20 Years of Teaching & Learning

:: Twenty Essays by Twenty Fulbright Korea ETAs from 1992 - 2012

Reflections on 20 years of the Fulbright ETA Program in Korea

above The current (2011-2012) ETA class

opposite page 2008 ETA Jane Lee stands on stage in front of her school

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Contents

forewords Sung Kim :: U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Korea.....................................10 Brent Byers :: Minister-Counselor for Public Affairs.......................................11 Ju-Ho Lee :: Minister of Education, Science and Technology............................12 Frederick F. Carriere ::

Former Executive Director, KAEC..........................13

Jai Ok Shim :: Executive Director, KAEC.....................................................14

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ALUMNI ESSAYS Rhea S. Suh :: 1992-1993..........................................................................22 Karen Peirce :: 1993-1994..........................................................................24 Michelle Hlubinka :: 1994-1995...............................................................29 Mark Engstrom :: 1995-1996....................................................................32 Kaliq Simms :: 1996-1997........................................................................34 Christopher Myers Asch ::

1997-1998.....................................................38

Christopher Steubing :: 1998-1999..........................................................40

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this page ETAs have fun on the shore opposite page An ETA with his students previous page ETAs explore the beauty of Korea

Kate Spence-Ado :: Katrin Katz :: Mimi Do ::

2000-2001.........................................................................47

2001-2002............................................................................51

Ashley Quarcoo :: Alex Kim ::

1999-2000................................................................44

2002-2003..................................................................54

2003-2004...........................................................................58

Tamara Failor ::

2004-2005.....................................................................60

Lindsay Herron :: 2005-2008....................................................................62

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Stephen Wulff :: 2006-2007.......................................................................66 Ajay Bangale ::

2007-2008.......................................................................70

Kenny Loui :: 2008-2009..........................................................................73 Christina Rho :: 2009-2010......................................................................77 Sonja Swanson ::

2010-2011....................................................................80

Sonia Kim :: 2011-2012............................................................................83

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Sung Kim U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Korea

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enator J. William Fulbright, the major proponent of legislation that established one of the most prominent and effective international exchange programs in the world — a program which famously bears his name — once said: “From the beginning, my hope with the Fulbright exchanges was to generate a deeper understanding — especially on the part of potential leaders — of the differing cultures and peoples of the world.”

For over 60 years, the Fulbright Program has taken on this task and helped foster meaningful cultural exchange between nations. In the Republic of Korea, one of the United States’s closest allies, Fulbright has done much to help Americans and Koreans better understand each other. One of Fulbright Korea’s signature initiatives, the English Teaching Assistantship (ETA) Program, has been hailed as a benchmark and model for all other Fulbright ETA Programs. This year we celebrate the 20th year of the ETA Program in Korea, and look forward to many more years of its success.

The Fulbright Program continues to play an important role in maintaining the long-lasting friendship between our two nations and cultivating an even deeper mutual understanding. On behalf of the U.S. Embassy in the Republic of Korea, it is my pleasure to congratulate Fulbright Korea, as well as past and current ETAs, on their efforts to contribute to these important goals, and I wish you continued success in the future.

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Brent Byers Minister-Counselor for Public Affairs :: U.S. Embassy Seoul

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t is an honor and great pleasure to serve as Chairman of the Board for the Korean-American Educational Commission, which implements the Fulbright Program in the Republic of Korea. This is especially true this year as we celebrate the 20th anniversary of the English Teaching Assistantship (ETA) Program, which has become a fundamental component of Fulbright Korea’s efforts to build cultural bridges between the U.S. and Korea over more than six decades. It is through success stories such as this that we are reminded that the U.S.-Korea partnership is based on much more than security and economic ties; it is a relationship nurtured by educational and cultural exchanges and our two countries’ shared commitment to furthering these interactions.

Renowned journalist Edward R. Murrow, who served as the first director of the United States Information Service, the precursor to the Department of State’s Bureau of Public Diplomacy, once stated that, “The real crucial link in international exchange is the last three feet, which is bridged by personal contact, one person talking to another.”

Participants in Fulbright’s ETA Program certainly exemplify this notion. Throughout Korea, ETAs enjoy the benefits of cultural exchange by not only engaging with students at the primary and secondary school levels where they teach, but also through their immersion in Korean family life through homestays in rural communities. It is here, as de facto family members, where ETAs gain their deepest understanding of Korean culture and, fittingly, impart upon their family and friends a bit of their own American culture.

The U.S. Embassy in the Republic of Korea is proud to be a part of the administration of the Fulbright Program in Korea, and we look forward to seeing it continue to provide Koreans and Americans with future opportunities for cross-cultural exchange. Doing so puts all of us within that last three feet and brings us that much closer to achieving Senator J. William Fulbright’s vision of a deeper understanding among people and a friendship among nations.

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Ju-Ho Lee Minister of Education, Science and Technology :: Republic of Korea

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send greetings to those celebrating the 20th anniversary of the Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship (ETA) Program in Korea. I congratulate the U.S. Government, members of the Korean-American Educational Commission, and many ETA alumni whose commitment has fostered cooperation between our two countries by teaching English in Korea.

Since the program has started from eight young American ETAs in 1992, the Fulbright ETA Program has been one of the cornerstones of Fulbright’s presence in Korea. Over the past twenty years, nearly 1,000 ETAs have embraced their role not only as “educators,” but also as “cultural ambassadors” between the U.S. and Korea.

As of this 2011-2012 grant year, 112 Americans are helping students learn English across Korea, demonstrating a remarkable expansion of the program. Its effective orientation course and well-coordinated home-stay program that bridges participants to local communities are widely recognized as a great success.

I send my sincere appreciation to the members of the Korean-American Educational Commission for their successful management of the ETA Program throughout the past two decades, and heartfelt gratitude to young Americans for their hard work and passion. The ETA Program will, without a doubt, continue to prosper in the years to come.

Once again, I congratulate the Fulbright ETA Program on its 20th anniversary. I wish you all the best for a joyous celebration.

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Frederick F. Carriere Former Executive Director :: Korean-American Educational Commission

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he first two decades of the ETA Program in Korea illustrate how successes achieved in the educational field have a permanence that makes so much of what we do in other fields seem so very ephemeral. This is because the successes actually are the myriad of intertwined lives, both Korean and American, which embody the past, present and future of the program in an unbroken chain of irreplaceable memories.

For me, the chorus of ETAs singing “We Share the Dream” as the finale of the gala dinner held in Seoul in October 2010 to mark the 60th anniversary of the Fulbright Program in Korea perfectly illustrated this point. Garbed in white and processing onto the stage in two files, the ETA chorus was like a ‘cloud of witnesses’ testifying to the reality of the ideals that have animated the Fulbright Program from its very beginning. It struck me how pleased Senator Fulbright would have been by this moving performance, if only he could have been present for it as he was for the 40th anniversary commemoration.

It is so fitting that the ETA Program bridges the two decades between these two major anniversary commemorations.

Among the different varieties of Fulbright experiences, all of which are valid, the ETA Program certainly stands out as one of the most ideal expressions of what Senator Fulbright envisioned for his program.

My deep gratitude and warm congratulations go to all those who are responsible for the past, present and future successes of the ETA Program in Korea.

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Jai Ok Shim Executive Director :: Korean-American Educational Commission It is my great pleasure to present this commemorative publication in honor of the Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship (ETA) Program in Korea’s 20th Anniversary.

On behalf of the Korean-American Educational Commission (KAEC), I would like to thank all of the contributing alumni and those individuals without whose time and effort this meaningful collection would not have been possible.

This publication is a celebration of the history of Fulbright ETAs’ presence in Korea. It offers a collective tribute to twenty years with host families, in the classroom, and time spent forging the bonds of mutual understanding that lie at the core of Fulbright’s mission. But it also lends us the opportunity to pause, reflect, and take genuine joy in the memories and accomplishments made during the past two decades.

Over the past 20 years, Fulbright Korea ETAs have contributed greatly to the development of relations between Korea and the United States. Most importantly, as a result of the ETA Program, great strides have been made to improving the quality of English education in Korea. Through shared passion and hard work, our ETA Program has overcome cultural differences and language barriers to bring people together in a truly meaningful way not commonly found among exchange programs.

One theme from Fulbright’s presence in Korea has always been: continuity through change. And although there have been many changes to our organization during the course of its history, our paramount focus remains with our grantees and their rewarding experiences in the program. Furthermore, while many of our ETA alumni are no longer in Korea, their

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words are a testament to the lasting impact even a year on the peninsula can make over a lifetime.

