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Please post this blacklist review of HUFS OeDae Language School (OeDae Academy) in Hwaseong/Dongtan . In an attempt to help other teachers know what they may be getting into if they sign there.
***WARNING*** Stay away from HUFS OeDae Language School (OeDae Academy) in Hwaseong/Dongtan!!!
The school was shut down by the Korean Ministry of Education for employing a Korean English teacher with no degree. Then they reopened as the same school (changing the name from OeDae of Dongtan to OeDae of Hwaseong; aka Korean Foreign Language University OeDae Academy).
They put the business ownership in the owner's wife's brother's name (a common loophole in Korean law that allows the hagwon owners to steal money from their ESL teachers). The other foreign teacher and I were advised of our contracts being terminated on the final day of May due to the closure of the school. They said we had to sign a new 12 month contract. They refused to honor the contract even though it is still the same owner (via his wife's brother's name on the paperwork), same students, same school. The school refused to pay the contract completion bonus of one month's pay. I was in my 10th month of the contract (1 month 19 day remaining). They also refused to pay my return airfare back to the USA.
They did this to the other western teacher from England as well (who was in the 8th month of his contract). Basically they are stealing about $5000 from me(1 month pay + bonus pay + airfare home) and also from the other teacher. We presume they are doing this to pay the fine imposed on them by the Korean Ministry of Education, basically having the western teachers pay the owner's fine (owner's English names are David and Windy - husband and wife).
Luckily, I have an F2 visa and can make up most of that by contracting out to companies. Unfortunately the other teacher is E2, and will have to swallow the loss. I should have left there once I got my F2 visa, but I believed in honoring my contract.
Other teachers there have had problems as well. There has not been one foreign ESL teacher complete a year contract at the school and they have high turnover of their Korean teachers. The owners also attempt to renegotiate contracts.
***Warning*** The owners of this school have no honor nor integrity. They are dishonest and will cheat you and steal from you for their own benefit. ***WARNING***
So it's now 2014. Are they still underhanded?
ReplyDeleteShit, I was offered a contract by HUFS literally 20 min ago - have not sent or signed anything yet.
ReplyDeleteGood job that I found this post before getting myself into trouble!
Thank you Flint!
Ray
I'll see what my recruiter has to say to that.
ReplyDeleteRay - again
Still bad. It's super uncomfortable and the boss likes pushovers and "easy to handle people." If you are opinionated and have great ideas you'd like to input and so on, don't ever come here. They literally don't think speaking teachers do anything. Speaking teachers are teachers who can be easily replaced to them.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately that was my experience with all but 1 of the directors I dealt with. As soon as you say no to something you are a bad teacher and they want to be rid of you.
DeleteHi! I'm working at HUFs in Geoje, but my contract says Oedae on it.
ReplyDeleteI'm a bit freaked out by it all, because apparently I'm their first F teacher, so noone seems to know what to expect of me, they only know when I'm doing something wrong. To make matters worse, I was told when I got here that I would be working in three different schools.