My First!  I got an e-mail, and the content had me a bit scratching my head on what or even how to answer the questions.

It basically came down to the following (heavily edited!):

I’m teaching at an adult hagwon these days. My problem again and again seems to be that even though I like kids, they don’t like me back. And the mothers’ complaints dog me.

Now, I take my job seriously. I show up early. I try to do “all the little things”. I try to make it fun. Verbally I’ve gotten promises of positive references from past kids’ hagwon where I’ve been let go.

I really don’t get it sometimes: I see good, bad, ugly, and alcoholic teachers who never seem to worry about anything other than being screwed over by their bosses rather than meddlesome moms.

I like kids. I like teaching. I could really use more income. Is there any way I can turn it around at a kids’ hagwon?

I’ve been thinking about this mail on and off to see if I could impart some great wisdom, but I don’t.  I don’t have an easy cookie cutter answer to the problem of dealing with kids.  I can only tell you what I have seen work and what doesn’t work.

FUN! doesn’t work.  It is like playing games, when you do it with the people you like, the silliest game is great, but playing with someone you genuinely don’t care about, could be your favorite game, it isn’t going to work out as well.

Kids work on an intuitive level, and that is how you got to teach.

ENERGY! works.  When batteries are low, my classes go awry, not always in a bad way, but lack of energy will give the kids an edge in controlling the classroom.  Which is a recipe for disaster.  Get your sleep on, don’t watch too much TV and don’t booze during the middle of the week.  Booze saps your energy for days to come.  I hired 50+ in my workforce, and even though they brought plenty of experience to the field, they did not have the energy needed to deal with kids.

EMOTIONS! Works.  Empathy is the greatest thing in a classroom.  Especially in an ESL environment, you have to be able to just read faces.  When I see some negativity in a child’s face, I immediately ask them if everything is OK.  They will probably say yes, but the fact that you noticed, they remember.  It is OK to be angry with kids, kids understand simple emotions, and anger (in a non-violent manner) shows them clearly that you are disappointed in what they did.  It should be very short lived though.   It is really about developing a rapport with children who don’t posses the language to express clearly, or even understand, what is going on.  Put an exaggerated form of your feelings on your face, and communicating with kids becomes that much easier.

RESPECT! Works.  You got to get them to respect your position, and you got to respect their time they spend in your presence.  ”Wow, this is great!  Now, can you do it better.” is something you should use a lot of.  This not alone acknowledges the effort they put in the work, but also the know that you believe they can do better, and they should try.

SURPRISE!  Works.  It’s good to have some recurring type of lessons, so kids get the hang of it, but you got to mix it up a bit.  Sometimes I will use exactly the same type of documents, but do something completely else with it.  E.g. Instead of reading the text out-loud, paragraph by paragraph, get the kids to say one word at a time.  So if you got 6 kids, each says one word, it creates some fun in class, they have to focus on the material, and they have to listen carefully to what is being said.

COMPETITION! Careful with this one.  Competition should always be fun and enjoyable, but it could destroy the relationships between students and turn aggressive pretty fast.

NEGOTIATIONS! Careful!  The negotiations should be used to convey what it is you expect from them, and that anything extra is earned upon completing what is set out for them to do.  Don’t negotiate yourself into doing less of what is expected of you.  My students know very well that if we can finish my weekly lesson plan, Friday CAN be a fun day.  They also know if we didn’t finish my weekly lesson plan, homework is inevitable.  Those are the kinds of negotiations that make everyone’s responsibility clear and understood.

CANDIES! Don’t work.  Nope they don’t, and stop fooling yourself, it simply doesn’t work.

FLOW! Sometimes classes flow into something more, something else.  Let it happen.  It gives kids the feeling they have some control over what is happening in class, it empowers them to pro-actively engage themselves in what is happening in the classroom.  The worst students are those who simple don’t engage in the class.  I make it a point to stop class until EVERYONE is on board.  You leave one kid out, next week, that kid is out of class, and it goes on and on.

I don’t know, does this, in any way, answer your question?

Cheers

TheBoss

We all make mistakes, and as long as they are not too big, and we don’t repeat the same mistakes over and over again, you should be in a better place after the experience.  In business and media they often like to tell you what you should do to be “successful”.  I think such tripe is redonculus.  What people do better is learn from other people’s experiences (aka MISTAKES).

Don’t Don’t Care

When you run your own business, it can become tiresome.  You wake up and start cursing “not again!”, before you even got your first cup of coffee.  That is a dangerous place to be in when you are running your own business.  Your clientele KNOWS you don’t care with that kind of an attitude. You will bleed customers.  The problem with running a school is that teachers also quickly get into the “F*ck it all” mindset.  In my experience  the best way to avoid these situations is to create the feeling that you achieved something.  As a teacher, when the kids fail, it’s your fault, when the kids succeed, it’s their doing.  You don’t get a pat on the back as if you were working in sales or project management.  This ungratefulness (or feeling as such)  can eat your mind.

