers or Native Speakers are Criminals?" The knee-jerk reaction is to think, "clearly this 'journalist' doesn't bother to read the news." There were over 300 negative articles about foreign English teachers last year, and about 1,000 since 2004. Every time a teacher gets arrested for smoking pot, there are 10-20 articles about it, and regarding these most recent cases, over 50 articles have appeared. As if crime by foreign teachers "doesn't matter." Of course, when you reach the end of the article, you see that this rhetorical question is meant to prod the national assembly into action.

Continuing,

According to a 2009 National Police Agency report on ‘The present state of crime by foreign English teachers,’ 274 crimes had been committed by foreign English teachers in the last three years.

Wrong. There was no National Police Agency report - it was statistics released by National Assembly Representative Lee Gun-hyeon. How difficult is it to get something that simple correct? (Apparently Rep. Lee contacted the Canadian embassy - and perhaps others - while researching the report telling them that he knew foreign crime and crime by English teachers was a big problem and wanted their help. They didn't respond.) Needless to say, the statistics in Rep. Lee's report are not put into context, but that would involve doing more than a Naver search, which is clearly not part of the job description. As I noted here,

The statistics reveal that 114 teachers were arrested in 2007 and 99 were arrested in 2008. So, for 2007, 114 out of 17,721 teachers were arrested - a rate of 0.64%. In 2008, 99 out of 19,771 teachers were arrested - a rate of 0.50%. As noted in Benjamin Wagner's report to the NHRCK, "The Korean Institute of Criminology... reported that in 2007 the overall “crime rate among [all] foreigners [in Korea] was 1.4% compared with the 3.5% rate among Korean citizens.” In other words, according to Lee's own figures, the foreign English teacher crime rate (0.64%) was more than five times less than the crime rate among Koreans (3.5%) in 2007 and half the rate of other foreigners.

At any rate, as the article above notes,

There are more than 7,500 native English teachers placed in elementary, middle and high schools nationwide. According to estimates by the The Ministry of Education, Science, and Technology, there are 30,000 native speaking teachers working in hagwons or universities nationwide.

I'd never come across that '30,000' figure before, which would mean that there are a total of 37,500 native speakers working in Korean hagwons, public schools, and universities out of this potential pool [2008 statistics]:

E-1 - 705 professors from English speaking countries
E-2 - 19,771 in total - 18,604 from English speaking countries
F21 - 3,060 spouses from English speaking countries
F-4 - 37,286 ethnic Koreans from English speaking countries
F-5 - 220 permanent residents from English speaking countries
There are an unknown number on tourist visas who teach English.

Of course, it seems odd, then, that "there are 50,666 F-4 visa holders [but] the government does not know how many are involved in English teaching." Of course, that's from a Korea Times article, so take that how you will. I thought I'd do a search to see if I could find out more about this estimate by The Ministry of Education, Science, and Technology, and used terms in Korean from the original article:

전국 초 · 중 · 고교에 배치된 원어민 영어교사는 7500여명이다. 대학이나 학원에서 일하는 원어민까지 합하면 국내 원어민 강사는 약 3만명에 이를 것으로 교육과학기술부는 추정하고 있다.

Oddly enough, this August 12, 2009 Money Today article seems to say the same thing:

지난 4월 기준 전국 초·중·고교에 배치된 원어민 영어교사는 모두 7088명. 대학이나 학원에서 일하는 원어민까지 합하면 국내 영어교육 원어민은 약 3만명에 이를 것으로 교육과학기술부는 추정하고 있다.

Actually, it says exactly the same thing. I wasn't joking about only using Naver to write the damn article. Control C, Control V. As for this,

Included among these was a formal university teacher who appeared in re-enactments on many local networks.

I'd never heard that before, but it turns out such a person was arrested last November, according to this Yonhap article (which is pretty much another cut and paste job). Also interesting is this:

In one instance a native speaking assistant teacher, using a bank note, showed his students the way to smoke marijuana [to roll a joint?] during class.

I was pretty certain when I read that I knew who the source would be, and yes - it's from a Breaknews article which features a (blurred) photo of Anti-English Spectrum manager 'L'. You know you're dealing with a credible reporter when they quote from Breaknews.