The sentiment “Korea never leaves you” is a feeling expressed in many ways, from multiple voices throughout this publication. It underlines one of the ETA Program’s original purposes to “foster the development of a ‘critical mass’ of young Americans who would have a firsthand knowledge of Korea.” Looking back, it is safe to say that our ETAs have gone above and beyond fulfilling this goal.

After successful completion of their grant year, our ETA alumni have gone on to pursue jobs in the Foreign Service, law, medicine, academia, and countless other fields. Our alumni corps finds among themselves published authors, celebrated artists, and accomplished businessmen and women. As such it is with great pride that I invite you all to embrace and take to heart the words of those alumni published here. While they cannot be the whole voice of the nearly 1,000 Americans who have served as Fulbright ETAs in Korea, they do present us with a meaningful homage to the past two decades of exchange.

I would like to thank you for your continued interest in KAEC’s programs and I hope you find this 20th Anniversary commemorative publication to be significant and rewarding.

Please look forward to twenty more years of growth, joy, and success with KAEC and the Fulbright ETA Program in Korea.

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Contributors Rhea S. Suh

Karen Peirce

ETA :: 1992-1993 Baeksok High School

ETA :: 1993 – 1994 Haksung Middle School

Rhea was nominated by President Obama and confirmed by the U.S. Senate in the spring of 2009 as the Chief Financial Officer and the Assistant Secretary for Policy, Management and Budget at the U.S. Department of the Interior.

Rhea is a graduate of Columbia University and Harvard University. Her favorite memories of Korea include exploring the temples of the country and a quest to find the best down-home Soondubuchigae in Seoul.

Karen is currently Associate Director of the Center for Writers at North Dakota State University. She has too many memories from her year in Korea to choose just one favorite. However, a favorite aspect of the experience is the lifelong friendships she made with her fellow ETAs, most of whom remain in touch to this day.

Michelle Hlubinka

Mark Engstrom

ETA :: 1994-1995 Kangwon National University Affiliated High School

ETA :: 1995-1996 Seogwipo High School

Michelle is the Education Director for Maker Faire, the world’s largest DIY festival, and MAKE magazine. She is the mother of two boys: Ion (age 4) and Q (age 2). Michelle recalls, “One transforming night spent alone at Haeinsa when the generosity of my monk hosts, the stillness of the dark, wee hours of the early morning, and the low hum of a bell almost caused me to quit my ETA work in Chuncheon to become a Buddhist nun. (Yup, that impulse passed by the time the sun rose.)”

Mark is currently the Middle School Assistant Principal at Graded—The American School of Sao Paulo, in Brazil. His favorite memories from Korea include hanging out with the other Jeju teachers from 1995-1996, eating kalbi near the waterfall in Seogwipo with his host family, and finding new coffee shops on a weekly basis.

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Kaliq Simms

Christopher Myers Asch

ETA :: 1996-1997 Jeju Seo Middle School

ETA :: 1997-1998 Daejeon Jungang Girls’ Middle School

After teaching in South Korea as a Fulbright ETA, Kaliq earned a Master of Education degree from the School of Education at Harvard University. Kaliq then joined the faculty at Roland Park Country School in 1998 as an Upper School English Literature teacher, where in addition to teaching she designed the senior electives: African-American Women Writers and History of the English Language. Kaliq married Joseph Simms in 2000. They reside in Baltimore with their two children--Hunter (age 5) and Hope (age 3).

Chris teaches history at the University of the District of Columbia and serves as UDC’s Director of General Education. He and his wife, Erica, have two daughters. His favorite memory of Korea is waking up in his tent before sunrise in Jirisan National Park to the echoing sounds of monks tapping their wooden knockers.

Christopher Steubing

Kate Spence-Ado

ETA :: 1998-1999 Changwon High School

ETA :: 1999-2000 Kwangdok Middle School

Chris lives in Minnesota with his wife and two children where he works as a Lutheran pastor.

While on his English Teaching Assistantship, he lived with a host family and taught at Changwon High School. His favorite experiences in Korea were traveling to historical landmarks, hiking the many mountains of the Korean countryside, and exploring the unique cuisine of each region.

Kate Spence-Ado is currently an Assistant Professor at the Sammartino School of Education at Fairleigh Dickinson University in Madison, New Jersey. Her favorite memories of her time in Korea are a weekend trip with fellow ETAs to Jangseong-gun to celebrate American Thanksgiving, where the host school lit the word “Thankgiving” on fire in their honor and an overnight field trip with her school, where the students engaged in a mock sumo wrestling tournament and the faculty ate live squid as a delicacy.

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Contributors Katrin Katz

Mimi Do

ETA :: 2000-2001 Mokpo Girls’ High School

ETA :: 2001-2002 Daejeon Jungang Middle School

Katrin currently lives in Chicago, Illinois with her husband and two daughters. She is pursuing a PhD in Political Science at Northwestern University. Her favorite place in Korea is Mokpo, because of her students.

Mimi taught as a Fulbright ETA at Daejeon Jungang Middle School and was the second full-time ETA Program Coordinator. She has had a diverse career since leaving Korea, having worked as a nonprofit administrator at the Juilliard School, Lincoln Center, the Brooklyn Philharmonic, and the Boston Symphony Orchestra. She attended Yale University and Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs. She is currently CFO of the Cambridge School for Adult Education, and resides in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

She still loves to go to noraebang.

Ashley Quarcoo

Alex Kim

ETA :: 2002-2003 Hanbada Middle School

ETA :: 2003-2004 Dongdo Middle School

Ashley lives in Washington, DC with her husband Chartey and works as a Democracy Specialist for the U.S. Agency for International Development. As an English Teaching Assistant, she lived with a host family in Busan and taught at Hanbada Middle School. Her favorite memories of Korea include spending time with her host family, exploring new and ever more delicious foods, and discovering an appreciation for the national pastime of public bathing.

Alex currently resides in Seoul in his second year as a graduate researcher at the Korea University Urban Planning & Design Lab. His favorite Fulbright memory is of the Dongdo Middle School Fall Festival where he happened upon what initially appeared to be a meth lab run by the students, but to his relief was a classroom making old-fashioned sugar candy on portable propane stoves.

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Tamara Failor

Lindsay Herron

ETA :: 2004 – 2005 Suncheon Maesan Girls’ High School

ETA :: 2005-2008 Seogwipo High School

After Korea, Tamara lived in Portland, Oregon for a few years before obtaining a Master’s Degree in City and Regional Planning with a focus in International Development from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Since 2010, she has worked in various capacities and countries for San Francisco-based non-profit The Asia Foundation (www.asiafoundation.org). Most recently, her job sent her to China for several weeks.

It was her first time there.

Lindsay came to Korea in 2005 and hasn’t left.

She currently teaches at Gwangju National University of Education in Gwangju, Jeollanam-do.

Her favorite Fulbright memories tend to involve her students, including a birthday picnic with students at Seogwipo Harbor, taking students to Seoul for the embassy’s Korean Alumni Youth Partnership Program, getting advice from onlookers while learning ssireum from a student, and watching her boys practice coordinated cheering for backhogi competitions each spring.

Stephen Wulff

Ajay Bangale

ETA :: 2006-2007 Gumi Shinpyeong Middle School

ETA :: 2007-2008 Yeongsanpo Middle School

Stephen currently lives in an American homestay with his parents outside of Chicago. He recently completed his Master’s degree in Sociology from the University of Chicago and will embark upon a PhD program in Sociology next fall. His favorite memory was receiving a massive brain freeze, after winning the patbingsu eating contest at the ETA talent show, during orientation in Chuncheon.

Ajay is currently pursuing his MBA at The Wharton School of Business, University of Pennsylvania. He welcomes any Fulbrighters to Philadelphia or New York City. Also, his fondest memories of the Fulbright Program include being humbled by his host brothers and sisters in intense acrobatic taekwondo battles at home.

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Contributors Kenny Loui

Christina Rho

ETA :: 2008-2009 Young-Il High School

ETA :: 2009-2010 Cheonan Wolbong High School

Kenny lives in Korea and the U.S. as a professor in the Department of Police Administration at the Catholic University of Daegu and Cadet Programs Officer in the U.S. Civil Air Patrol. In 2012, he will become a Second Lieutenant in the U.S. Air Force. He interned at the U.S. Embassy during his grant year and was invited to an event featuring Girls’ Generation, Kenny’s favorite kpop band. Kenny later joked, unaware that it would foreshadow his future: “I owe Uncle Sam more years of government service for this.”

Christina lives in New York City with her family.

She is currently a graduate student studying International Education Development and would like to further focus on instructional technology and media use within education. One of her fondest ETA memories is watching her high school students at Cheonan Wolbong High School think of creative ways to get their fellow classmates to answer correctly in the game of Taboo.

