How much vacation are you getting this summer?

[jehall]

I'm just curious what other public teachers are getting in terms of vacation this summer. I'm only getting 1 week because my camp is 4 weeks long. But the people I know in my area say 4 weeks is unheard of and have more than 1 week of vacation this summer. Am I alone in this?

[pez]

The reason that you are getting short vacations in the summer is because Korean summer break is much shorter than their winter break, so to plan around camps they want you to take short vacations in the summer.

You can ask if you can have more, but if the camp is already set then they won't want to change it.

You might suggest doing two camps in one day, which makes it a busy day, but you could get more vacations (and maybe overtime pay)

Our school is having us teach one camp in the morning and then another in the afternoon, because we wanted to take as few vacations as possible in the winter because we had family coming in town in the summer.

Your issue is that you haven't had winter break yet so you don't have any entitlement to vacations, so you might just have to deal with it this time around.

Read your contract, I think mine says that winter and summer vacations are more or less split evenily, if that's the case, maybe you can argue for 2 weeks.

Good luck!

[adamwatch]

my school is on vacation but i have been told i have to come in anyway. nothing to do, but i still have to come in.

[jehall]

I'm not sure what you mean by doing two camps in one day? Camp for me is four classes a day. Two grade 3 classes, a grade 4 class and a grade 5/6 class. It's the same schedule and hours as regular school. Other people have something different?

[rainesbaines]

Speaking of which, have you guys seen this?  Hilarious....  Maybe it all IS a conspiracy....

"Hitler Has to Desk Warm"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIeHeJ0V4LY

[carebare]

Hello,
Depending on what city you are in, is the amount of summer vacation days you get. I get 8 working days in the summer and 10 in the winter. However, it sounds like you are being used and abused only allowed to take 5 days of vacation sounds a bit off. i would check your contract and bring it up with your school officials if there is a problem.

Hope this helps

Care

[pez]

Camps, normally, for us are just 4 hours in the morning. But, this summer we have 4 hours in the morning and 3 hours in the afternoon, but we don't all teach all classes (so its possible)

I guess it would be impossible to do 2, 4 hours camps in one day.  But, maybe you could talk them into 2, 3 hour camps (3 hours in the morning and 3 in the afternoon)... which would still be a  lot...

[jehall]

So I take it that people's camps are on some sort of schedule that doesn't reflect regular school hours? At my camp, it's the exact same as a school day. Each class gets me for 40 minutes and then they go to their other classes. So I couldn't ask to teach 2 camps a day because the students have other classes in the afternoon.

Is my camp schedule unusual?

[BBetz1985]

Yes, at least compared to mine. My school is a ghost town outside of my camps. Students come in for their 2-class periods of camp (same students) then leave for the day.

[Drapes]

There are a couple of classes at my school, my co-teacher has a bunch in the morning 4-5. I even got asked to cover 2.
We do the English camp in the afternoon for 3 hours.
I have a 1 week camp, 2 weeks vacation, and 2 weeks desk warming.

Don't mind deskwarming, did farm work since I was 14, can't complain about being paid to do nothin'.

[Eribee]

Check your contract, I think you should be getting 14 days vacation during the summer break (including weekends, so it means 2 weeks). This is standard for all EPIK teachers (public school teachers) as far as I know. If you are with EPIK you should also have a local coordinator who can help if showing the contract to your co-teacher gets you nowhere.

If they insist you do 3 weeks camp leaving you with just one week vacation I think you should tell them you will carry over the extra week into next term or during the winter vacation, and see how they like that. For your winter vacation make sure you book your holiday (if you are traveling) way in advance so they end up having to plan camp around you. Schools leave it so late and the cost of flights just goes up and up. Everyone I know has managed to get away with this with schools just (often begrudgingly though) planning camps around the native teacher's flights.

My camp is 4 classes every morning for a week (on my own) and then another week 9-2.30 with my co-teacher helping.

Desk warming is good for getting ahead with planning, and yes, it's great to get paid for doing nothing! Or learning Korean, or reading a book, or planning the next trip (I'm sure that would get you through!)

Good luck!

[twebb]

Eribee is right.  In my contract at least, pretty standard EPIK, I get 2 calendar weeks - 14 days- of vacation for summer.  But, "if it interferes with smooth operations" one week can be added to the winter break.

Your school can make you take only one week of vacation during the summer.  It's weak, but they can.  But you will get that week later. 

[Janitor]

hmmm I am not sure if anyone else got a memo like I did for the ministry of education, but a few months ago there was a memo sent out to all native teachers in my area stating that we only get 8 working days off this summer. This conflicted with my school's start up date, so the extra 3 days were added to my winter vacation.

My contract actually states (EPIK) that we are only entitled to 18 working days off. 8 in the summer and 10 in the winter as opposed to last year's contract what was 21 calender days including weekends.