Also recommended in the article is that "To solve the problem, each step of employment visa issuance should be thoroughly verified." So let's see. An Apostille doesn't work for Canada, so for the process of getting my last visa I needed a criminal record check, two notarized copies of said check and two notarized copies of my diploma, and all of those notarized copies had to be stamped by the Korean embassy, three copies of transcripts, and drug and AIDS tests. Except that I decided to do a visa run to Japan after arriving in Korea and when I got to the Korean embassy in Fukuoka, they looked confused when I passed them all this paperwork and told me that - in Japan - all that was needed was the confirmation number, application, passport and the fee. But I digress. One wonders how more thoroughly verified it can get, but I don't doubt for a moment that it can't go further. It's worth remembering that what is important is not solving a problem, but the appearance that one is solving a problem. I imagine many of the players (AES, politicians, journalists with an axe to grind, or who need something to crusade against) do not want the 'problem' to be solved. Where would the fun be in that?

At any rate, some of the criticisms noted in the article - for example, that choosing teachers based on skin colour is not logical - and suggestions are worth noting, such as this:

Also, if there are cases of private hagwons hiring illegal native speakers, strong measures should be considered to halt their operations immediately.

Absolutely. However, you can be sure the Hagwon Owner's Association will make certain that never happens, so it's much easier to go after a group of foreigners that is essentially powerless.

The revised bills referred to at the end of the article are of course Choi Young-hee's bills which are translated here. I'll look more closely at those bills after I translate this article, which focuses on the bills and Choi Young-hee's recent comments about them. Anyone who thinks that she might take advantage the recent arrests to embiggen herself and push for the bills to be passed will not be disappointed.

Olympic Park bridge collapse

As this Joongang Ilbo page notes, 12:20pm on Sunday the Blue Dragon Bridge in Olympic Park suddenly collapsed. Luckily, only one person, 52 year-old Mr. Jeong, was hurt, and he suffered only minor injuries.

No new H-2 visa holders to enter the country this year

Last week an article about the former Korean American gangsters who were teaching English in Korea mentioned that "ethnic Koreans, who can gain a residential F-4 visa, are exempted from the screening procedures" which are required of E-2 visa-holders, and an official from the immigration office correctly noted that, "F-4 visa holders are allowed to do all kinds of jobs as it is a residential card, so hagwon supervisors have to weed out unqualified English teachers among the visa holders." The article also gave us these statistics:

Currently, there are 50,666 F-4 visa holders and 22,018 E-2 visa holders as of December 2009, according to KIS. Among those with F-4 visas, the government does not know how many are involved in English teaching.

Considering the uproar over the three recent cases involving Korean-Americans (46 articles related to these cases at Naver (though some are due to multiple broadcasts by YTN and other networks)), you'd be forgiven for wondering if the title of this article referred to Korean Americans: "Seoul Slams Doors Shut for Ethnic Korean Workers."

It's worth noting however that only one reference to the relation between the F-4 visa and the ability of ethnic Koreans to work as English teachers without background checks has turned up:

[학원관계자 : 외국인 강사면 확인을 하는데 교포들은 F4 비자(재외동포비자)만 있으면 되니까 검증을 안 해도 대학은 나왔겠거니 하고 넘어가는 수가 있죠.]

Otherwise, no other references to the differences between E-2 and F-4 visa-holders has turned up in the media.

As the aforementioned article about 'slamming the door shut on ethnic Korean workers' reveals,

A committee of labor officials attached to the ministry decided Wednesday to open the quota of E-9 foreign workers to 24,000, up 7,000 from the last year's 17,000.

About 19,000 are allocated for the manufacturing industry; 2,000 in the cattle-farming and agricultural fields; and the rest in construction and others.

But the number of H-2 visas will fall to zero from 17,000.

"The decision follows the domestic employment market's demands. Permitting workers from overseas was originally intended as a substitute for domestic workers. With the unemployment rate hitting its highest rate ever, it is time to secure more positions for domestic workers," a key official inside the ministry said.

He said many employers made more requests to the government for E-9 workers over H-2 workers. "Foreign workers have limited choices - they are allowed to switch their workplace no more than three times during the three year-visa validity. But H-2 holding ethnic Koreans have more liberty in choosing their employers," he said.

According to a separate report by the ministry, most E-9 workers are engaged in the manufacturing and agricultural fields, which are not favored by Koreans. H-2 workers mostly work at construction sites or in the services sectors such as restaurants that are considered relatively prestigious.