Sonja Swanson

Sonia Kim

ETA :: 2010 – 2011 Seodaejeon Elementary School

ETA :: 2011- 2012 Hanbit School for the Blind

Sonja works for a creative agency by day, and helps run Seoulist Magazine by night. When she’s not working, writing or editing, she enjoys exploring hidden corners of Seoul and hunting for the world’s best patbingsu. She misses being surrounded by the brilliance, spontaneity and creativity of her students from her ETA year in Daejeon. Case in point: So far, no one at work has given her original artwork, pretended to be a lion, or broken into a song and dance routine.

Sonia Kim is an ETA at Hanbit School for the Blind in Seoul. So far, her favorite memories of Korea include: going fishing with her host family, traveling to Jeollanam-do an inordinate number of times in one year, and belting out 80s throwbacks with her coworkers.

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:: Twenty Essays by Twenty Fulbright Korea ETAs from 1992 - 2012

Reflections on 20 years of the Fulbright ETA Program in Korea alumni stories |

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Rhea S. Suh ETA :: 1992-1993 Baeksok Middle School

T

his past fall, I had the opportunity to visit Seoul again after nearly 20 years. My trip brought back so many memories of my time there as an ETA from 1992-1993. The old Korea I knew was still there in part, but the new Korea was overwhelming in its modernity, pace, and palpable sense of opportunity. As I explored both the new and the old, I was reminded of the biggest lesson that I learned from my ETA year: Expect the unexpected.

I arrived in Seoul with high expectations of myself and of the newly-created ETA program. As I launched myself into teaching, I was determined to be the best English teacher possible, capable of imparting on my students an uncanny ability to pick up the language. In less than a month, my expectations were quickly diminished.

My students were adorable, but sometimes a handful to manage. As a recently-transplanted New Yorker, I thought I could handle anything.

Anything, except as it turns out, the pranks of the eleven-year-old boys in my classes. I also had a difficult time with the pedagogy. There were so many students per class and so many classes per day, I found it difficult to tailor the lesson plans, let alone learn individual names. Before long, I grew more and more frustrated and struggled to try to establish some meaningful improvement in the English of my students. I had expected to have a complete command of my classrooms, my students, and their ability to master the English language. Instead, I was frustrated and my students seemed bewildered.

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One day, I sat down with some students who were having lunch to talk with them. My presence made them nervous and many stopped eating, so I tried to coax them out with some simple questions about their lives and suggested that they ask me questions about my life as well. After about ten minutes of back and forth, one young girl named Au-rum told me she was sorry. “Why are you sorry?” I said. “We are all sorry because we are not good students for you,” she replied. It was unexpected and such a shock.

Inquiring further, I learned that a lot of them felt badly because during my classes it was clear that I was frustrated and anxious. I had inadvertently let my high expectations for myself become a stressful experience and barrier to learning for the students.

It dawned on me that it was more important to make the English class fun, memorable, and something that could catalyze further years of study than it was to perfect a lesson plan around vowels, idioms, or sentence structure.

And from that day forward, my experience in Korea became more successful as I made the day-to-day life for my students and myself more enjoyable.

I have often thought back on that lunch and the simple lesson it imparted.

While I had expected to fill my year teaching important lessons to my students, in the end they were the ones who taught me about the value of unexpected smaller moments of joy, connection, and learning.

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Karen Peirce ETA :: 1993-1994 Haksung Middle School

500 words to tell the story 500 words to tell the story of a 21 year old who receives notice on Embassy letterhead that she is going to Korea

500 words to tell the story of instant celebrity on a small college campus of cramming “Survival Korean” tapes of packing for a year in two suitcases 500 words to tell the story of Mrs. Lee and Ms. Choi who taught us Korean in the Embassy compound 500 words to tell the story of Elaine “Sways” of the Blue House bodyguards of a USO tour to Panmunjom 500 words to tell the story of sock puppets aiming to teach conversation in between sightseeing at Chongmyo and Seoul Tower

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500 words to tell the story of yogwans of watermelon of aircon 500 words to tell the story of the Suncheon Rag the Towanda newsletter and the desperation of reading the English on toothpaste tubes 500 words to tell the story of the Muju Ski Resort of being stared at of being shoved on a Busan sidewalk 500 words to tell the story of a profoundly disabled teenage boy both neighbor and student giggling as he poked at my big nose 500 words to tell the story of Buddhist chanting of hikers in high heels of riding the kosok bus

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500 words to tell the story of ghost stories in Iri more people in a hotel room than can possibly be legal and Christmas at the Dragon Hill Lodge 500 words to tell the story of New Years Eve in Jeonju of catching the bouquet at a co-teacher’s wedding of Andy’s English Fun Workshop 500 words to tell the story of cultural ambassadorship that goes both ways and wondering what it means to seem more Korean than American 500 words to tell the story of Seoraksan of Haeinsa of Haeundae Beach 500 words to tell the story of learning to play the kayagum on a borrowed instrument in the Haksung Chung Hakkyo library 500 words to tell the story of cuttlefish

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of bibimbap of kimchi 500 words to tell the story of traveling to Andong to see the folk festival and ending up at the Gangneung Mask Dance Festival instead 500 words to tell the story of the Daejeon Expo of hitchhiking on Jeju-do of the Plaza Hotel 500 words to tell the story of being the only American in Ulsan but not being the only expat and finding acceptance among the other “others�

500 words to tell the story of continuing to study hanguk-mal of craving panchan of listening to Seo Taeji and the boys 500 words to tell the story of the greatest but also the most challenging year of my life and how it lingers

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above right Karen and her home stay sister in Gyeongju

below right Karen and few of her ETA friends during an excursion to Iri

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Michelle Hlubinka ETA :: 1994-1995 Kangwon National University Affiliated High School

S

pring 1994. Dark stories peppering the news dampened my excitement for a year in Korea. Kim Il-Sung was “negotiating” by wiggling the North’s missiles towards the South. I must admit (with all due shame) I had little awareness of the political climate until the question of whether I should embark on this wonderful adventure before me. Was war imminent?

I shared my concerns with the KAEC office in Seoul. They reassured me I shouldn’t worry, this was business as usual. Before I knew it, I ran out of time to chicken out, and I found myself in the middle a thickly wet summer in the heart of Seoul.

Barely a week after our arrival, Kim Il-Sung suddenly died. The dramatic news astonished us all. The entire political landscape shifted. We knew little about his successor. Although we’d heard bizarre descriptions about the reclusive son, we had no sense what an international comedy staple Kim Jong-Il would become. I rejoiced as peninsular tension eased, and to know I’d made the right choice in coming. North Korea was in mourning---just as it is again in 2012. (Wow, we arrived two regimes ago.)

I chuckle at how totally preposterous the premise was of my year in the classroom: teach about 1,000 students conversational English, seeing them 40 at a time every other week for an hour! My sense of futility led to a small epiphany. Realizing that the United States Information Agency housed Fulbright, I decided my role was some kind of educational diplomat, introducing my favorite hands-on, minds-on approaches to learning to a room full of kids. Since I saw every student in the school, some of those kids,

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undoubtedly, would go on to become teachers. Could some of them, someday, be preparing their lesson plans and think, “Hey, instead of just being the sage on the stage, cramming my kids’ brains with facts I read out of a book, maybe I’ll try an activity like that weird American teacher did with us. Maybe I’ll try to make school fun.” If just one or two of them would think that, then my year was really worth it.

We practiced diplomacy in a more obvious way, as a bunch of smart, friendly young Americans defending, for example, why the U.S. had, and still has, bases scattered all over the country. Once, I asked about a picture of a lake hanging on a classroom’s rear wall. A student who’d never said a word in any of my visits to his class suddenly grew agitated. He rose to deliver an impassioned speech, all in Korean, explaining that it lay on a northern border of North Korea, and that the lake symbolized hopes for reunification. Six or seven classmates got involved with translating the parts of his speech I didn’t understand. Others murmured in excited agreement and disagreement. A few jumped out of their seats to join his pronouncements or to tackle him and make him stop. I lost control of the class, sure, but I sat at the front in sheer wonderment, realizing how little I knew and how much these kids could teach me.

As I arrived, it seemed so momentous that the missiles stop twitching. As I left, the depth of the rift was far more real to me. We had years to go.