Don’t know it all

As a school you do need to position yourself, but you also need to be able to adapt to the needs of the customer.  Something I am sorely lacking, mostly due to my inability to accept the “best practices” in SK.  I try.  I really try.

Don’t not do advertising

You stop advertising, you stop getting new students.  End of the line.

Don’t spend that cash

The first three years of running a hagwon are the hardest, and if you understand the basic principles of the BCG matrix, you will understand that the first three years of operating a NEW business, you will have to reinvest every single penny you make.  Every single one.  No holidays, no fancy cars, no expensive dining, …..  Really.  Your initial investment will never be enough to support a growing school.

Don’t Not Network

Get out there, meet people, show your face and find ways to cooperate with other small businesses.  Yeap, it will cost you time, money, patience, and most of it will go wrong, but when things go right, it will keep your bottom line happy.

Don’t ignore your ignorance

Yes, you are ignorant, as am I, of certain aspects of running a business.  When you can do something really good, there is something you cannot do so good.  Take care of that.

Keeping it short today!!!

Yeay

The following article, in all it’s seemingly innocence, shows exactly what education is all about in Korea:  Homework agencies.

The rhetoric on homework aside (disclosure: I’m not a big fan of homework), homework does aspire to some people to improve the academic success of the individual student.  It gives parents some kind of warm fuzzy feeling that their kid is heading in the right direction.  It gives teachers the opportunity to shift the work/blame/energy/whateveryouwant to the household So overall it is a Win/Win/Win/LOSE situation (hehehehe  Parent/Teacher/School/Student)  Let’s simply assume for the sake of argument that homework does benefit every player in the education game.

From that assumption, that article is mighty interesting. There are so many things we can pluck out of it.

Lee, like many women in Korea, is an overly-involved mother. The 41-year-old considers her son’s school assignments her business. Homework scores factor into overall academic performance, along with the college entrance exam, when universities select their students.

“Overly involved mother“, I wonder why.  O yes, their social status depends on it.  Good homework improves the score at school which improves the entrance exam, which improves the University the child can attend.  Which is the goal in South Korea.  Your adult life is determined by the University you were able to attend.  Your parents social status is dependent on which University you went.

But one assignment in particular tested her resolve. Her son’s art teacher had asked the class to make a unique work using hanji, traditional handmade paper made from the bark of indigenous mulberry trees.

Math,English, Korean, Chinese, Sciences, etc are all covered by one or other hagwon.  But Arts and Crafts seems to be a problem.  Look at the word unique, which indicates that the teacher would like something that sprouted out of the brain of  the student, I assume.  Isn’t Arts and Crafts ultimately to express oneself through manipulating materials?

She immediately found the business online and filled her address in on its website, along with the specifics of the assignment and the deadline. The agency charged 30,000 won ($28), and Lee received the finished assignment two days after sending the fees.

Problem solved.  Which problem?  The problem of having something “unique”.

These days, many parents like Lee are losing confidence in typical hagwon – cram schools that prepare students for college entrance exams – and believe they are no longer enough to turn their children into top performers.

What many people don’t see is that ultimately, Education is the great EQUALIZER.  It doesn’t matter where you come from, if you studied exactly the same thing as everybody else, you can do what everyone else can do.  In Korea, education is still perceived as a DIFFERENTIATOR, something that makes you unique, but education teaches us what we know, not what we don’t know, therefore, education can only equalize the situation, not differentiate.   Ergo sum, cram schools and parents, inevitably, have to find novel ways to make it seem like the kid is getting a head start.  But it is a fallacy.

Most parents believe time spent working on these types of projects takes away from the time their child could be using to study for exam-centered subjects, like English and math.

The crux of the matter: time.  The student has to be marginally better than everyone else, because entrance to a top-tier University depends on marginal percentages.  A student with a 94.5% score might miss out and the student with the 94.7% is in.  So we have to make sure, by spending hours and hours upon hours to make sure the student gets the 94.7% instead of the 94.5%.  It is in the margin that the differences occur.  Since most people know that those hours are spent inneficiently, they will turn to study to the test or cheating.  Which is quite the opposite of what people tend to think education is all about. Exasperating.

“The Education Ministry needs to come up with ways to implement a new set of rules that warrants punishment,” said Kim Moo-seong, a representative of the Korean Federation of Teachers’ Associations. “This issue needs to be addressed. It is seriously jeopardizing public education.”

