Need to Know – #2 Recruiters

A good number of foreign teachers will use a recruiter for at least their first stint here and I’m no different.  Unfortunately, I have never had a great feeling about my recruiters and I wouldn’t recommend them to anyone (e-mail me if you want the name).  One of my colleagues, who is in her second year of teaching here and was hired from within the country, used the same firm.  She didn’t need a lot of hand holding because she’s been here a year but she asked for exactly two very simple things–and got neither.  They simply aren’t that invested in delivering on what you want.  My impression, and this is from other teachers as well, is that, recruiter or not, you really are fending for yourself once you get here.  The recruiter has been paid their cut once you get started at your job, and while you can badger them into helping you with big conflicts with the school, you will probably get the most help on day-to-day things from other foreign teachers and Koreans that you befriend.  Get to know the other foreign teachers as quickly as you can when you arrive and if you’re lucky you’ll have ones like my neighbours who really took me under their wing when I arrived.  It’s the fastest way to get the lay of the land.

Your recruiters, if they’re anything like mine, will resurface to take you to baseball games or send you information three weeks after you needed it and have already found it.  But for the most part, it’s best not to rely too much on them.  I relied on my recruiters to find out the dress code of my school.  They told me it was casual and that jeans were okay.  That was not true.  It was business casual and jeans were not preferred.  I made the recruiters go to bat for me on that with the school and it turned out to not be a big deal at all.  Other teachers have turned up wearing jeans and now I realize I had no reason to panic.  However, it’s the kind of thing that caused me a lot of stress in my first days here and it just didn’t need to be an issue

Now having said all this, I stumbled across a recruiting firm based in Toronto just before I left, that seemed to be really top notch.  I’ve also heard from some people here and there who have had really good experiences with their recruiters.  I guess I’d say that good recruiters are out there.  They just don’t seem to be the norm.