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below Baekdu Mountain surrounding Heaven Lake : this site has been a long-time symbol for the hope of reunification for both the Korean North and South; Michelle learned this from her students

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Mark Engstrom ETA :: 1995-1996 Seogwipo High School

I

was welcomed into the Fulbright Korea ETA Program in the summer of 1995. It was an experience that included wonderful relationships with students, teachers, other ETAs, and a country that I had little knowledge of previously. After spending the year in Seogwipo, Jeju-do, with my amazing host family I was filled with a new perspective on life and a self-confidence that I hadn’t experienced before. My host mom had an English teacher translate for me on the first day the idea that her family did not speak English, and if I was going to live in their house, that I would have to learn Korean. That set the tone for a wonderful year where I became part of an amazing family who welcomed me into their home in more ways than I could have believed possible. They had a daughter who was about three years older than I and she was the only non-school-aged child living at home. My interactions with her were crucial to understanding more Korean, Korean family dynamics, and the culture in general. During the final weeks of my homestay she asked me if my parents would consider hosting her for a year. My parents were thrilled to have her live with them for a year in New Orleans, Louisiana. It was there that she met her husband and now they live in Austin, Texas with their two kids. Our families have gotten together on and off for the past 15 years and it’s a special relationship that I am sure will last well into the future.

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above A group photo of the 1995 class of ETAs

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Kaliq Simms ETA :: 1996-1997 Jeju Seo Middle School

One Voice

T

he memories of my time on Jeju have appeared to me in flashes over the past decade and a half. A sea of students in identical blue blazers and blunt haircuts standing and bowing ceremonially upon my entering the classroom each day, “annyeong hasaeyo, Hunter seon-saeng-nim!” they would chant. The ever-open classroom windows let in snowflakes, ocean breezes, or sunshine depending on the season. Jeju Seo Middle School would teach me the wonders of the open air school. My students waving a colorful farewell banner, “saranghaeyo!” would blanket me forever with their vitality, a stark contrast to the island’s relentless calm. These images come to me from time to time, rediscovered pictures in an old album.

I felt as if I were on location in a movie for most of my year in South Korea.

The scene opens on a tall, clear-eyed, Black American tourist, her hair in dozens of sturdy braids. By all accounts, I was a spectacle. We, the Fulbright ETAs of 1996, all were a sight to see in what was then a culturally homogeneous country—give or take a few thousand oddly inconspicuous U.S. military solidiers. On the congested Seoul streets with their pungent aromas of smoked squid and fermenting cabbage, every one of my senses simultaneously experienced unfamiliar stimuli. The effect was heady, out of body. Was I really there?

I’m not sure which was the greater motivator: the longing to leave the U.S. or the draw of living and teaching abroad. Having attending a Historically Black College, Morgan State University in my hometown of Baltimore, Maryland, the last place I ever thought I would wind up was South Korea. I was an English and Secondary Education double major preparing to teach English

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in Baltimore City’s public school system. The late Dr. Sandye McIntyre, a legendary Morgan professor of modern languages encouraged me to apply for the Fulbright ETA Program. I believe his guidance single-handedly won me the coveted fellowship.

I will never forget the visit of my mother and grandmother to Jeju-do. How my students marveled that their teacher actually had a family. Apparently, to students worldwide there is nothing more foreign than the teacher! In addition, I understood that perhaps what was equally intriguing was to meet in person two more African-Americans. For the vast majority of the five hundred students in my ten sections of English that year, I had been the first Black person they had ever known. Now, they had met three generations of one family. My grandmother was ninety when she made the trip.

My family’s visit threw into sharp relief the purpose of my ETA year in a way I had not expected. The students were to sketch portraits of my mother and grandmother and to write, first person descriptions of each woman. The finished projects appeared as cartoonish brown faces framed by flat wooden sentences. Initially, I was disappointed by the lack of detail in the drawings by students I knew to be good artists. Likewise, the simplicity of the captions called me to question whether I had taught any English that year. It was not until the next day, when the students presented their posters and read aloud their sentences that I realized the deeper significance of my assignment.

As each student read, I found that if I closed my eyes, my pre-teen Korean students, my family, and I became one voice: “I am a grandmother.” “I am American.” “I am a Black woman.” “I am a mother.”

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above Kaliq and her 1996 ETA classmates

left Kaliq poses in front of one of Jeju-do’s many beautiful waterfalls

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above Kaliq’s students

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Christopher Myers Asch ETA :: 1997-1998 Daejeon Jungang Girls’ Middle School

I

t was my first field trip with my middle schoolers in Daejeon. The entire eighth grade – several hundred girls – was scheduled to hike a couple miles up to a Buddhist temple hidden in the mountains outside the city. I confess, I was a bit apprehensive. Before coming to Korea, I had taught elementary school in rural Mississippi, and I knew that field trips were hell on teachers – they involved hollering, chasing kids, and searching for children gone astray.

As we got off the buses, visions of chaos filled my head, particularly when I noticed that only about half a dozen teachers had come on the trip. The teachers congregated at the base of the mountain and began chitchatting idly as the students disappeared. The girls had organized themselves into their classes and were marching, two by two, up the mountain. Without any hesitation, the teachers eventually started ambling up as well. When we reached the top, I saw a dozen large circles of girls, all eating lunch and entertaining themselves with dancing and singing. The teachers and I sat together and enjoyed a leisurely meal as dozens of students plied us with their mom’s kimbap and other goodies. The rest of the day was equally stress-free – I did not holler at all (except for a hearty “yaaaa-ho!” at the top).

I often tell that story to my friends and colleagues in education to underscore the profound differences in educational culture between Korea and America.

Though many American education reformers focus on the high scores Korean students achieve on international tests, my Fulbright experience gave me a

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deeper insight into how culture and character shape Korean education. From the honorific title given to teachers to the unwavering support of parents and outsiders, I learned just how much teachers are valued in Korea. The structure of a teacher’s work schedule – which encouraged lesson planning and teacher collaboration – contrasted sharply with my experience in American schools, where harried teachers barely had time for a bathroom break. My Korean students were more deferential and well-behaved than my American kids, and they also were given more responsibility and freedom in many ways.

After Korea, I returned to Mississippi to launch a non-profit education program where I sought, to encourage American students to develop the positive habits that I saw in so many Korean students – diligence, discipline, dedication. In our program, we offered Saturday School, taekwondo training, and night-time study sessions to help get our low-income students on the college track. I now work in higher education and do much of the same thing.

So much was crammed into that one short year: – great food, long nights at the noraebang, the “IMF times” when the real value of our salaries dropped by 50% in a matter of weeks. But what endure fifteen years later are the stories – stories of my host family, stories of random acts of kindness from Korean strangers, and one particularly powerful story of middle school students marching up a mountain on their own.

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Christopher Steubing ETA :: 1998-1999 Changwon High School

Foreigner

I

n the summer of 1998, while the South Korean soccer team was making a surprise showing in the World Cup, I arrived in Seoul with 18 other ETAs. Twenty years old and newly-graduated from college, I began my Fulbright experience with a hunger for learning and adventure. After a few days exploring the capital, we traveled to Chuncheon for a six-week orientation before receiving our teaching assignments. Besides the intensive sessions on Korean language and cultural awareness, our experience was rich with learning through exploring local cuisine, taking taekwondo classes, and reflecting with fellow ETAs. The most valuable lesson I learned during my year in Korea, however, was the experience of living as a foreigner which became much more intense once I left the comfortable confines of the Kangwon University campus and moved in with my host family in Changwon. As a white male from the United States, I am a privileged member of the dominant culture. In South Korea I was an outsider, a foreigner, and adjusting to this new identity was one of the most challenging and valuable experiences of my life. As a foreigner, I often felt excluded. There were times I felt like an outcast; like I didn’t fit in.

Cultural practices were strange to me. Much of the food was unrecognizable and smelled funny. Since my language skills were less than stellar, my presence in a room full of work colleagues tended to make others feel un-

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comfortable so sometimes people would just leave when they realized I was there. I got stares as I walked down the street because there were very few other European-looking people who lived in Changwon at the time and I’d often hear children yell out to me “America” or “Michael Jordan.” When people tried to include me it often seemed forced, like the time my host mother made me American pizza for dinner. All the good intentions in the world couldn’t make pizza out of white bread, slathered with ketchup, and topped with yellow processed cheese.

I will never forget a fellow ETA who is Korean-American saying to me, “I’m glad you’ve had this experience because now you know what it’s like for me every day of my life when I’m the only Asian in a room full of white people.”

Participating in the Fulbright ETA Program equipped me with a global perspective and sensitivity to issues of language, culture, and race which affect how I approach my daily life and work as a Lutheran pastor today. I believe that I am a better learner, listener, and leader, more capable of empathy and viewing situations from the perspectives of others, because of this program.

Korea is a land full of natural beauty, rich in culture and history, and home to an honorable and passionate people. I remain grateful for all of my experiences as a Fulbright ETA, but it was the opportunity to be a foreigner for a year that has most profoundly impacted my life.