According to 2008 statistics, (compared to 50,666 F-4 visa holders for 2009), there were 299,332 H-2 visa holders from the following countries: Korean Chinese, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Korean-Russian, Russia:, Ukraine, Belarus and Moldova.
The visa was started in 2007; more information can be found here and here.

There were 190,776 E-9 visa-holders at the end of 2008. As noted above, 17,000 were allowed to come last year, compared to 24,000 this year, but it also notes that "More than 55,000 people applied for the E-9 visa in the first quarter of last year" showing the demand for the visa.

As noted here, Filipina English teachers have complained about their treatment in comparison to white foreigners; one wonders how H-2 visa holders feel about F-4 visa holders, as there will likely be no move to cut off applications for F-4 visas any time soon.

Another journalistic classic

Ilyo Seoul, or the Daily Sun, a political tabloid paper (see its covers here), has picked up the story of the Korean American gangsters/murderer/drug dealer who became English teachers, which I looked at here, here and here. Apparently, the pressures of only writing about 'things that have actually happened' and using 'facts' was too much of a challenge for reporter Yun Ji-hwan, so he just decided to fabricate in its entirety the final section of the article below.

The Seriousness of Foreign Teachers’ Ugly Double Lives Cannot Be Measured
They have no taboos against money, sex, or drugs

Recently a Korean American who had taken part in gang activities and committed murder in the U.S. and who openly worked as a teacher in Korea was exposed. This incident has shown how lax the management of foreign teachers is. Problems concerning foreign teachers are nothing new. The teachers’ excesses and disordered private lives are a problem, but another problem is that hagwons do not carry out proper verification when hiring native teachers. Calls are becoming more urgent for laws to regulate hagwons in Korea that allow foreign lawbreakers to disguise themselves as native speaking teachers. As well, foreign teachers are of course distributing drugs which are being abused. For this reason areas around universities where young people gather have been a paradise for drugs for some time.

The number of foreign teachers buying, selling, and of course producing drugs is increasing. An American working as a teacher at an English hagwon who grew, processed, sold and smoked marijuana for several months was caught by police.

[From there it reports on the familiar story of the ex-gangsters and pot growers, and then continues.]

Unkempt activities every night

Foreign teachers' disordered private lives have highlighted numerous social problems. Not only drugs, but also incidents of sexual violence by foreign teachers are increasing yearly. Especially, incidents involving foreign teachers taking pictures of lewd acts with Korean women and putting them on the internet are common. If we examine recent incidents related to foreigners, there numerous cases where drugs and sexual assault are connected. After taking drugs rape occurs in a drugged state.

There are surprisingly many women who have associated with foreigners and become mired in drugs, police explained. According to an official of the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency, in recent years drugs and marijuana have persistently increased at the hands of foreign teachers who have come to Korea.

A police official said, "There are many women who come into contact with marijuana or other drugs in clubs or foreign teachers’ houses and become addicts,” and “Because they’re young and curious they think that if they just try it once or twice they’ll be okay and then become caught up in drugs.

For most, drug-taking is followed by sex. Many drug cases occur because men and women gather together. Police have seen a considerable number of women who suffered an unexpected rape when they were high. It’s known however that most of the women who suffer rape in this way do not report it to the police, because they fear that the fact they took drugs might be discovered.

A police official said “Among foreign teachers there have been reported cases of them having sex with an unbelievable number of Korean women.” “One teacher showed symptoms of drug addiction, and I was speechless when he told me he slept with 200 women and did marijuana or other drugs with most of them,” he sighed.

Drug addiction leaves one in a state where normal behavior is not possible, and regarding hagwons which allow such lectures, strong measures against the thoughtless recruiting of foreign teachers are urgently required.

Reporter Yun tells a chilling story of debauchery and ruined lives. The only problem is that I haven't come across any newspaper reports of sexual assault against Korean women by foreign English teachers (there are a small number of molestation charges involving students), and certainly none involving sexual assault and drugs. The English Spectrum incident and another case involving a blogger who posted photos of adult students and nude 'models' are likely the basis of the claim that posting lewd photos of Korean women on the internet is 'common.' There are some pretty bold claims made in that article, but not a single case or statistic is cited to back anything he wrote up. Perhaps he simply saw things like this on TV, or read this equally dubious quote from 2007:

A source at the foreign affairs division of the Seoul Police Department said, "American and Canadian English teachers think Korea is a 'land of opportunity.'" They become hagwon teachers not only because there is no country which has much desire to learn English as Korea but because they believe they can make up to 1,000,000 won per month through illegal private lessons. The source also said, "the majority of them find it easy to seduce Korean women and do drugs with them." Foreign English teachers see Korea not only as a 'land of opportunity' but also as a 'perverted heaven'.