Here we have to governments point of view. People are looking for ways to get ahead. Those things cost money.  Money is used to keep rich people in the top.  Middle class people follow suit, cause they want to be part top society, and the lower class get’s left out since they have no ability to pay for it.  Government than has to show they are FOR the people and start passing out rules and regulations to keep it “democratic”, too bad they have a constitution to consider.

So here we have it.  Public education uses homework to get the lower achieving social classes to come to the same levels as the other classes, to give them a fair chance.  The upper classes want to protect their families social status, and send their kids into cram schools so they can keep the family in the top.  They spend a lot of money on education to do so, in various different ways.  Government starts to take notice of these “free-market” “undemocratic” solutions and starts regulating the whole industry (with little effect since they just go underground), which forces rich people to become even more creative in their quest for a better future for their children.  A lovely rat race we got here.

The only solution is a deep cultural one, but since this is not my country, since I am only a guest in this country that I care about, my opinion has no value and carries no weight.

Keep on fighting the good fight.

Chief out.

Advertising.

This is probably the single most irregular part of doing business you are ever going to deal with.  How to establish a marketing campaign as a small business.

The first thing you got to do is know what you are selling.  You might think this is a trivial question, but what you think you are selling is not necessary what other people think they are buying.  You sell apples, people are buying a snack, could be something else than an apple… you just wanna make sure they buy the apple.

When it comes to a school, what are we really selling? Education?  Not really. We already know that the student is the “product”, the end service.  But what about the paying customer, the parents, what are their expectations?  That depends a bit on the segment of the market you are approaching.

Let’s see.

Status: For many parents, the ability to get their kids to the front of the line is what matters.  Like a brand new Iphone, when the old one is good enough.  This market segment is mostly aimed at test taking, an “objective” high score on an official test is something.  They might also be the ones that come and inform you you got 2 weeks to prep their child for a speech contest.  In this segment price is actually positively related to demand.

Fear:  This component is very prevalent in South Korea, where job opportunities are only for those who can compete in the rat race.  English is part of that.  This part of the market needs a lot of feedback on how their child is doing.  This is also the part of the market that is always looking for the next best thing.  And it is that part of the market that knows better how to teach their kids English than you do…  They like to have a strict curriculum and lots of testing during the learning process to keep tails on the progress of their kids.  This segment is somewhat ignorant of price, but very sensitive to “results”.

Opportunity:  There is a segment in the market that looks at Education as an opportunity for their kids, not as a requirement.  Too bad this is the smallest segment in Korea.  They will be looking for someone who can guide their kids to a bigger world.  This group will also look for other ways to keep their kids going.   Looking at alternative solutions like language holidays, information on Universities and the like.

It is obvious that every parent is a mix of the above, and therefore your advertising needs to have a mix of these too.

In my experience, to have a good advertising campaign on city level, you need to be part of the city. Developing this is so time intensive that the only ones I have seen succeed at this is where partners team up.  Can’t really help you there.

Another issue is time.  Advertising is a costly affair. It doesn’t always work, and one time it will work,another time it won’t.  The trick is to keep up the energy up and keep the advertising going.  Consistency reaps the greatest benefit.  The only advertising campaign that has ever worked (apart from the heavy social involvement) was the one where we just kept putting on the same adds, in the same places for the longest time possible.

Good luck.

The question of education often revolves around 2 things; Costs and Results, most of the time people are not too worried about the cost of an individual students as long as that individual student has a marginal (but significant) advantage.  On a national scale though, the relative R/C does become important when looking at competitive edge towards other countries.

B-proficiency

With Korea there is the added social pressure of their relative status towards other countries.  Koreans are very sensitive in how others perceive them.  A B- is considered to be insufficient in Korea.

The above article completely ignores the economic factors that come along with education.  A country has to be able to carry the burden of educating their children, and the education needs to add value to society, in such that the total wealth of a country is improved.  South Korea is a very good example in how a country can increase their level of wealth by investing heavily in education.  But the law of Marginal returns also dictates that, simply said, too much is too much.  Is that one extra dollar spent on education adding at least 1 dollar to the value of an economy?

I found this information.  Three important variables are thus presented; Cost per student, GDP per capita and proficiency.  You might make the claim that the distribution of the cost in the different fields of education makes a difference, but I am going to assume that in regards to languages, it doesn’t matter.

According to the first website, Korean fluency lies around 24th in the OECD, Korean GDP per capita is 23rd and cost per student they are ranked 20th.  Just looking at the ranks, one cannot consider Korea to be an ineffective, albeit slightly.  Let us not forget that Korea is still catching up with the rest of the OECD.

The problem is, I cannot see if hagwons are added to the mix of expenses in South Korea. The private education system is unique to Asia.  The burden of paying for the younger generation falls mostly on the parents, where in Europe, the burden is carried by mostly taxpayers.  This is my pet peeve.  Are parents spending their hard earned won effectively.  If we look at the aggregate numbers, we cannot come to that conclusion, but by simply realizing that the cost of education falls upon the individual, rather than the general public, the ailments of Korea become understandable.