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left Chris dressed in a hanbok poses with a fellow teacher at his school

below Chris and his students

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above The taekwondo group at the 1998-1999 Summer ETA Orientation

right Chris with his home stay brothers

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Kate Spence-Ado ETA :: 1999-2000 Kwangdok Middle School

W

hen I stepped onto an airplane bound for Seoul from Burlington, Vermont, via Cleveland and Los Angeles, it was the first time I had been on an airplane. Now I had traveled internationally, if I counted a car camping trip with family across nearby Quebec province; however, as a rural country girl who attended college at a slightly more suburban, small, liberal arts college in central Pennsylvania, I knew that embarking on a journey as part of the ETA Program would broaden my life experiences more than I could even imagine.

Initially, I applied to the ETA Program in Korea for practical reasons. I knew I wanted to teach and the ETA Program in Korea had no language prerequisite and it was someplace I felt safe traveling to as a single, white woman. I had no idea that I would fall in love with the country, the culture, and the people when I made this pragmatic choice. I also was unaware of how the short 13 months I spent in Korea would shape my personal and professional trajectories. The hot, humid days in Chuncheon, with afternoon excursions to taekwondo class brought an introduction to both the basics I would need to survive—language classes and learning to eat with chopsticks and to some of the cultural phenomenon I still miss most— ddakalbi and noraebang. My teaching assignment was at Kwangdok Middle School, an all boys middle school in Gwangju, Jeollanam-do, a part of the country renowned for its excellent food. My host mother was no exception to this rule and I soon looked forward to her cooking each night.

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As someone who was at the start of a career in education, I was excited about the opportunity to experience another country’s school system first hand. I had earned my teaching certification in the U.S., but my first formal experiences at the head of a classroom came in Korea. At Kwangdok, I was inspired by the sharing of responsibilities amongst stakeholders within the school, from the basic, yet necessary functions of cleaning the school, to the more coveted responsibility of class captain, and I saw the benefits of students working together as a class for the entirety of a day. More broadly, my experiences at Kwangdok introduced me to the great value that Koreans place on education and allowed me to see how this type of cultural value can influence the functionality of an urban school. Personally, as a 6 foot tall miguk saram I quickly came to understand what it means to be a racial minority, though a respected one, when it was impossible to blend in anywhere I went. As a novice Korean speaker, I experienced what it was like to only minimally be able to communicate the complex thoughts I was having in my native language. All of these lessons have influenced the interactions I have had in my subsequent rural, suburban, and urban classrooms in the U.S. Since my time in Korea, I worked first as a middle and high school English teacher, and after earning a doctorate in education, I now am a college professor, preparing future teachers for their own classrooms.

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above Kate and her fellow ETA classmates take a group photo during the 2000 Spring ETA Conference in Jeju right Kate and some friends unwind at a noraebang in Chuncheon, Gangwon-do during the 1999 ETA Summer Orientation

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Katrin Katz ETA :: 2000-2001 Mokpo Girls’ High School

W

hen I applied to the ETA Program as a senior in college, I had two largely personal goals: to get back to East Asia (I had spent a year living in Kyoto, Japan as a junior) and to live in a country I had not traveled to before. Regarding the latter goal, I was admittedly not in the most pragmatic mindset. While other seniors were gearing up for their first ‘real jobs’ out of school, I was driven primarily by an intense curiosity to see if I would ‘sink or swim’ in a country whose culture and language were a blank slate to me. As such, I was more interested in testing my limits personally at that time than in building my professional or academic credentials.

But a funny thing happened along the path of learning to survive as a young and clueless miguk saram in Korea: I developed a passion for the country so deep that it literally took the reins of charting my career path moving forward. I did not know exactly the type of work I was best suited to at that time—academia? government? business?—but I knew that I would feel a sense of fulfillment as long as my work enabled me to deepen my knowledge of this fascinating country.

What was it, precisely, about my experiences as an ETA, and later as the program’s first ETA coordinator, that gave me the “Korea bug?” Was it the opportunity to bond with other ETAs while we learned the Korean phrase for “please do not boil my underwear” during our summer language training sessions in the hills of Chuncheon? Was it the smiling faces of my students when some English phrase I was struggling to impart on them

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finally ‘clicked’? Was it the humiliating-yet-hilarious opportunity to sing an off-key version of “How Deep is Your Love”—complete with hand gestures and backup singers—to an auditorium of 700 students and their families at the annual “Mon-yo-go” variety show? (It is a tribute to the depth of my affection for my students that they talked me into that one.) Or was it my homestay mother in Mokpo, who proudly proclaimed to anyone who entered our home that I was her “daughter”—not her homestay daughter, her real daughter—prompting intense levels of curiosity among Mokpo’s social circles?

In truth, the Korea bug bit me at several moments over the course of my time as an ETA. I was left with an overall impression of a country that faces great challenges (these were the post-IMF, early ‘Sunshine Policy’ days) with immense soul. Having the opportunity to learn more about Korean history and politics while I lived there, I was deeply inspired by the ability of this people, this culture, this economy, to thrive in the midst of great uncertainties in the security realm. It became clear to me that at the core of Korea’s ability to stake its bold claim in this world is the grit and determination of its people.

And so a combination of comical/personal and more serious/universal realizations about Korea instilled in me a passion for this peninsula—its people, its culture, and its security challenges. Since leaving Korea, I received a master’s degree in East Asian and International Security Studies, worked

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for the U.S. government in Washington, DC—culminating in a one-year stint as the Director for Japan, Korea and Oceanic Affairs at the White House National Security Council—and, at present, am pursuing a PhD in Political Science with a focus on sovereignty issues in East Asia. Each of these phases of my career has involved work with Koreans on Korea-related issues. As such, I may have left Korea in 2002 but Korea has not left me. I credit the ETA Program with providing this focus—I entered the program with a fuzzy interest in adventure and left with a passion that continues to drive my life’s work.

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below A summer taekwondo class during the 2000 - 2001 Summer Orientation and a group photo at the ETA Spring Conference in 2001

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Mimi Do ETA :: 2001 - 2002 Daejeon Jungang Middle School

I

t’s hard to believe that I was an ETA over ten years ago. Like many KoreanAmericans, I went to Korea to “discover my roots,” only to find that my roots were deeper in the U.S. than in my parents’ native homeland. The more I learned about Koreans and Korean culture – through my students, my host family, and my own relatives living in Korea – the more I realized I was definitely more American than Korean. I was loud, I was independent, and I liked eating pizza more than golbaengi. In the context of Daejeon in 2001, I was an all-American girl.

This patriotic revelation was further highlighted by the events of the time.

As the ETA class of 2001-2002, we were in the difficult position of being ETAs during 9/11, which occurred only a few days after we were shipped off from ETA boot camp in Chuncheon. It was a scary time for us, one that our Korean colleagues and friends couldn’t fully comprehend, even as they tried to comfort us. Our role as Fulbright ambassadors was even more important then, given the anti-American sentiment that followed with Bush’s “Axis of Evil” comments, skater Anton Ohno’s gold win at the Olympics, and other grievances that our students held against us. On the plus side, we were all swept up in national pride and World Cup fever as Korea co-hosted the games for the first time.

Despite the challenges of those uncertain times, my two years in Korea were among the most rewarding of my life. After my first year teaching, I stayed

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on as the ETA Program Coordinator because I wanted to continue to learn Korean, and I wanted to help ease the transition for those about to follow in my footsteps.

While my memories of Korea have faded, and my Korean language ability has certainly diminished, there are some lessons from Korea by which I continue to live: 1. Nothing can be harder than teaching 600 middle school boys.

Nothing. If I could withstand them, I can face any challenge.

2.

Communication barriers can be overcome, despite the cultural barriers between people, if one uses basic human kindness.

3. There is nothing more rewarding than family. Whether it is my Korean family, my American family, or my ETA family, we share a special experience and bond that is important to maintain despite the number of miles or years that separate us.

My experience in Korea seems like a lifetime ago, yet the lessons I learned and friends I made are still with me today.

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below Mimi attempts to take a class photo with some of her rambunctious students

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Ashley Quarcoo ETA :: 2002 - 2003 Hanbada Middle School

L

ast month, I sat on a plane on my way to Seoul, dreaming of hodduck and yujacha. It was my first trip back to Korea since 2004, when I had returned after the conclusion of my Fulbright Award to attend the graduation of my 3rd grade students at Hanbada Middle School in Busan. I wanted to return to Korea to say farewell to the only class of students I had the privilege of teaching for an entire year, to reconnect with my favorite host teachers before they were transferred to new schools, and to visit my dear fellow ETA friend, who had remained in Korea to reconnect with her Korean birth family.

That visit represented a hundred points of light of my ETA year in Korea.

