A good example is my bank in Korea. My academy had Kookmin Bank in their building. This was VERY handy, especially on payday. However, any major transaction, such as wiring money overseas or even just opening an account turned into a major headache because nobody spoke English, including the people at the foreign exchange desk. (Well, they spoke a little and they presumably took tests on it. But wiring money often turned into a major hassle.) The third in command at the academy found it hard to believe me about the struggles I had with the bank. My last day, when I was closing out my account, I had to have him come down and translate. And it wasn’t like I was wiring major amounts of cash, either. I had been going through the hassle every month and now wanted to close out my account. It took well over an hour to get everything sorted out. He was amazed, as he thought that they could understand English! Not so.

I am happy to try and speak Korean in many situations. However, when it comes to money, well, that is a different issue. There are so many people who have studied the language, but when it comes to actually communicated, they fail and fail miserably. They might even have a good score on the TOEIC!

I did have some students who could actually communicate. I taught a very bright 15 year old boy who had near-native pronunciation of English. He studied English because he genuinely wanted to learn to speak it and would very happily talk to any English speakers he could find. He had a great attitude towards learning and that is probably why his fluency was near perfect. He is something of an exception. There are any number of people with high TOEFL and TOEIC scores who can’t talk. A test is a good measure of knowledge. But if you can’t talk, well then what good is it?

Your skin looks remarkably smooth. What’s your secret? Are you raiding your wife’s makeup stash?

Get a haircut! Shave.

GET OFF MY LAWN!

STOP PLAYING THAT HIPPITY HOP MUSIC!

DON’T MAKE ME TAKE OFF MY BELT!

You need to ask yourselves if the newspapers and politicians who criticize the TEOIC exam don’t have vested interests in doing so. What’s their solution? Replace it by a homegrown test, preferably one that they will administer? I’m sure they’ve be raking in the cash, but how could that be an improvement on the current situation?

I got a call from a reporter last week, asking me to contribute something for a piece KT wants to do on the election and English education. I think “OK, this won’t be too difficult.” I hammer it out in two hours to meet what I thought was the deadline and zipped it in. I didn’t expect that it was going to be a stand alone pieace.

That was music to my ears. Every single thing was perfect.

Koreans have been too occupied with image and not substance. Wasting money on ideas such as the English villages is a prime example of this.

Point: There is no leadership in the education system of Korea. Look here -

http://www.adiversity.com/maga.....=645838550

Education is too important to be left to government.
Business demands results.
Ask a CEO at a Korean company what it takes to make in the business world:
1. English skills
2. Computer skills
3. A specialty

What does education deliver, “Hi I am fine thank you and you?”