This is a choice every country has to make for themselves, do we let parents pay for the future of their offspring, or does the whole nation take the responsibility of paying for the future of the next generation?  Either solution has it’s problems,and each country (culture) has to figure out what is best for them.

In regards to English proficiency, looking at the generalized statistics, Korea is exactly where it should be.

I once referred to the 7 sins as a way to categories countries, as a bit of a joke.  I used Greed and Gluttony to describe U.SA., Pride and Sloth for Europe, But I used Envy for Korea.

Before I continue, I would like you to read following articles in succession.

Decompression

Class Struggle

The Logic of Stupid Poor people

If you ever have the chance, I would also recommend reading Status Anxiety, by Alain de Botton.

When you have read all of that, you will understand that the third article explains the education problem in Korea far better than the two articles before that.  It also explains why the problem is so tenacious.

The heavy undercurrent of Envy and Insecurity running deep within the culture of South Korea has a historical background.  About ten years ago I happened to be walking in a museum and saw a display of a procession.  I inquired about the meaning of it, and the explanation was that a young man had passed the state exam and came back to his hometown as a bureaucrat.  He would have the whole town under his administration.  Already in the history of Korea Education meant Social Mobility.

Another event, at around the same period, indicated the importance of Social Status.  I fell sick and I wanted to go to the hospital.  Everyone dressed up as if we were going to a party.  I was a bit miffed.  I was explained that in the past the parents had to go to emergency and were dressed in their pajama’s.  They hardly got any service, and their general treatment was very bad. Since then, they would always dress up and show off their wealth before going to the hospital.

This is South Korea.  People are treated according to their show of wealth.  This is why the pressure of parents on their children to become financially successful is so tough.  This is why Exams in Korea are so important.  This is why a top score on the test is better than actually acquiring the required skills to perform the job.  This is why people live on the sharp edge of their spending capacity, to eek out every little advantage they can.  This is why suicide rate is so high.  etc …..

We often think “why do Korean hagwons do what is obviously not beneficial for the kids or the country?”.  It’s because we are looking at the wrong benefit.  The goal in life of every parent is to give their children the best chance in life.  In Korea it means showing people that you are better through status symbols and perfect exam scores.

I think it will take at least another generation before this fundamental problem is resolved.  When Koreans will increase their confidence in their own abilities and feel comfortable with their achievements.

One more issue is that Koreans don’t trust their government.  Which is a healthy attitude … but in Korea it is founded in the experience that, up until now, every single president, and practically all politicians have had their careers smeared with corruption (white border crimes).  They believe that the government is trying to perpetuate the existing inequality in favor of their own offspring.  That the hagwon industry is the only way for middle class people to break through the limitations of the perceived low quality in public education.  They see wads of cash being wasted on stupid populist projects with very little to show for.  They see tax rates go up, with very little in return.  One of the reasons why President Park won is because the youth have become detached from political life and didn’t even bother to vote.  Whereas the older generation still holds on to their hard won freedom and democracy and voted for what they understood.

Change comes from younger generations committing themselves to make a better place for themselves.  At the moment, I see very few of them having any interest in politics.  They are so immersed in getting the perfect score that the rest of the world doesn’t matter anymore.

Taptaphye

Some more reading material

OECD Korea

Employment outlook

Better Life

I own a school, so I ponder the question “Why do people get an education?” quite a lot.  The problem is, I can’t seem to answer that simple question.  I often ask my students, “Why do you study English?”  Inadvertently the answers are limited since I am dealing with kids, but it’s either social pressure (My mom wants me too) or future stability (To get a good job).  I only got a few students who shrug their shoulders and just do it.  Those, by the way, are my favorite students, the ones who “Just Do It”.

Since I can’t answer this question in regard to other people, I can only answer the question “Why did I get an education?”  It certainly wasn’t because I wanted a good Job.  I actually never wanted a “real” job, for me University education was more a postponement of having to get a “real” job. That is probably why it took me such a damn long time to finish it.  It certainly wasn’t because my parents wanted me too.  People were constantly telling me NOT to go to University, that it was a waste of time, especially since I was probably the worst possible student imaginable. Going to University doesn’t make you rich, but it does enrich you.  This and only this is the only tenet I have on education.  Don’t do it for others, do it for yourself.  Don’t do it for money, do it for yourself.

There are certain occupations in life that do require education (professor, lawyer, doctor, …), but most occupations in life just need you to be able to read, talk, listen, write and … think.  When people want to become a professor, a lawyer or a doctor, it is simply because they ARE those occupations.  The education is just forced upon by society, since a quack in any of those occupations could have disastrous consequences ….