At least tabloids like Breaknews would base a [totally exaggerated] story on at least one or two facts. Instead of writing about the 'disordered private lives' of foreign English teachers, a good source of material would more likely be the 'disordered writing habits' of Korean journalists and editors. Reporter Yun can be reached here: jjh@dailysun.co.kr

On that topic, I was told that after reading an article about foreign bloggers, an editor from one of the English language dailies (I'm sure you can figure out which one) told someone involved with the article, "You know that many of these foreigners who come to our country are uneducated," in reference to the bloggers.

Oh, and I found another Korean American gangster/teacher cartoon from 2008:

"Wanted" "Teacher"

We can now complete the collection:

English instructor (2006)

(2010)

The article translated above used the word 둔갑, which as a verb (둔갑하다) means to transform into or take the shape of (as in "외국인 범법자를 원어민 강사로 둔갑시키는 국내 학원," or "hagwons that let foreign criminals transform into native speakers") and it's interesting that one of the first examples given by Naver's online dictionary is "사람으로 둔 갑한 여우," or "a fox in the shape of man," which likely explains the photo above; further discussion of the meaning of the photo can be found here.

Article on Filipina English teachers

Korea Beat translated this article (original here) about Filipina English teachers in Korea and the discrimination they face (articles about such teachers have appeared before). Some tidbits:

Because of past problems in English education these teachers were given an opportunity[...] People in our country, they said, seem to prefer white people and discriminate against south Asians.

Hagwon instructors are mainly Americans, Australians, and Canadians, but some of them are unqualified, they said.[...]

We should reflect on our tendency to ignore certain countries and think too highly of others.

One wonders what 'past problems in English education' they're referring to, and it's nice to see 'unqualified' bandied about... again. It's interesting that, as far as lived experience goes, people in Korea "seem to prefer white people and discriminate against south Asians," but in the media that trend is actually quite the opposite.

Violence in Elementary Schools... and Beyond

The Korea Herald has a disturbing article about violence in elementary schools.

Among the 335 primary school students who participated in the Assault Prevention workshop in September-December last year and asked for professional consultation, 41 or 12.2 percent had experienced intense violence at school, said officials. Thirty five cases involved bullying and six sexual assaults.

Also, the survey conducted on the 1,609 workshop participants showed that some 30 students or 1.9 percent had experienced sexual abuse, said officials. A large number of violence cases were committed by peers or slightly elder students. "Most involve senior students bullying the juniors," said a ChildFund official.

Many cases of sexual abuse against children tend to be committed by adults acquainted with the child, such as family members or neighbors, said the official. In some cases, the sexual harasser turns out to be a teenager, only slightly older than the victim.

It's hard not to read that and remember the Daegu Elementary gang-rape scandal from 2008 (which was never fully investigated), or some of the stories related here. A grade six elementary school student told me last year that she wasn't looking forward to the next day because she and nine of her friends had to meet a group of middle school girls after school and give one of them 40,000 won in total, or 4,000 won each, because it was one of the bullies' birthday. In another story, a girl in either grade six or middle school grade one was out with friends at a Pizza restaurant in Myeongdong and they were confronted by older middle school girls in the bathroom who took their money - not the way my student planned to spend her birthday. Also, a friend told me last week his elementary school had a meeting with parents of young children angry about the abuse they were receiving from older students - not the best way to start the school year.

As the article nears its end, it notes that,

Last year's workshop was held amid the scandal of a brutal child rape incident, known as the Cho Doo-soon case, involving an ex-convict raping and disabling an 8-year-old girl.

The Joongang Ilbo had an article about the girl's family last week:

The father of an 8-year-old rape victim testified in court on Monday that prosecutors forced him not to copy the records of their investigation into Cho Du-sun, who brutally assaulted the girl known as Na-young in 2008. The family of the girl, who has been identified only through that alias, filed suit against the Korean government seeking 30 million won ($26,400) in compensation for the prosecutors’ actions, and trial began Monday at the Seoul Central District Court.

