JP-89-

Thanks keeran! Having been in Korea and China and spoken to English teachers in both countries, the general consensus has been similar to what you've said: Going through recruiters into the private school system (hagwons in Korea) is generally a bad idea.

My major was Chinese, and it would've been pretty impossible for me to become fluent unless I studied abroad, so I spent my junior year in Changchun, China. It was...different, both in good and bad ways, probably a lot like how life in Korea will be. I lived in the dorm with other international students, but I was particularly envious of was the fact that an American friend of mine lived with a host family, which is one thing I'm really pumped about for Korea. While I was over there I studied at a Chinese language center, and so I had other international students as classmates, including a lot of Japanese and Koreans. A lot of us became friends and for my winter break and before I went back to the US in the summer I visited a bunch of them in Korea, but only around the Seoul metropolitan area. I also did a language exchange where I helped teach a Korean classmate English in return for Korean lessons, so I have the basics down pretty well. Anyways, I reached my goal of being pretty fluent in Chinese, and having the basics of Korea down already and the fact that Korean shares a ton of Chinese-derived words makes me hopeful that I can learn a lot of Korean this coming year.

I graduated in Jan so I couldn't go to a health center, but for the "name of health plan" I'm pretty sure they want the name of your health insurance plan (that's how I filled it out anyways!).

I hadn't even realized I'd be missing the 4th of July for the second year in a row...last year I was still in China at that time. For those who haven't mailed their medical forms yet, you might wants to hold off for now. The two grant acceptance forms need to go to the same place at the medical forms, so you could just mail them all out at once as soon as your packet comes from Korea.

I just got the FedEx letter from the Korean-America Fulbright Education Commission, the award starts July 3rd! Get ready to pack your bags!

So after a little more snooping I can say with some degree of certainty that we'll be at Jungwon University in Goesan. Apparently a portion of our six-week orientation involves us learning some TEFL skills at Camp Fulbright, where Fulbright ETFs from the finishing year come and teach Korea students while we observe. Camp Fulbright 2011 is scheduled for July 17-30 at Jungwon University, so I'm pretty certain that's where we'll be. http://webcache.goog...a.or.kr/xe/camp I'm sure if I just waited a few weeks for our info packet to arrive in the mail I'd find this all out then, but I can't help it!

Hey everyone! I've been looking around for information about where we'll be having our orientation and I've come across a few blogs from people who are currently on the Fulbright program that I wanted to share with everyone: http://skunfamiliarterritoryeta.blogspot.com/2010/07/jungwon-university.html http://jimgoestokorea.wordpress.com/page/4/ It seems like the answer to my question is Jungwon University, or at least last year it was. http://eng.jwu.ac.kr/

http://us.fulbrightonline.org/program_country.html?id=60 From the website it says that the program starts sometime in early-July. I'm guessing the packet we'll be getting will tell us all the nitty gritty details. I'd like to fly there a couple weeks before the program actually starts to visit a few of my old classmates from the school I studied at in China if they'll still reimburse me for the tickets. Anyone else planning on applying for the critical language scholarship over winter break?

I'm also from Rutgers-NB! I was in the Chinese and Russian departments, but I graduated a semester early. Congrats to you too!

I just got my Korea ETA acceptance letter!!! I'm in NJ and it was postmarked April 1st so everyone else should be getting letters soon! Keep in touch fellow Korea Fulbrighters!

Huh, you're right, I had only really given it a cursory glance. So now I'm not even sure what kind of grant that is...

http://www.strausnews.com/articles/2011/03/10/photo_news/news/2.txt Someone just posted this in the spreadsheet chat, looks like someone was already awarded a South Africa ETA grant. Still waiting (semi-)patiently to hear back about Korea ETA grants...

I hope it's true!!! I'm a Korea ETA finalist as well and at this point the wait is killing me!