The problem is, kids that go to school today, that get an education for a job that exists today, might not be ready for a job that doesn’t exist today.  I am opposed to learning for specific jobs, apart from those that require a deep rooted knowledge of the matter.  Education needs to focus on teaching kids how to think, not what to think.  When you teach kids what to think, it becomes impossible for them to adapt to the changing environment, that is only changing faster and faster.

This is probably the fundamental reason for my extreme distaste of a curriculum.   Curricula  teach you the “what”, not the how.  Education should always be skilled based.  Let individuals personal experience fill in the “what”, but let education focus on the “how”.  We teach people how to write, how to read, how to listen, how to talk.  Why don’t we teach them how to think?

That is easily answered when you take a simple look at society.  I come from a “European” background, and have immersed myself into “Korean” culture.  The difference between both does shed light on my understanding of human nature.  Humans, for some reason, always try to enforce their point of view upon other people, and as a society, they want to enforce the next generation to “think” in the same way.  Maybe this is the core reason why teenagers revolt against education/parents/peers.  There is the underlying sense of the mind to make up it’s own mind, but the pressure from others to conform to society creates a stress, an anger, a dissatisfaction with the world.  Which thus is a clear identification that teaching people what to think is fundamentally wrong.

That is why I started my school.  Korean education’s focus on “what to think” is so overwhelming strong that there is a need for these kids to start thinking on their own.  Group think in Korea is very strong.  Social pressure in Korea is very strong.  You are not allowed to be who you are, you always have to be what others want you to be.  The kids that come to my school (and stick around) are exactly those who psychologically cannot withstand the onslaught of that kind of pressure.  They find a freedom of thought, a chance to express their free will and be accepted for who they are.  Those are the kind of children that flourish under my supervision.  Those are the kind of kids I want to teach, the misfits.

Change only happens when people stop doing the same thing over and over again. If Korea truly wants to become a “Creative Economy”, it is going to have to change on how it teaches the next generation.  I don’t see it happening.

http://www.ncmle.org/journal/PDF/Jan09/Students_think.pdf

I am not a doomsayer, and pretty optimistic about the future.  I have a small list of things the government can do to harm my business.  This is one of them.

[EDIT: It seems that that article is very badly worded, a better explanation is given here. It seems that it will be an opt-in for those who NEED it, and no "education" will take place, except the accidental one]

I prefer not to give my list of things the government can do to curb the hagwon industry, some guy might actually read and implement them.  I am also not saying that this will “destroy” the hagwon industry, not quite there yet.  I am saying that it will have specific repercussions on MY business.

The services the hagwon industry offers to parents can be looked upon from various angles.  The main idea is we teach something to the kids, so they can master the skills to compete in the academics of South Korea.  Another service is babysitting.  It’s a perfect blend, keep your kids occupied and away from danger and fill that time with things they can use in the future, allowing you to make a buck away from the kids.

What people outside of Korea don’t know is that 1st grade elementary school kids finish around 2pm.  It gradually moves up as the years go on.

If you are a parent, you already have the question flash through your head.  ”What am I gonna do with my kid?”  Here comes the hagwon with their bus service.  The most profitable time period for me is between 2pm and 7pm.  That’s it.  All the other hours are just gravy.

Worst Case scenario

If the article is correct, it would effectively take away up to 60% of my revenue.

I have been talking to other people, trying to gauge the real situation, and what is going to be actually implemented.  What people say and what actually happens are two different things.  Nevertheless, I am worried about the direct consequences on my operations.

If the program would just be “Child Care”, it might not be a problem, the hagwon still provides “some” value to the time spent in class.  The article, though, doesn’t say that.  It says:

Starting next year elementary schools will provide after-school classes to first- and second-graders until 5 p.m. as part of an effort to expand after-hours child care programs within the public education system

They will provide “classes”.  Which is exactly what I, and many other hagwons are doing.

From a personal point of view, I have absolutely no problem with the implementation of this program.  As a business owner, I do.

Why is there no such  thing as an after school private education industry in other industrialized countries?  At least not in the extent we witness in Asia.  The main reason is the academic pressure on families to succeed, but also that schools don’t finish at 2 pm.  I don’t know about your school, but I seldom finished before 4.30 pm (except on Wednesday’s).

The fact that children have available time is an important part of the hagwon industry.

ESL teachers

When the worst happens, a drop in demand will also mean a drop in demand for NET’s.  Public schools have already severely cut into the English programs and let many people go without replacing them.  If this program is executed the way I think it will be executed, not many ESL teachers are going to remain in South Korea (compared to current levels).

