Indifference to foreign professors

By Kang Sug-won

In mid-October, 2008, The Korea Times reported that a 45-year-old female professor from the United States had suddenly left her tenure-track post at Seoul National University the previous month, without telling anyone that she was leaving, much less where she was going. The head of her department could only say that he had nothing further to say on the matter.

I found the woman’s callous disregard for the welfare of her students appalling. But the absence of any communication seemed to imply something more: contempt for her employer and the host nation.

That said, The Korea Times was certainly on target in seizing this opportunity to call attention to the pitfalls of international education at Korea’s universities in an age of ``globalization.”

The KT article carried an excerpt from SNU’s campus paper quoting the runaway professor to say how ``delighted” she was with her students, further remarking that ``even the students who were only auditing” came to her class ``fully prepared,” completing ``all of their assignments.” If she could inspire her students this way, she was, obviously, a gifted teacher. So, what happened?

The KT article referred to an email message the professor had written to her class assistant in which she complained of some ``difficulty” she was having ``in adapting to life here.’’ It would appear that something inside her had snapped, and she just took off!

The paper’s editorial, soon thereafter, raised the question whether or not SNU was doing enough to ensure that newly-arriving foreign professors are adequately looked after as they settle into an alien environment.

Having arrived at Sogang University that same fall, I was bewildered by what I saw around me throughout the semester, despite my many advantages as a returning native son. I found myself wondering what it must be like having to adjust and learn if you’re a foreigner with no training in Korean studies. The woman at SNU was a Renaissance art historian.

That KT editorial struck a sympathetic chord in me, as I was grappling with what impressed me as a culture of indifference on Sogang’s campus, which at times seemed, as one colleague put it, ``Balkanized,” with little to hold the center as a community.

But I had my students for solace. I always looked forward to being back in class. I was behind my lectern before my students started to file in. And I never let them out early! I made a practice of returning papers and exams at the very next meeting, deviating from this routine only twice in the two years I taught at Sogang.

I was impressed by the high level of motivation in my students, as the SNU professor did in hers. And I found their appreciation palpable and most gratifying. There were many times when the corridor outside my office was crowded with students waiting to come in, to have me go over their marked-up exam essays and term papers.

I can very well imagine any number of my fellow visiting professors from the United States having the time of their lives teaching these appreciative and motivated students at the better universities in Korea. Indeed, I heard similar tales of satisfaction from a fellow Fulbrighter at Yonsei while I was teaching at Sogang.

But good students are never enough; visiting professors need a campus support system to help create a nurturing environment in which to work, so they can devote their fullest to their task. Of all people, Korean academics should understand the value of peer support in the life of a lone foreign professor, many of them having had their share of culture shock and loneliness when they were studying abroad.

Having a caring and attentive departmental chair obviously helps, and I did so both times at Sogang, first in political science and then in history. For that I was grateful.

The author is a professor emeritus of political science at Hartwick College. After living for half a century in the U.S., Kang returned to Korea in the fall of 2008 as a Fulbright Senior Scholar, teaching political science at Sogang University. In 2009-2010 he was a visiting professor of American history. He can be reached at kangs@hartwick.edu.