I recently re-read an essay I wrote in 2003 for the Korea Fulbright Review, reflecting on my year of teaching and learning as an ETA. At its core, the essay and the year that it chronicled was a reflection of a very personal journey – that of a young, African-American woman navigating the boundaries of her own identity in a culture that did not necessarily celebrate diversity. I will never know whether my lessons on Nina Simone or Martin Luther King cultivated a more nuanced understanding of American society among my students. What I do know much more clearly today is the impact that each of my interactions – with my students, my fellow teachers, and my fellow ETAs – had on my own sense of self and my ability to successfully navigate a new culture and an unfamiliar setting.

I credit my ETA experience with shaping both personal interests and professional aspirations that remain with me today. Following my return to the United States, I became a Teach for America Corps Member in New

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York City, motivated largely by a desire to help underprivileged youth to develop the knowledge and skills necessary for responsible global citizenship.

Today, I continue this passion through volunteer work with an NGO focused on youth development through international education. I hope one day to bring a cohort of these students to Korea for the same transformative cultural experience that has influenced me so profoundly.

Yet, even more than the impact that my Fulbright experience had on my personal and professional development, there was no experience more rewarding during my year in Busan than the relationship I developed with my host family. I remember clearly meeting them for the first time – it was my first real foray into Korean society away from my fellow ETAs, and I was terrified that I would be different from what they expected. I could never have imagined how fully this family would embrace me as one of their own. On my second day after arriving in Busan, my host father took a very rare vacation day from work – the only vacation day I saw him take all year – to take me on a trip to the ancient Korean city of Gyeongju. Through the generosity and affection of my host family, I was able not only to witness Korean life, but to be a full participant in it. Their adoption of me did not end there – it also extended to my mother and now husband, both of whom visited Korea, and felt keenly the same degree of warmth and kindness from them.

Despite long lapses in communication with my host family, I have never forgotten their deep openness and generosity. Two years ago, my host sister Yuri traveled from Korea in order to attend my wedding in Atlanta. It was

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an incredibly moving reunion that touched my entire family. At that time, I learned that since my departure, my host father had taken up painting as a new hobby. He sent with Yuri one of my most treasured wedding gifts – an original painting of the city of Gyeong-ju.

So, here I was, eight years since my last visit, on a plane headed back to Seoul. This time, I was returning to attend Yuri’s graduation from Ewha Women’s University and to reunite with my host family. Despite the rustiness of my Korean, I easily fell into broken conversation with my appa and omma, and could not believe that my host brother, Myong-Hun, had somehow transformed from a 5th grader into a junior in college. And despite the fact that I had come to celebrate Yuri’s wonderful accomplishment, I myself somehow ended up going home loaded with gifts and Korean snacks courtesy of my host family. In turn, they were surprised at all I had retained of Korea in the intervening years – the names of my favorite Korean dishes, the importance of insa, the painting of Gyeongju that now graces my home.

For me, this relationship is the legacy of my Fulbright experience. It has sustained itself over time and space, across graduations, marriages, moves to new cities, military service, career changes. It demonstrates that personto-person relationships can transform the way that Koreans and Americans understand and relate to each other. I will always appreciate the unique opportunity to be immersed in Korea, its culture, and its people. But I will most deeply treasure this surprising friendship between two families that will continue to sustain my connection to Korea for years to come.

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above Ashley with her homestay family at Yuri’s (homestay sister) graduation in 2012

left Ashley with her students on graduation day in 2004

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Alex Kim ETA :: 2003-2004 Dongdo Middle School

A

s any alumnus will tell you, the ETA experience can be one of the purest forms of cultural exchange a fresh college graduate could ever hope to achieve at such a young an age. An added bonus for me personally was the pleasure of working in my birthplace, Daegu. The fast-paced, lilting intonations of my faculty and student’s southern Gyeongsang dialect recalled summer vacations with relatives and immediately put me at ease.

I was fortunate to have amazing co-teachers who guided me every step of the way. These hard working women led double-shift days by virtue of teaching students and raising children of their own. Despite their hectic schedules, I was treated with an unexpected level of love and care, as if they had suddenly been reunited with a long-lost younger brother. Our working relationship relied on mutual trust, allowing me a great deal of latitude for creative lesson plans, while I was awestruck everyday by their unending energy and daily diligence to consummate professionalism.

Often after school, they would whisk me away on impromptu day trips to provincial Shilla relic sites, or to enjoy a farm fresh meal in some mountain suburb. The guilt vanished on the second trip when I realized they were joking about leaving their kids to starve back home. Another teacher invited me to go fishing on Geoje Island where we ate our catch right there on the dock with spicy head stew to wash it down. After-work discussions were stimulating and engaging; it was refreshing to know that the conservative stereotype of the Daegu people wasn’t true. We debated topics ranging from

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the news of the day to cultural politics with open minds, in a genuine spirit of learning something new from the everyday act of conversing with one another.

Of course the year wasn’t always rosy and I thank my “big sis” co-teachers for putting my social missteps and the misunderstood nuances in perspective.

Towards the end of my year, I realized I had begun to grasp the concept of jeong—a type of love and respect that has no equivalent in English. These relationships not only enhanced my understanding of the Korean people, it affirmed a new conviction in humanity. When the students of one of my final classes sang Boowhal’s “Never Ending Story” as a farewell, I had to hold the tears back. For a moment, this rugged individual was a part of the collective.

A past ETA once told me that even long after completing the program, “Korea never leaves you.” It sounded sappy at the time, but seeing me back here for graduate school nearly a decade on, I admit it’s true. I would not have had the personal fortitude to do so were it not for my co-teachers in the ETA program, and I am forever grateful to Fulbright Korea for continuing and expanding this truly beautiful exchange of people. Congratulations for an outstanding 20 years of service and may it endure for many decades to come!

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Tamara Failor ETA :: 2004-2005 Suncheon Maesan Girls’ High School

S

everal months into my Fulbright year, I faced a cohort of new students.

My getting-to-know-you Q&A generated the standards: “Do you like Korea?” “Do you like kimchi?” Some questions were impressively thoughtout: “Did you lose weight or gain weight after you came to Korea?” The questioning moved pretty quickly to the political: “What do you think about Bush?” “What do you think about Ohno?”

I knew very little about Ohno, so I asked my students to explain. The one who posed the question was stymied, so a peer stepped in: Ohno was a speedskater who “overreacted,” causing an undeserved penalty which cost Korea the gold medal. This was followed with the inevitable, “What do you think about Japan?” Dokdo (disputed islands in the East Sea) was in the headlines, and they knew I’d visited Japan over winter break. I hemmed and hawed; the bell rang. “Bye!” I said brightly, my relief only slightly exaggerated as I stepped quickly out, the laughter rising as the door closed behind me.

During Fulbright Orientation we’d watched footage of a Korean soccer player celebrating a goal by skidding across the grass with speedskating motions, before being tackled by his ecstatic teammates. This was part of an orientation meant to prepare us for a year in a country which now seemed increasingly nationalistic, and torn between resentment and appreciation for the U.S., its supposed liberator and undeniably crucial economic and political ally.

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2002, two years before I arrived, was rough for international relations in Korea. Korea’s speedskating loss in the Winter Olympics was only a few months old at the 2002 World Cup, hosted by Korea and Japan. Ohno’s skating team canceled a World Cup-related appearance in Chuncheon, Korea, after he received death threats. The celebrated goal was scored against the U.S., bringing their Cup match to a draw. While I found such intense hatred surprising, at the same time, Ohno seemed a likely focal point for Korean anger, representing both American privilege and arrogance, given his citizenship, and Japanese oppression, given his lineage. Then, in June 2002, within days of the soccer match between Korea and the U.S., two Korean girls in Seoul were crushed and killed by a U.S. military vehicle. The two G.I.s were tried in an American military court, instead of a Korean one, and many Koreans believe their punishment was too light. Public anger was palpable. Anti-American pop-songs gained in popularity on the radio waves.

My response at the time was gratitude that this tension was rarely focused on me. Half a decade later, while spending months in Mongolia, Sri Lanka, and Afghanistan, I better appreciate such frank sentiments about Western powers, and my time in Korea as gentle preparation. Not only did these interactions help me navigate cross-cultural relationships in my career, but to understand that such passions cannot be boiled down to global competitiveness, but often are as grounded in optimism, well-articulated by my young students, as they are in the injustices of history.

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Lindsay Herron ETA :: 2005-2008 Seogwipo High School

W

hen you work at a boys’ high school, the laws of math are not absolute. For example, if you bring 1,600 pieces of candy to school for Halloween, and you tell 430 students they can each choose three pieces, you should have about three hundred candies remaining at the end of the day, right? Wrong! What this really means is that, while some students will select the appropriate amount of candies, others will stuff a handful in their pocket while you’re distracted; some students, sucking on the candy they just received, will move to empty seats across the classroom and pretend they haven’t gotten anything yet; and a handful of students will actually follow you to the next classroom and pretend to be a part of that class. How many pieces will remain at the end of the day? Answer: one, if you’re paying attention and if you downgrade to two pieces per student.