The article notes that Cho Du-sun attacked Na-young on Dec. 11, 2008. It was in late September 2009 that this KBS show which brought the case to public attention, and this was followed by the government lashing out in every direction to try to appease public anger over the lenient punishment her attacker received, including declaring foreign English teachers to be "especially potential child molesters" (among other things), and declaring that immigration would ban all foreign sex criminals from coming (or returning), a policy that came into effect recently, even though the foreign sex-crime rate is five times less than the Korean crime rate and foreigners had nothing to do with the Na-young case.

Two weeks ago justice minister Kim Kwi-nam visited Cheongsong Prison in Gyeongsangnam-do, where Jo Du-sun is being held (video here).


Returning to the violence youth inflict on each other, the first-mentioned article ends,

Also, the nation was shaken last month over the violent graduation ceremonies in some middle schools, where seniors inflicted serious physical violence or sexual harassment, claiming it to be a school tradition.

While I'd heard of graduates running amok naked before, it seems it may be a little darker than first imagined, as many of these kids - at least ones in the photos I've come across [some of the ones below may be NSFW], have been forced to strip, had clothes ripped or cut off, and been photographed, such as in Ilsan last month:



Photos from previous years show there to be some pretty disgusting hazing practices included:







The girl in the third photo appears to be covered in ketchup, while the boys in the last photos are being pelted with hundreds of eggs and being urinated on. I was reminded of this article in the Hankyoreh years ago, which ended by saying:

Violence is just violence. This is a truth no one can deny. There are many factors to prevent people from seeing this simple fact. The most insidious of this kind of block is when violence wears the clothing of "custom." This being the case, before blaming individuals, we should crush the oppressive things that have made violence customary.

Well, okay, the system is the problem, but overlooking punishing individuals in order to go after the system isn't helpful either. As for systems, looking at the violent discipline inherent in the military system, which influenced the school system (going back to the colonial era), and seeing how the ritualized violence meted out by bullies (in videos associated with this case, just to name one) seems like a twisted parody of the discipline students receive at school, one imagines "the oppressive things that have made violence customary" will not disappear any time soon, and their manifestations - involving individuals - will linger further.

Ulsan Police Grow Op: "If you can't beat 'em, join 'em"

Okay, maybe not.

As I mentioned in this post, the Korea Herald had an article last week about a Korean American English teacher busted for growing pot:

Police sought an arrest warrant for a Korean-American English instructor Wednesday on charges of growing and selling marijuana worth 20 million won ($17,000), according to Yonhap News. The suspect, 27, allegedly cultivated marijuana at his home since January and sold it to foreign residents, according to the Ulsan Metropolitan Police Agency. Police said the suspect is believed to have studied cultivation methods and was able to grow the plants here after smuggling seeds into the country in June.

Yonhap posted an article on the 24th titled "Foreign-born Korean (동포출신) English teacher [busted for] growing marijuana indoors and dealing." Nice of them not to just blare "Foreign English teacher arrested for drugs" as a headline (even the sub-headline reads "Ulsan Police -3 Daegu area English Hagwon Foreign Teachers Arrested") It wasn't a good week for arrests of Korean American English teachers for drugs.

The article includes several photos, such as the ones above and below (and another of the books he used in cultivating the plants). It notes that the accused was living in Daegu's Nam-gu, and that in one room in his house he had 8 plants totaling 320 grams as well as a great deal of equipment for 'processing' it.


Police also booked without detention two foreign English hagwon teachers who worked in Daegu, one a 26 year-old American, for smoking Marijuana at home in foreigner clubs after buying it from the grower. Said grower also said that in America smoking pot isn't considered to be a big problem. There's footage (of course!) here.

B.R. Myers article about recent North Korean propaganda

B.R. Myers has a must-read article in the Wall Street Journal (via this comment at the Marmot's Hole).

In his book The Cleanest Race: How North Koreans See Themselves - And Why it Matters, B.R. Myers examines the propaganda used by the North Korean government over the years. The main line is that Koreans are uniquely pure and virtuous, but that this virtue makes them an easy target for outsiders, and the only person capable of protecting them from such rapacious outsiders (such as the Americans or Japanese) is their leader.

That Kim Il-sung was single-handedly protecting them was retroactively supported by the famines and economic collapse that occurred almost immediately after his death. While Kim Jong-il was presented as having forced the U.S. to surrender during the 1994 nuclear crisis, the regime struggled to figure out how to present Kim Jong-il to the people in the wake of the famine and economic troubles, eventually settling on a military first policy in which Kim Jong-il was said to be so busy tirelessly touring the country's military bases that the people would have to fend for themselves (something they were shamed into by descriptions of his diet: "whatever the troops are eating").

With the worst of the famine over in the late 1990s, a new slogan - "A Great Country, Strong and Prosperous" - was announced, and when Kim Dae-jung came to Pyongyang it was said that the idea of cooperation was Kim Jong-il's idea, one he had dazzled the South Korean president into after the latter had come to Pyongyang wanting to make the North renounce socialism. As the North toned down the anti-ROK rhetoric and increased the anti-U.S., anti-Bush propaganda line, the influx of information and popular culture from the ROK was not as harmful as might have been thought, considering that the ROK government and media line during those years was essentially anti-American and, if not pro-Pyongyang, at least not anti-Pyongyang. That the South were economically better off was known (and blamed on the (necessary) military-first policy), but it was believed that the Southerners wanted to be freed from U.S. control and be unified under Kim Jong-il's rule.

The 2008 election of 'traitor' Lee Myung-bak provided a challenge to this belief, though that challenge was delayed by the mad cow protests of 2008, which lived up to Northern propaganda about Lee hoodwinking the electorate. In the years since, the DPRK has been in a crisis, dealing with the increasing support in the south for Lee, the south's cool stance towards the DPRK, the declining health of Kim Jong-il, and the need to (very quickly) groom his son for leadership. Last year, under the slogans "150 Day Battle," followed by the "100 Day Battle" urging the people to farm and work harder, the government line has become more martial, with slogans calling on people to sacrifice themselves in battle for the leader becoming more common.
[Pages 50-66]

This new article continues from where the book leaves off.

What the masses are learning is incompatible with their decades-old sense of a sacred racial mission. They have known since the 1990s that their living standard is much lower than South Korea's. The gap was explained away with reference to the sacrifices needed to build up the military. What the North Koreans are only now realizing, however—and this is more important—is that their brethren in the "Yankee colony" have no desire to live under Kim Jong Il. In 2007, after all, they elected the pro-American candidate to the South Korean presidency. Why, then, should the northerners go on sacrificing in order to liberate people who don't want to be liberated? Unable to answer this question, the regime in desperation has resorted to the most reckless propaganda campaign in its history.

This "strong and prosperous country" campaign is nothing less than an effort to persuade the masses that economic life will change drastically by 2012, the 100th anniversary of the birth of Great Leader Kim Il Sung, the father of Kim Jong Il. The official media have dubbed 2010 a "year of radical transformation" that will "open the gate to a thriving nation without fail in 2012." On TV news shows, uniformed students smile into just-delivered computers, and housewives tearfully thank the Leader for new apartments. The media predict even greater triumphs "without fail" for next year. The Juche calendar—which starts with Kim Il Sung's birth year of 1912, from one and not zero—numbers 2011 as year 100, and thus hugely significant.

Be sure to read the entire article.

Update on 'Foreign English teachers in the news'

The Joongang Ilbo has an article on the arrests of the former Korean-American gangsters.

R, 26, was reportedly a member of a Korean-American gang in Los Angeles when he got into a fight on July 14, 2006, at a cafe in the city’s Koreatown, stabbing to death a man identified as B, 27. Four days later, R fled to Korea.

After Interpol located R in Korea, U.S. investigators asked the Korean government to extradite him. However, because R has dual citizenship, he had been able to change his name in a Korean court and couldn’t be traced.

During his time on the run, R worked as an English teacher at a hagwon in Suwon, Gyeonggi, for two months. While there he allegedly took methamphetamine and marijuana.[...]

Seoul police said yesterday that R was arrested on the drug charges here, but they plan to extradite him to the United States if the Korean courts agree. They are also searching for Yu, 31, who fled after being interrogated for allegedly taking drugs with R.

