Avalon English: Private Elementary & Middle School Jobs

Avalon is a good place to start teaching in Korea. Small class sizes are perfect. The class load isn't too heavy. The job itself is as easy or as difficult as you make it. I enjoyed my time with Avalon.

Living in Korea, particularly in the Seoul metro area, is safe and easy (if you can handle being away from home). In the aggregate, Korean children are well-behaved and motivated.

This leaves company and community support as the critical elements to consider. Avalon is a major company in the private education market, and they behave accordingly. You will be paid on time, have insurance, and generally have all promises delivered on. In the classroom, this large company mentality can turn into a bit of a widget factory mentality - focus on testing can be frustrating. But this is apparently endemic to Korean education in general. Materials were useful for the most part, but with most Avalon books you will have to improvise to keep the class engaged.

The community at my particular campus included a large contingent of foreign teachers, among which were excellent head teachers. You may want an experience where you are the only foreigner around; large urban campuses will not provide that experience. Personally, having many other foreigners available at various points in their ESL experience was invaluable and made the transition that much easier. The Korean teachers at Pyeongchon were very friendly and helpful to the foreign staff with only a few sparing exceptions. You will read of unfriendly Korean co-workers in your research, and perhaps they are accurate, but I am of the opinion that this is due to lack of effort on the part of the foreign teacher in question. If you make an effort to abide by Korean cultural mores - some of which can be a tad frustrating - and don't behave like a fraternity pledge during rush week, Koreans are generally very friendly people.

All in all, the company is recommended for their professional behavior and institutional support. If you are seeking to be out on your own with no hook to wester culture, however, a large urban campus is not for you.

I had never taught before and had a hard my first month at Avalon. Luckily the campus I worked at (Pyeongchon) was a big one with about 15 other foreign teachers. It was a tight community that had a lot of fun together. A lot of the Korean teachers were fun too. The Avalon facilities were nearly new and pretty well maintained (for 5th grade classrooms at least). I had my own desk and my own computer to use to prep for my lessons, or keep in touch with home while at work. The apartment Avalon provided was very close to work (about a ten minute walk from work). There were also some other teachers in my building which made for a fun, dorm-like atmosphere. My only complaints about Avalon were with the campus manager and the head teachers. There was poor communication and oftentimes we would be asked to do something at the last minute which didn't have much explanation. It was also obviously a commercial operation and sometimes the bottom line came before the students. Financially I was able to save up a lot of money which I used to travel with for months afterwards. Try not and spend your paycheck on going out the first couple months, its easy to do.

I worked for two branches of Avalon, totaling 18 months, and I enjoyed the experience overall as a first teaching gig.

I was always paid on time, which is not always (often?) the case in South Korea, and both of my apartments were large and spacious (not to mention free).

The teaching workload is bearable except during the summer/winter intensives, but particularly at elementary level, preparation time for classes is minimal.

So overall, if you don't have any teaching experience and want to go to Korea, then Avalon is a decent choice as you are unlikely to get any nasty experiences. Personally, I wouldn't work there again but I am grateful to Avalon for giving me the chance to start my ESL career.

I worked for Avalon for two and a half years, first in middle school and then in elementary. Avalon is a large company in Korea and has a good reputation around the country for providing competitive English classes therefore I did not worry about my pay check or any other contractual issues. Overall Avalon treated me well. The salary was competitive and on par with other private academies and the housing was more than adequate. Sometimes maintenance issues were complicated to take care of but if they were serious they were handled promptly. The company also provides a good amount of training and chances for all teachers to improve their skills in the classroom. Even as a seasoned teacher here in the states, I appreciated the opportunity for training workshops and the time to meet and work with other teachers. The best part of my Avalon experience was building friendships with the other foreign and Korean teachers. Avalon's size translates into a lot of employees so everyone is able to find a group to fit into. The Korean teachers were friendly and helpful and many were excited to make friends with their foreign co-workers. There were many organized social events which gave us all a chance to get to know each other away from the students.