Reality Check

The whole scheme is going to cost about $600M dollars.  That is a hefty sum.  Mostly because labor is an expensive part of the deal, and you need teachers to do more hours within the same time lapse, which simply translates into more teachers.

Public After school business are already a corrupted scheme, where greasy palms rule the day.  I’m sure many Korean parents are thinking exactly the same.  The trust level is not high, and they will have to increase their credibility before parents will be picking up on it.

Taxes.  Will the South Koreans swallow more taxes?  I don’t know about you, but I have a creepy feeling that, even though tax rates haven’t moved, I actually have been paying in real terms more and more taxes.  600.000.000/35.000.000 = 17$ per working adult.  Peanuts right. Assuming all 35.000.000 actually do pay taxes.

Social programs failures in the government. The South Korean government often tries new programs, but they often fail, mostly due to bad implementation or misguided concepts on what is actually required.

All in all, I am worried about the news, but I will play it cool and wait until the information becomes a little bit less propaganda and a little bit more real.

Some time ago,  I saw a link pop up on my stats and was put in a very good mood from that point on.  I even got my wife to laugh at me while reading it to her.  She finds anyone taking me serious as being seriously funny.

What peeked my interest more though is this, this and this.

You can see he put some time in trying to understand the hagwon Industry, and I am happy to say that Part I and Part II are pretty much to the point.  I don’t think I can add anything extra.  In Part III he starts thinking of what it would take to make a better hagwon.  The one big flaw is the consistent negligence of the business reality of costs and revenue, and how to make a profit.  But we cannot blame him for that, assuming he had no formation in any part of economics education.  This is why my point of view, inside the ESL world, offers a second limitation to what is possible as a hagwon.  On the one hand we have desires concerning what education is supposed to be doing, and on the other hand, we have the economic limitations on running a school.  Resources are not infinite and time even less so.

I will be grouping ideas based on similar underlying principles.

Idea 1 to Idea 4, Idea 7 and Idea 13: Time!

Let’s assume a full time teacher is hired for 38 hours a week, but teaches 25 hours per week, allowing for 13 hours of “doing something else”.  That means that only those 25 hours make money, and the margin on those 25 hours needs to pay for everything else.  You can already see that this is not going to work, unless you got a lot of students in each class, or each student pays a lot of money per hour teaching.  Since tuition fees in Korea are “limited” to around 10k per hour, and even if we pay the teacher 2.1M nominally (real cost 3M) on a 25 hour teaching schedule, you get 3.000.000/(10.000) = 300 student hours per month, just to pay for the teachers wage, that is about three student per hour per teacher.  A known secret among most people that are in business know that to run a healthy business, 30% of total cost is labor cost.  Given this “normal” standard we come to the point we need 9 students in class to run a healthy school at 10.000 won per hour per student.  Now, the exception is with industries that rely heavily in HR to create revenue, it could rise up to 50% of the total cost, so in that case, a class would need a minimum of 6 students in a class to be considered normal. It is when you reach student 7, 8 that you can consider a school to actually make a profit.

Given the 38 hour week for a teacher (yeah right …) you have 13 hours per week for your teachers to either study English or Korean (which costs money, you still have to hire someone to run that class), have some social time (or shall we force people to do that outside of the working hours?), Evaluate students (a decent evaluation takes 30 mins per student, depending on the number of students, that is a heck of a long time), Keep getting trained, and prepare for classes.  All that in 13 hours per week or 650 hours per year.  I don’t think so.

The one condition you are forgetting is that most people have NO interest in expanding the hours they work, unless you are crazy like me, working 12-13 hours a day.  Most people just want a job, go home and enjoy life, that is reality.  The job is to pay the bills, so the time you are paying them for is the time you get to put ALL of those ideas very tightly packed.  A lot of people pretend otherwise, but that is only because they are looking for a job…

Time is a very valuable commodity, and making your employees go through all that hassle will ultimately backfire in less energy IN the classroom, and students dropping out.  My take is completely the opposite.  ALL energy should be focused on what they are here to do, and that is to teach.  If the teacher wants training and asks me for it, I will provide, but if I force it unto him/her, it will only result in a less effective teacher in the classroom.  A plane doesn’t make money sitting in the hangar getting a fix over, it is only there because if they don’t, it will fall out of the sky and business will suffer.  A teacher creates value teaching, and that is what a school should support, all the other stuff is just a distraction.  Under the condition that the individual wants to do it, all is fine, but most simply won’t, unless it has a direct effect on their pay-grade.

HR is a real bitch, and to get people to even do what they are paid to do is already though, don’t put on anything extra that doesn’t directly involve getting the job done, unless they want it.

