The History of EPIK

As with any job, a person must study up in preparation to meet new challenges. Usually, I would research a company based on its history, its current projects and goals, and then all the press involved with that. If I were really bold, I might go interview someone who is working at the company now over a cup of tea or email someone who has worked at the company in his recent past for a few quick pointers.

Before I jump ahead of myself to record my secondhand textbook knowledge about Korea, it's nice to take a step back and first go over the program and school I am working with.

Through EPIK (English Program in Korea), established between the allied nations of the United States and South Korea, I am working specifically for the Daenam Elementary School in the Daebudo county, in the city state of Ansan, part of the Gyeonggi-do province/region roughly in the northwest of South Korea. (From a random scene in the HBO series The Wire, a commander cop told a street patrol cop that that's the first thing someone should know about his given situation - the very specifics of where he is.)

EPIK has a good fifteen years of history so far, though it is still somewhat a recent development. As with many international efforts regarding education and globalization, the initiator of these actions was Peacecorp, starting in 1981. The South Korean government determined, while working with Peacecorp, that having their youth learn foreign languages and be exposed to the cultures of other countries are important goals. EPIK was established in 1995 as its own organization; however, it became jointly operated by Korea National University of Education and National Institute for International Education (NIIED). In 2007, EPIK fully transferred to NIIED, which is a branch of the Ministry of Education Science and Technology. Since then, they have only gotten more organized, hiring and training more people. For more, see EPIK's Wikipedia page and its more-direct sources.

Daenam Elementary School offers first grade through sixth grade. It's a seaside building in a relatively small town, with the main attractions being malls, the beach, seafood and small resorts. I'll write more about this later when I have pictures for you. So for now, it would be easier to take a step back and look at South Korea - the country as a whole.

I was using Culture Smart!: Korea, by James Hoare as a first reference, but EPIK also has its own little booklet to pass out when training Guest English Teachers (GETs) during orientation called Living in Korea: A Guide for EPIK Teachers. (While I've mainly been talking about EPIK, I'm actually working for GEPIK, which is the branch of EPIK specifically for the Gyeonggi region, but most or all of the rules and procedures are the same - just clarifying that now.) The second source is very useful for specific information and the appendix of terminology in the back because of the Korean terms as applied to daily school life.

All of this will be especially useful when your recruiter asks about a phone or Skype interview. She's going to prepare around ten or so standard questions for you about your experiences, why you want to teach, why you chose Korea specifically, how you will interact with your coworkers, so on and so forth. The more you know, the more prepared you will be to formulate your answers to these questions based on your personal experiences. =)

Visiting the Consul

Hello! Visiting the consul comes only after you've gotten your VISA number from your recruiter. He may also have given you a form to interview with the consul and instructions on where to apply for your proof of residency. The proof of residency is for tax form purposes, but you can worry about that later.

After you fill out the form to interview with your consul, prepare:

• some money (about 60 dollars is a good bet)
• another copy of your university transcript
• your passport, and
• a passport photo

to include with the VISA application. If your recruiter didn't give you the address for the consulate, you will have to look it up on Google - type in your home city, the target country, and "consulate" (eg. Boston South Korean consulate) and search results should show their website, if not their address. Their address should be found either on the Home page or the Contact Us section, though there's a good chance that the site may be in a foreign language.

Since I reside in the Boston area, the Korean consulate that I went to is in Newton. This is their website. Because it's all in Korean, I could not access any of the forms that were on the website, and had to go visit in person to get anything done.

I had to make two or three trips. First, they had me fill out an application on site. Then, when they realized I didn't have an appointment, they sent me home with a health form to fill out and come back the next day at 10:30am.

2nd trip: When I did that, they asked for the passport photo and $45 in cash that I didn't know I was supposed to have, but decided to interview me anyway, because I sincerely apologized for being late as it was a really rainy day and the bus (there were only 2 bus routes to that address) ran 15 minutes late. So the interview was very short, where the consul asked pointed questions about why I wanted to be in Korea specifically, why I wanted the job, about my experiences, my family and my health. Then they sent me to the nearest CVS - with a Google map as a guide - to take a passport photo and obtain $45 dollars in cash to pay them for this procedure. When I returned with the desired items and dripping from the rain, they gave me a receipt and told me to come back 2 days later to pick up my VISA.

3rd trip: When I successfully did that, my quest was finally completed, thankfully.

I felt like I spent a lot of money, because each bus trip one way was about $3 in cash so I had to go to the ATM a lot, having gotten used to just using the debit card. Overall, it was $18 in bus fare plus $45 for the transaction, that's $63, plus $10 for the passport photos, and $2 for the ATM fees when I didn't have cash on me, the total rings up to a solid $75 dollars. However, most of this was because I was drastically unprepared for this visit - my recruiter didn't tell me anything about how to get a VISA, just sent me the form for interviewing with the consulate, so after reading this, you should come by fewer obstacles!