The article goes on to mention Lee, 26, who was "deported from the United States in 2006 after being charged with attempted murder and credit card fraud." It also mentions that "Five others, including an American teacher, were indicted without detention for buying drugs from Lee." I'd had the idea that the five others were all native (ie E-2) English teachers, but perhaps that's what the police/media want readers to think. One wonders if there is a reason the two cases were mentioned together. The person wanted for murder worked only for two months while the other person apparently worked for much longer, but the idea one gets from reading the reports in both Korean and English is that both had been working at hagwons for years - which I imagine is what the some elements in the police/media would like people to believe. As Brian in Jeollanam-do noted, the language in Choi Young-hee's 3 bills focusing on foreign English teachers does not specifically mention E-2 visa holders, only 'native English teachers,' but her office told Benjamin Wagner that they were meant to target E-2 visa holders. One wonders, after the fallout of this case, if such vague language could be used to justify making people on all visas be subject to the drug tests and criminal record checks the bills call for. As is pointed out in this article,

Currently, there are 50,666 F-4 visa holders and 22,018 E-2 visa holders as of December 2009, according to KIS. Among those with F-4 visas, the government does not know how many are involved in English teaching.

One wonders if that ignorance applies to F-2 visa holders as well.

The Korea Times reported this week that the government is planning to check the qualifications of Korean hagwon teachers.

Under the current regulations, Koreans who completed at least two-year college courses are entitled to teach at hagwon without legal binding.

Officials from the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology told The Korea Times, Friday that they are likely to submit a bill to ban inadequate teachers from working at hagwon.

"There have been no attempts to regulate eligibility of hagwon teachers by law. We plan to submit a bill next month, disallowing ineligible hagwon teachers, to the National Assembly," said an official in charge.

As Brian has looked at in depth, the Korea Times article about this tries to conflate this with foreign English teachers (no surprise, considering it's the Times). It's interesting that, after years of calling for and then implementing rules for foreigners working in hagwons on E-2 visas, nothing has been done regarding the qualifications of the Korean instructors working there. In fact, I'm not sure if the numbers of these hagwon instructors are kept track of. Sex crimes by Korean teachers have been kept track of , as noted in this article:

A total of 124 sexual crimes involving elementary and secondary school teachers were reported to the education authorities between 2006 and 2009. Among them, 47 involved prostitution, 43 were sexual harassment and five were rape cases.

However, only eight teachers (6 percent) were given prison sentences, while 31 were not indicted and 28 received suspended sentences. "It seems that teachers were exempt from punishment through out-of-court settlements with the parents of the victims,'' Rep Choi said. "Moreover, each city and provincial education offices, which were supposed to strictly punish those teachers, gave only verbal warnings. Only 21 teachers were fired for sexual violence.''

According to data collected by the lawmaker, nearly 60 percent of the assailants were merely warned or reprimanded.

It does not seem that such statistics are kept on hagwon instructors, however. It's estimated that there are 480,000 teachers in the public school system, so it's likely a safe bet that there are at least as many (if not twice as many?) hagwon instructors at all sorts of hagwons. While it's been suggested that, instead of comparing the E-2 visa holder crime rate to the general population, it should be compared to the crime rate of Korean teachers, it would likely be fairer to compare it to the crime rate of both Korean teachers and hagwon instructors, seeing as two thirds of E-2 visa holders teach in hagwons. Of course, it's possible such statistics for hagwon teachers do not exist.

At any rate, after years of calls for more regulations for foreign English instructors, and after that, calls for even more regulations (and if Choi's bills and others pass, likely even more calls for regulations), it's nice to see something being done to check the qualifications of Korean instructors, seeing as there are far more of them than foreign English instructors working in hagwons.

Foreign English teachers in the news

[Update]

Our favourite Korea Times reporter is now on the case.

[Original Post]

AP (Via the Joongang Ilbo) reports on Aijalon Mahli Gomes, the most recent American to be arrested for entering North Korea illegally (one hopes he is better treated than Robert Park was).

A spokeswoman for the man’s family in Boston, Thaleia Schlesinger, said that Gomes had been teaching English in South Korea for about two years and that it was unclear why he would have gone to North Korea.[...]

Authorities at Sinbong Elementary School in Pocheon, north of Seoul, said he taught English there from April 2008 to March last year.

“All the memories we have of Gomes are only good. Everyone here liked him,” school headmaster Cho Kyoo-Sig told AFP. “I remember him as a very mellow and calm person. He was very kind to everybody and all the children liked him so much.”