Idea 5 : Curriculum

That idea is so spot on, I did you one better.  I do a “curriculum” based on a week.  The fickleness of the students (mothers) can be quite high especially during February and September.  Added to that we got so many other things impacting the consistency of student participation that planning anything for more than a week doesn’t make sense. Every week, I focus on some language points and make sure they get it within the week.  The problem is making it all string together cohesively. You need a framework in which a teacher can use as a guideline, to make it easier for the teacher to adapt to the flexibility a school requires in an environment where students can drop out or in at any lesson.

Idea 6 : Individualized Learning Model

This is an idea I really have to dig into.  I just need to find a way to put that into something deliverable.

Idea 8 : Homeroom

Most of the time the kids got a list of hagwons to go to.  They go from music, to math, to sports and English.  The homeroom might be empty most of the time, unless you enforce a homework discipline into the schedule.  Hiring extra people is still hiring extra people.  Tuition still depends on the hour taught, not on the hours of the children’s presence.  It will be difficult to tie revenue to the cost, and make it go break-even.  I transferred one room into a Library, and it has other uses.

Idea 9 : Integrated

Of course it is better.  Do you know how many times I get asked the question “What do you teach?” Answering English is not the best one.  Integrated/Immersive doesn’t mean anything.  The question in their minds is, “How will this get my kid to outperform any other kid.”  If people want corn on their pizza, you sell pizza with corn, irregardless what you think of the taste.

Idea 10 & Idea 14: Testing

Depends on the test, right?  That is what you are saying.  What do you test and how do you test it.  If you read my previous post, I alluded to the idea that extreme testing can lead to a misguided idea from the students that what matters IS the test, not the actual acquisition of language capability. Developing a test that isn’t a test will probably require 20 PhD’s. …. That is why I focus on what the teacher can do, and that is asses the students IN class while they are working with a yard stick in hand.  The problem is that parents don’t have the attention to take a wider perspective of analyzing their kids.  They want a simple number that explains everything.  No wonder they get cheated half of the time.  I am not in the business of selling bridges.

Testing also takes a lot of time, time that could be spend actually learning something.

Idea 11 : Infrastructure

The day I can see that teaching and technology working seamlessly without a teacher having to spend hours prepping for one hour of class with same said technology, we can talk about it.   Every time I try to do something with technology, not only do I spend a lot of time prepping, it also has a direct negative impact on the output of said class.  Technology and Entertainment are now too much intertwined for children to see technology as nothing else as entertainment.  It’s still too disruptive.

Idea 12: Hagwon as a home

Actually, the rule I employ is that the Hagwon is MY home and if they destroy anything in my school, I will come to THEIR home and destroy one of their toys. They are my guests, they should behave like them.

I also don’t allow students to bring their pens and pencils.  They use MY pencils, My paper and MY books.  Any disrespect towards my stuff, translates a story from me asking them if they would like me to disrespect their stuff.  One incident per student is enough to stop them from Erosion Vandalism.  They cannot write on the table and since it is pencil only, it is not hard enough to even scratch the surface of the table, which is where the real damage begins.

Another issue is clutter.  I allow my teachers to come up with ways to “improve” their work-space.  None of them have taken up the opportunity.  At least my classrooms are clutter free.

Idea 15 : CRM

CRM is very expensive.  Only a school of a certain size can afford to even consider making use of it.  What you need is Admin people who are working for you , who believe in the product you are selling.  That is your CRM.

Firing parents only work when you have filled enough capacity to pay for everything else.  Getting rid of a customer before you break even is a bad idea.  It’s a luxury problem.

A better strategy is to learn how to handle them.

Idea 16 : Empowering

Empowerment is a beautiful idea.  That’s it.  In the end, all that matters is the pay check.

Idea 17 : Flat fee

Actually, a hagwon is no longer allowed to do more than a flat fee. No more book selling, no more paper selling.  Just tuition.

Idea 18: Detention

Never saw that happen and very stupid indeed.  It just helps to make the kids NOT want to go to the school to begin with.  The negative mindset will decrease any output you might create. And it costs money to keep kids around for longer than necessary.  So it simply doesn’t make any sense.

The extra stuff is probably not allowed by MOE, or is either not possible due to the expense it entails.

Cheers and thanks for your point of view!

 

 

 

 

 

I can agree with most of what the following article is discussing.  My approach in the classroom is very similar.  What I would like to do is look at those principles and see how they work from a wangjangnim’s point of view.

1. A little pain is good for you.

Can a hagwon boss be painfully honest about the student’s he has in his school.