But let me back up. Halloween is my favorite holiday and, although it isn’t really celebrated in Korea, my Halloweens at Seogwipo High School in Jeju were nothing short of amazing. My first Halloween there, I received special permission to visit students during sixth period. My co-teacher warned the other teachers in advance of my arrival, and I spent an incredible forty minutes interrupting history, math, science, and Korean classes to distribute candy in my festive get-up: a sparkly spider-web hat and a giant rope spiderweb that draped over me like a poncho. I was met with exclamations of startlement and entire rooms full of grinning faces; a few boys even asked to try on my hat.

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The following year, Halloween was a week-long affair in my classroom; and then, the day before Halloween, I wore my students’ uniform to school as a kind of warm-up for the holiday, to a wide range of reactions. The female teachers exclaimed with delight when they saw me, and the principal wheezed with laughter. At lunch, the cafeteria fell quiet as students spied me in the lunch line. Heads turned; conversations trailed off; and about half a dozen second-years, thoroughly nonplussed, refused to stand near me in line. During club time, one boy walked into the classroom, turned to ask me a question, and then just started laughing. Another sat down, looked at me, blinked in surprise…and then asked, completely deadpan, “Where’s Lindsay?” Another student asked if he could use informal language with me, his “classmate.” (I told him he could, then I asked in Jeju dialect, “Hey, what’re we doing?”) They loved it.

I could write an entire dissertation about the advantages—for teachers and students alike—of teaching culture and holidays in the EFL classroom; but for me, the biggest reward is in the faces of students. Walking home from school at the end of my first Halloween in Korea, I encountered a student who looked happy to see me. He said, “Teacher, for this day, very thank you.” And that was all the justification I needed.

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this page & opposite page Snapshots from Halloween in Lindsay’s classroom

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Stephen Wulff ETA :: 2006-2007 Gumi Shinpyeong Middle School

I

n 2006, my life as an ETA was like the Beatles song “A Day in the Life,” which I believe goes something like this: Woke up, fell out of bed, Dragged a comb across my head Found my way to the kitchen and ate kimchi, And looking up, I noticed I was late Found my coat and grabbed my hat Made the Gumi bus in seconds flat…

Each morning, when I arrived at Shinpyeong Middle School—a public school in Gumi, the industrial hub of Korea—my fan club of hyperactive middle school students greeted me with handshakes and high-fives, as they played soccer in the sandy courtyard before classes started. (That year alone, I must have shaken more hands than former President Clinton has shaken in his lifetime, which may explain the carpal tunnel syndrome forming in my right hand. But it doesn’t bother me. When you’re a cultural ambassador, that’s the price you pay to promote cultural understanding, and I wouldn’t trade it for the world!).

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Upon entering school, I put on slippers, and headed to the gyomushil, or teacher’s office, where I greeted my fellow co-teachers and reviewed my lesson plan for the week. Music was one of the most effective teaching devices and ways that I related to students. In fact, early on in the year, I instituted a reward system called “Beatles Points.” I awarded students points when they answered questions in English correctly or completed optional English assignments. When they reached 10 points, they received candy.

(Sadly, this reward system broke down after a couple months. It was very difficult keeping track of 560 students’ points, and after buying pounds and pounds of candy and consulting with my dentist back home in the US, I decided it wasn’t healthy for my students to be eating tons of candy anyways, since it rots teeth and causes cavities).

Word traveled fast around school that I played guitar and sang. During the school’s spring festival, I performed “Molly’s Lips”—a Vaseline’s song made famous by the American grunge rock band Nirvana—with my backup band of Korean co-teachers. We performed in front of over 1,500 screaming students and parents. I felt like the Beatles descending upon America in 1964. That night I was a bigger heartthrob than the Korean pop star Rain.

My final lesson plan of the year was a “Beatles Music Marathon.” I taught my students “Let it Be,” “Hey Jude,” and John Lennon’s “Imagine.” I supplemented each song with YouTube videos. We had a blast. It was like being at a Flaming Lips concert. The only thing missing was costumes and confetti!

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At the end of each school day, my students were sad to see me leave. As I walked through the courtyard, they always waved goodbye to me and blew me kisses. Some even sniffled a little bit. Sporting sunglasses, I would dramatically turn around, and in my Arnold Schwarzenegger perfected voice, reassure them that tomorrow “I’ll be back.”

above A “Beatles Point” from Stephen’s classroom

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left Stephen with his students in front of Gumi Shinpyeong Middle School

below Stephen with his co-teachers

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Ajay Bangale ETA :: 2007-2008 Yeongsanpo Middle School

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hen I made the decision to relinquish my Blackberry rights and embark on a year filled with kimchi, bibimbap and a wide assortment of exotic Korean treats, I obviously had more than food in mind. Rather, the ability to test my limits and expose myself beyond my usual comfort zone was a powerful driver in making my decision. Furthermore, the opportunity to pursue studies and teach in an area of the world I had only read about seemed quite attractive. I had no idea that the way I think, react, listen, and teach would be completely transformed during my one-year fellowship abroad.

The first seven weeks in South Korea were by far the most challenging; they involved learning the Korean language from scratch. After an intensive language training program, I had elevated my language skills to the level of a Korean kindergarten students. I could successfully tell a taxi driver where to take me as well as navigate a Korean food menu without having to resort to a translator. I relished in my small, adaptive successes that I would never have even blinked about back in New York.

The opportunity to live with a host family also helped speed up my adaptation to a new culture and gave me the proper foundation to understand Korean family customs and traditions. Five generations of family members occupied three relatively modest rooms. From my five-year-old host brother all the way up to the eighty-six-year-old host great-grandmother, I was able to witness the various ‘stages’ of Korean life. The proper ways to bow, the

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proper ways of serving water to one’s elders, the daily pear and apple eating rituals after every dinner; these were all new traditions that I openly came to embrace and adapt myself to during my year.

I also constantly interacted with professors and fellow students who had limited English skills. There were many frustrating times when an idea or concept that I wanted to get through could not properly register on the other end. Yet patience, and mutual understanding, helped me get through these more linguistically painful times. By constantly jotting down questions I had in my notebook, I was able to remember and reinforce some of the open points.

All the small adaptive steps that I took during my Fulbright year in South Korea have been crucial to both my professional and personal development.

I could have stayed in my corporate cubicle for another year without seizing the chance to do a Fulbright abroad. Yet, I am extremely grateful that I had the opportunity to live in South Korea; I would undoubtedly make the same decision again today. During these twelve months, I was constantly challenged not only in reassessing previous beliefs and perceptions, but was also able to learn and mold myself with each new experience.

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below Ajay, fellow ETAs, and their resident assistant at the 2007-2008 ETA Summer Orientation

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Kenny Loui ETA :: 2008-2009 Young-Il High School

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y one year as an ETA at Young-il High School in Pohang was an enriching experience, to say the least. I had the chance to serve as a mentor to several students, helping them discover their dreams and develop plans to pursue them. I also helped students prepare for essay and speech contests and in so doing, (hopefully!) improved their confidence with English. In my lesson plans, I worked hard to emphasize community service and volunteerism as well.

During my final month of teaching, I had students give presentations on “global issue” topics, ranging from school violence to global warming.

My objective was to get students to think about the important issues and problems facing their communities, both at the local and international level.

One student’s presentation, in particular, I will never forget—not because of the amount of effort she put into researching her topic or practicing her speech, but because of the way she concluded it. At the end of her presentation, Jo Sun-hee, a student from Class 1-6, told her classmates: “It is our responsibility to save our world.” A few other students’ presentations, in which they used their particular global issue to discuss their dreams and aspirations for the future, had messages as insightful and as moving as Sunhee’s, which touched my heart.

Lee Kwan-hun (Class 1-2), whose dream is to someday become the Korean Minister of Education, criticized Korea’s education system and its emphasis on “studying as the only way to success,” and noted that although “earning

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lots of money and getting a good job is the goal of most students … success in this world should be [defined as] having kindness and humanity.”

An Young-joo (Class 2-7) wants to become a doctor, and shared with the class her desire to help others regardless of their socioeconomic status: “It makes my heart hurt to see some doctors cure only patients who have money.”

Bae Ji-eun (Class 2-5) wants to be a pharmacist so she can “help many sick people.” She doesn’t want to only “give medicine to people” but also “share [their] sorrows and joys.”