Gomes left the school, saying he would find a better-paying job in Uijeongbu, Gyeonggi.

“If he wants to return to this school, he would always be welcome. It’s hard to find a native English teacher as good as Gomes,” Cho said.

Leaving out the possibility of the last sentence being a back-handed compliment, it's nice to see a media report in which a school official compliments a good English teacher (even one who is as wacky as to make an unauthorized visit to the DPRK). I was curious to see how these comments were reported in the Korean media but - brace yourself, this is shocking - they weren't. Some nice things about him said by a former co-worker in another AP article were translated by Yonhap (via the Chosun Ilbo), but not the principal's remarks.

Meanwhile, a search at Naver turns up 39 articles about this story of the arrests of former Korean American gangsters teaching English in hagwons - one wanted in the U.S. on murder charges and another who has been importing and dealing drugs. Nine other unqualified teachers have also been arrested for drug use. As the Marmot's Hole notes,

The Segye Ilbo has more if you care to read it, including this quote by a police official, “Language hagwon, getting on the English education boom bandwagon, have recently been indiscriminately hiring native speaking teachers. We must strengthen screening of educations and career histories when hiring English teachers.”

Police often seem to give the media such great quotes, which sound more like editorializing by crusading journalists or editors than quotes from police officials. Here's another example from 2007:

A source at the foreign affairs division of the Seoul Police Department said, "American and Canadian English teachers think Korea is a 'land of opportunity.'" They become hagwon teachers not only because there is no country which has much desire to learn English as Korea but because they believe they can make up to 1,000,000 won per month through illegal private lessons. The source also said, "the majority of them find it easy to seduce Korean women and do drugs with them." Foreign English teachers see Korea not only as a 'land of opportunity' but also as a 'perverted heaven'.

On a related note, the Korea Herald reports today that

Police sought an arrest warrant for a Korean-American English instructor Wednesday on charges of growing and selling marijuana worth 20 million won ($17,000), according to Yonhap News. The suspect, 27, allegedly cultivated marijuana at his home since January and sold it to foreign residents, according to the Ulsan Metropolitan Police Agency.

YTN might not have reported on the nice things the principal said about Aijalon Mahli Gomes, but they did end another report by tell us this:

The reality is that as long as they are good at English, violent criminals and habitual drug users can easily become English teachers.

The anxiety of parents of young children is growing.

Allow me to fix the first sentence:

The reality is that as long as they are good at English, violent criminals and habitual drug users can easily be hired by unscrupulous hagwon owners and become English teachers.

I'm not sure if anything has been said about the visa status of these former gang members. No doubt if they are F-visa holders, then it's much easier for them to get jobs here than E-2 visa holders. As for the final sentence, to assess that the anxiety of parents is growing... wait, they did nothing to assess that. Well, if you're going to report this case in that way, I'm sure that last sentence will become a self fulfilling prophecy. Especially if you report it, as the Donga Ilbo did, with a title (in English, despite it being a Korean language article) like this:

He is a killer, drug dealer… and your teacher

It helps to have this cartoon to illustrate the dire situation:


I'm not sure why he has a tail. I believe South Korean propaganda used to depict North Koreans with tails and horns, and North Korean propaganda has depicted Americans with bestial characteristics, so I'm not sure what it's supposed to mean. A wolf in foreign English teacher's clothing, perhaps, but since foreign English teachers are routinely depicted as wolves, so to speak, that metaphor makes little sense. Not that I expect any of this to make sense, mind you.

[Update] Having read this Korea Times article, I think I understand the tail now:

Both immigration and education authorities have long turned a blind eye to loopholes in screening "unqualified" foreign English teachers. That inattention occasionally horrifies parents and students when such teachers show their true colors.

I see. 'unqualified' teachers (which seems to mean teachers who do drugs, commit crimes, or who 'paint the Han River black') are wolves, and the teacher in the cartoon is showing his 'true colors.' Alternately, it could mean "We thought you were Korean, like Hines Ward, but it turns out you're foreign, like Cho Seung-hui."

I think this cartoon, from the last time former Korean American gang members teaching English in Korea were arrested (in October 2006), was better:

English instructor

Still, the Donga Ilbo has done better cartoons of this sort before, and it's always just wonderful to have more of this 'art' to add to the collection.