Hello from Coquitlam, BC

Hi Everyone,

My name is Wanyi. This is my 9th/10th MET course and I’m taking it along with another MET course ETEC 531 as well. This also means that this is my last semester. I work for a private education company that has exclusive contracts with selected private secondary schools in BC and Toronto, as a Student Coordinator. So I work with many international students from all parts of China, who have come to Canada to study.  My job requires me to think outside the box quite a bit, especially when helping schools or students with problems that range from academics to everyday life.  I am currently doing this MET program, partly for self-interest and partly due to self-improvement as my education background is in Education and Interactive Arts.  I taught in South Korea for 5 years, after receiving my first BA from SFU, then my B.Ed from Lakehead in Ontario.

I look forward to working with everyone this summer. Have a great week even if the rain lingers longer than it should.

Cheers,

Wanyi

6 comments

  1. Hi Wanyi

    I am in my 9th course and looking forward to completing the course this year 🙂 How was the teaching experience in Korea? Where did you teach in Korea? I am from South Korea and thinking about going back there for a while after completing MET. I didn’t know private education companies are providing services to schools here. What types of educational services/products are offered to the schools?

    I am looking forward to working with you this semester as well!

    YooYoung

    1. Hi Yooyoung,

      I enjoyed my 5 years in Korea and would have probably stayed longer if I could. In fact, I’m going back to visit this Dec. I’m Chinese so I didn’t have as much trouble adjusting to the Korean lifestyle. The teaching experience was great, I got placed in a great English Academy run by the Seoul Ministry then a great public school after, though both were by Seoul Metropolitan office of Education, one was in Gapyeong and one was in Seoul. Because I only taught English I had to learn how to be creative. My BA in Interactive Arts helped as well, even if it’s something as simple as making a lesson look fancier for one class.

      If you plan to return to South Korea after this program, you might really need to do the research first. Because from what I know, unless you are a Korean citizen, you can’t be a public school homeroom teacher meaning, you would probably only get contract jobs teaching subjects. However, the private sector has more options, especially with the international schools or even the semi-private ones like foreign schools. However, with a Master’s you can definitely look at some post-secondary options. Or even look at some of the private companies like YBM, Cheonjae, etc. They have private academies and have publishing teams that create textbooks and interactive materials for the resources they create. That’s all that I can think of at them moment, if you have more questions, feel free to let me know.

      I look forward to working with you too.

      Wanyi

  2. Thanks for the intro Wanyi, and congratulations on almost finishing! As student coordinator, are you having to travel a lot between select schools? Looking forward to learning with you.
    Andrew

    1. Hi Andrew,

      Nice to “meet” you, I look forward to learning with you as well. You are right, for my job I travel back and forth quite a bit. But luckily though my company works with a dozen schools, I only handle four, 2 in Vancouver, 1 on the island and 1 in Chilliwack. So I have to travel only between those four. In fact, I just came back from a school visit from the island, hence my late posting.

      Cheers,
      Wanyi

  3. Hi Wanyi,

    Almost done, Congratulations! I’ve worked the public system for over 20 years and it seems that everyone is trying to attract the international student or they are setting up special schools for a select few. I look forward to hearing more about your work in your blog postings.

    Christopher

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *