DUX (Daechi)

As someone who has worked at the Daechi DUX branch, while I have my gripes (like any job), it s not all bad like these reviews say. To start, my contract hours were set as 2-9:15 M-F. My MF schedules start at 2:20, and end on time. My T/TH classes however, don t start until 3:50. So if I come in at 2, I have almost 2 hours on Tuesday and Thursday for planning. That doesn t include the hour and a half break between my two Wednesday classes. I m also teaching an extra class. If I didn t have an extra class, my teaching hours would be roughly 3-9:15.

The reading and writing classes are easy to teach, and the kids are pretty easy to manage even when there s 10 in one class. I personally have a huge family, so I ve been around lots of kids my whole life. Behavior management isn t super difficult. As for the literature classes, all you have to do is teach them three themes from the book, analyze the characters, and then have them debate about the book. That s three separate classes. Once you re familiar with the books and how to split them across each term, the actual teaching part of the job isn t that stressful.

As for the bad stuff, we do have to make our own tests from scratch, but all the teachers now have a google drive with a copy of lesson plans for the novels as well as every teacher s term tests for the last 3-4 terms. Each teacher has 6-8 classes and there s like 5-7 of us. You can do the math there. A lot of our classes will often share schedules or we ll teach the same novel, so whoever makes test questions for a novel first will upload them, and we ll just copy them onto our tests. The kids never read the same novel twice, so it s not an issue. Also, you know the exact test dates and your teaching schedule 1-2 weeks before the next term even begins, so you can plan out how you want your test to look/what you ll cover. For example, if your goal is to finish a textbook in one term, then you know by the time term test hits, you just need to be halfway done with book. Which means you can just start picking out questions and exercises to put on the test from the beginning of the term.

The most annoying part of the job is definitely essay grading, but I have almost 6 or 7 hours of planning time in a week that I use to knock those out. Sometimes I ll crank em out early in the week, other times I ll just do them all on Thursday and Friday. Also, as long as you are familiar enough with the books to teach the key points and themes, you don t have to read all those novels. Online summaries do more than enough justice for 95% of novels out there. Also, anyone who went to school in the US is probably familiar with books/movies like Shiloh, Matilda, Charlotte s Web, etc. Also, whoever said it takes 20 minutes to grade a 5 paragraph essay, that s definitely exaggeration. That essentially means they re reading roughly 20 words a minute. Grading essays takes time to get your personal rhythm as a teacher, but 20 minutes is is a gross overestimation. My strategy is to focus on one or two mistakes that they consistently make in the essay and just give detailed feedback on how to stop doing everything wrong.

That being said, I don t have an official lunch break or anything, but I eat breakfast/lunch around 12, bring a snack/light meal for one of my 15 minute breaks, and then just eat a full meal later when I m home. I almost never set an alarm to wake up, even if I m awake until 3am. Because even if I fall asleep at 3am, I can get a full 8 hours, wake up at 11am, and still not have to be at my first class until 1:50ish. If I was working a full 8-10 hour day with no official 30min/1hr breaks then I d be more upset, but for 6-7 hours it s not that serious. Personally, [redacted] here and there, even back home. Some stuff is worth putting up a fight for, others not so much in the sea of crappy jobs out there, you have to learn what s worth fighting and what you can take in return for the rest of the benefits. The kids are well behaved, and even when they aren t, I know how to manage a classroom so I don t have many problems.

In conclusion, DUX is definitely far from perfect, but the stuff to complain about isn t terrible if you manage your time well. The only time I ve taken work home is when I didn t plan for term tests and was cramming it all into a couple weeks instead of slowly working on it over the term. Had I started early, I wouldn t have had to take work home. Hopefully my review sheds a different light on DUX, specifically the Daechi branch, and people can decide for themselves if the good outweighs the bad, or if it s something they d be okay accepting.