2 situations : The student is doing a level test.  It is obvious that the kid will fail, you don’t even have to question the validity of the test.  If a hagwon owner wants a kid in his school, telling the mother the kid is alright, needs a bit of work won’t do.  Nope, only the politics of fear will work.  Make the mothers worried about their kids future, and they’ll spend all the money they can to reduce the chance of failure.  Situation 2; the kid is enrolled.  Telling the mother the child is not doing what he/she is supposed to be doing might not be good to keep enrollment going, as you know, the mother might think that it is not possible for her kid to do badly, so it must be your fault.  So here begins the obfuscation.  You leave them in the dark, you put on a dog and pony show, you show them results of tests (again do not question the validity) that their child has made great progress …. (personally, I believe one can only see a difference in action every three months). So tests can be used to manipulate mothers to adapt their choices in preferences of the shady hagwon owner, sometimes it could also be due to mothers lack of patience, that the owner has no choice but to relay false information.

2. Drill, baby, drill.

Ha yes!  The point of contention.  Is drilling of any use?  It depends what you are drilling.  In the case of the article, refers to music.  Music is an art-form that requires dexterity. Dexterity can only be acquired through physical practice (minimum 4 hours a day).  Does it work with memorizing vocabulary?  Done properly, I believe, yes.  Done incorrectly, it certainly leads to easy test taking by the end of the week, and it teaches students that only the test is important, not the actual memorization.  It’s really about habit.  Does the drill you perform increase a positive habit to memorize words?  That is the question one has to ask.  Since everything in Korea is “pally pally” (fast fast), positive habit forming might not be the thing a frightened hagwon owner might wanna do.  He would prefer the students to do a flat form of drilling and just score perfect on the tests.  More on that later.

3. Failure is an option.

But not in Korea. ‘nough said.  But if children cannot fail, how do they acquire grit?

4. Strict is better than nice.

Have you ever heard a hagwon owner tell you, “Be nice, have fun”.  If you ever hear an owner say that, you are looking at the end of the tunnel.  Start looking for another job, and I mean it.  The hagwon owner who doesn’t allow the teacher to control his class by being strict will achieve zero success.  And I mean, real success, real progress.  When children achieve zero success, either the school will flounder or you’ll be stuck with the bad kids.  Another big mistake to make, but one that is inevitable if the only thing the hagwon owner wants is to make sure that his students stay just one more month, and if you lose that student, it is the teachers fault (and in a way it is, but it was the owners advice to begin with that lead to the situation).

5. Creativity can be learned.

Creativity, the buzzword of the year.  Creativity is, for me the mix between Knowledge and having an open flexible mind.  This is arduous work that shows very little result, in the short run.  It takes time to teach people confidence, questioning attitude, perseverance, passion, and on and on and on.  But you don’t do it by making kids take weekly tests over and over again, for no apparent reason accept to satisfy the curiosity of the parents.  Creativity can only be achieved if the person wants to create.  If your future is predetermined by your parents, and you feel powerless about your own life, don’t expect much from them.  Vision-less Hagwon owners cannot understand, and will copy any handy curriculum they can find, and throw it at the kids without even considering whether the kids are ready for it.

6. Grit trumps talent.

It’s like Intelligence, you might have it, but if you don’t use it, it doesn’t matter.  But in many parents minds, talent (present or not) represents all, when it actually represents nothing without the proper perseverance.  The will to excel.  Don’t treat the children for what you want them to be but for who they are, and what they want to be.  Yes, we need to teach discipline. Yes, we need to make sure they get the basics right.  But the kids also need to make that decision, “This is what I have to do!”.  In Korea, it is the opposite.  Every time I have a new student walk in, I ask them, “Why are you here?”  Inadvertently, the answer is “Mom”.  ”You don’t want to learn English?”  ”No.”  ”Please, go home.”  I give the children a choice, a choice they have to make.  Do you or don’t you want to learn English, it is up to you.  You might think this is cruel, but when they switch that mindset from “I have to”,to “I want to”, everything changes.

7. Praise makes you weak…

“Good Job” won’t cut it, if the child did not do any effort, did not make any mental sacrifice. When you tell them good job, it is meaningless.  If the child worked hard through the problem and didn’t even do a perfect job, but still better than before, the words “Good Job” mean everything.  I praise my kids, but only when they showed effort.  If they finished the work too fast, or without a care, next time, I make it much harder.  You don’t learn from an easy class.  Hagwon bosses love easy classes and perfect tests.  ”Your child is so smart, she never makes a mistake.”  Say what?  Mom’s ego’s might be brushed, kids might go home with a smile, for one more month, but the product is shoddy, the child will suffer.

8.…while stress makes you strong.

This one is about building resilience within the character of the child.  In Korea, Parents and hagwon owners OVERstress the kids to a breaking point.  They stress the kids about the tests, but they don’t stress them about doing a good job.  Putting the emphasis on the wrong target.  The tests are not important, the child’s development is important and with that, the test’s are there to make sure the kids are developing.  I am not sure if Korea can ever correct this.

On a little funnier note