Jo Ye-eun (Class 2-2) said that she would like to work with UNICEF someday so that she can “help poor children and give them visions.” She ended her presentation by saying, “I think helping others is the most important thing in our lives.”

The last day of student presentations put to rest any doubts in my mind that I had made the right decision in choosing to become an ETA. I left Young-il High School at the end of my grant year realizing that I really did make a difference in these students’ lives. That being said, I still wonder whether it was I who had the greatest impact on my students, or they on me.

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above Kenny with some of his students at Young-Il High School

left Kenny poses with students during a field trip

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above Kenny takes a class photo with one of his boy classes

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Christina Rho ETA :: 2009-2010 Cheonan Wolbong High School

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efore the ETA program, I took Gandhi’s words to heart and tried to be the change that I wanted to see in the world starting with my Fulbright ETA grant year in South Korea.

While change encompasses many features, I primarily perceive it as being assisted through greater dialogues and open communications among multiple stakeholders. For my interests in particular, I wanted to help interactions between Korea and the United States thrive. As a result, I initially approached teaching high school students with a savior complex. I wanted to prepare my students to make changes. I wanted to make a difference However, lesson plans did not always pan out to be as successful in practice, which often left me questioning if I was getting through to my students— let alone making a difference. Are my students learning? Am I effectively teaching? Is meeting classes not as frequently as regular classes going to have any impact? How do programs like the ETA grant compare to and/or exist with English tutoring and/or private academies, which are frequently too expensive and not readily available to all students?

Fortunately, throughout my ETA year, I eventually learned that programs such as the ETA Program are not solely about teaching or delivering acts of service. It is also about listening, observing, and sharing diverse experiences between educators and learners alike.

Teaching, as a matter of fact, is rather incomplete without learning and vice versa. Effective teaching and learning, therefore, is a two way street.

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Teaching is largely effective when teachers learn how to present and package lessons that are contextually conducive to learning. Likewise, learning is generally effective when students take the teachings they received beyond school grounds by utilizing what is available to them to forge their own paths of understanding. It is all about attitude, and optimism goes a long way.

In hindsight, I think (and hope) that I somehow contributed to change, and if not, at least provided additional views of understandings, between Korea and the United States. Learning never stops, but it took being a part of the ETA Program to internalize that learning is a lifelong process. Thus, what Fulbright Korea and other similar programs are doing is so essential in terms of providing supplementary English education in South Korea.

It fosters an opportunity (for better or worse) for students and teachers to mutually exchange their views on and about their diverse lives. Or, at the very least, encourage students to seek multiple resources in and out of the classrooms to address both domestic and global issues.

As an ETA my grant year once shared at a workshop, ETAs are more English cheerleaders than English teachers. What students do with the information we present is entirely up to them, but at least they know there is something else out there. In fact, as teachers, we generally motivate students to seek, grapple, and innovate with what is available to further evolve our lives. In the end, we cheer—not preach.

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below The 2009 ETA class takes a leap on historial sites in Gyeongju at the Fall Conference

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Sonja Swanson ETA :: 2010-2011 Seodaejeon Elementary School

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hortly after I arrived at my host family’s home, when we were sitting down for the post-dinner ritual of snacks and TV, a new snack made its way to the living room. Chocopie, as the small, round cake is known, is a decades-old standby on grocery shelves here in Korea. Yet in a stroke of genius, the company that makes Chocopie initiated a brilliant branding campaign that makes a Chocopie more than just a Chocopie.

“Do you know what this means?” my host father asked, jabbing a finger at the Chinese character emblazoned on the wrapper. I admitted that I did not. “Jeong,” he responded triumphantly. “Do you know jeong?”

I had heard this term defined several times already by this point, but still couldn’t quite explain it in English, much less Korean. I opted for grinning helplessly instead. “Jeong is…” he began, and broke into a grin as well. “Too difficult to explain! Eat, eat.”

So I peeled apart the layers of shiny red plastic and took a bite of the chocolate encrusted treat, teeth sinking into the spongy layers, the inevitable crumbs of chocolate littering my lap.

I do not particularly care for Chocopies.

Nonetheless, by the end of my year, I found myself armed with boxes upon boxes of Chocopie, giving them to my coworkers and thanking them, genuinely, for the jeong that we had built and shared together. It’s a little easier

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for me to define jeong now. Jeong means you’re a little less alone, whether you like it or not. Jeong means sacrifice, noticing, remembering. Jeong is a bond of respect and care.

Is it too presumptuous to say that these bonds across cultures lay the groundwork for world peace? That the world could stand to learn a little jeong? That it’s as essential as the sticky marshmallow filling that holds a Chocopie together?

Too difficult to explain.

Every so often, I find myself reaching for a Chocopie: I eat, remember, and grin, grateful for the year that changed me forever, tied me to a new part of the world, and taught me jeong.

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left Sonja’s host family visiting her in the U.S.

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Sonia Kim ETA :: 2011-2012 Hanbit School for the Blind

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teach at a school for the blind. People’s responses upon hearing what I do for a living generally fall in two categories: the first, a laundry list of questions about the blind, or a “Wow, that’s so awesome,” tethered to a strange belief that I must have superhuman patience. For the first, I generally answer what I know, and for the second, I assure them that my students think differently.

In the beginning, my school seemed like a completely foreign world. My first few weeks were an intensive crash course in everything related to the blind. And I made plenty of mistakes. I terrified blind colleagues with my over-enthusiastic “Good mornings.” I mistook blind students for sighted ones. I gestured too much in my classes. As was the custom for new teachers at my school, I ate my lunch blindfolded, dropping curry onto my skirt.

“Be grateful it wasn’t fish and soup today,” my coworkers quipped.

As the novelty disappeared and the school year came into full swing, routines became more established. I prepared class handouts in multiple formats: .txt files, which students read using their Braille notetakers, and largeprint materials for low-vision students. I made mp3 recordings of myself reading textbook passages; my students who used them as study aids would laugh at my clumsy Korean translations. I taught grammar to advanced students who couldn’t attend hagwons due to their disability and introduced the alphabet to students who had previously been ignored in traditional schools. To my students’ amusement, I started learning English Braille, clacking away at letters with my stylus and tablet and painfully typing out

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words on the computer.

My students range from 5 to 33 years old. They make the funniest jokes, groan about “Sonia ajumma Teacher’s” homework, and tell me about their boyfriends and girlfriends. They play musical instruments after school and soccer during lunch. Their vision is a spectrum: some were born with low vision, some lost their sight when they were young, and for some, their vision changes every day. Many were teachers from a young age, to a public woefully uninformed about disability issues. And yet, despite the multiple eye surgeries, difficult family situations, additional disabilities, and painful memories of prejudice, they are willing to learn. And their resilience floors me.

For every bumpy day, there is a smooth one, and there are memories that could only come from teaching at a school for the blind. On the first day of class, one of my high school boys, who has been totally blind* since birth, asked me to explain the difference between a white person and a black person. I remember pausing, reaching for words to describe something so fundamental and complex—to a boy who ultimately found such matters insignificant. One weekend, I watched a movie with a blind coworker. As I described settings and facial expressions, and he filled in plot gaps and explained Korean slang, the movie slowly slipped through our grasp, to be replaced by a mutual gratitude and empathy. I remember the exquisite joy of my kindergarteners when they learned how to wave hello for the first time.

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I teach at a school where students happen to be blind. It is a beautiful world—one where sounds ring clearer and where texture is the basic fabric of perception. I fix grammar mistakes and correct pronunciation. But, more importantly, I tell my kids to look up when they speak, because they live in a world where shame and silence are expected—where the ignorant assume and the well-intentioned can patronize.

“Shoulders straight!” “Head up!” “Now speak!”

* Totally blind refers to an individual with no light perception. This term should not be confused with legally blind, which describes individuals whose vision places them within a government’s classification of visual-impairment. Many legally blind individuals can see shapes and colors and read large-print materials.

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above Hanbit elementary school students play tug-of-war during a sports festival

left Sonia’s host sister, an 8th grade at Hanbit, perform at the annual school talent show

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right Some 3rd grade girls pose with their handmade turkeys after a Thanksgiving lesson

below The kindergarten class celebrates Halloween!

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above

ETAs take a stroll through Gyeongju during the 2011 Fall ETA Conference.

20 Years of Teaching and Learning The Fulbright ETA Program in Korea

Fulbright Korea ETA 20th Anniversary Commemorative Publication

Korean-American Educational Commission Fulbright Building 168-15 Yomni-dong, Mapo-gu Seoul 121-874, Republic of Korea Tel: 02-3275-4000 Fax:02-3275-4028 Email: admin@fulbright.or.kr Website: www.fulbright.or.kr