 the EPIC program in South Korea. And that stands for English program in Korea. And I had a couple of comments here that said South Korea, you're interested in teaching in South Korea, so this is something that you wanna pay close attention to. But basically I know a lot of people who are working in the EPIC program, I myself have not. I worked for private schools in South Korea, but a lot of my friends are in the EPIC program, and so I know it pretty well. Yeah, so basically the EPIC program is run by the South Korean government, and it places foreign teachers into schools across the country to work as English language instructors in schools with kids of different levels, different schools, some of my friends, they work at two or three different schools. So that's all that. Then the EPIC program is popular because it offers a lot of competitive salaries, attractive extra benefits, and the chance to live and work in a unique cultural environment in East Asia, so in South Korea. And here's the link where you can apply. So I wanna mention that obviously you should always make sure that you check for accuracy in terms of information. I have done my research, this is all from my and my ITTT teams research, but obviously you should always turn to the official organization and all that for your additional questions and stuff. We are not from the EPIC program, right? So we are just giving you the information. So check out epic.gio.kr if you want to apply, and they are also currently hiring and placing teachers into the programs. Yeah, then a little bit more about that. So the requirements for the EPIC program. Unfortunately it's not open to everybody. You have to be a citizen of a country where English is the primary language. So that's typically like mentioned here, Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, United Kingdom, United States or South Africa from those countries. You need to have a passport from those countries or you must have studied from at least the junior high level, so seventh grade and graduated from a university in one of those seven countries to be eligible. However, Indian citizens are also eligible for positions if they meet all other requirements and hold a teacher's license in English. So that's also good to know because I get a lot of questions from Indians who want to teach English in South Korea. So that's something that if that fits for you, you know it is possible. Then you also need to have a bachelor's degree, a minimum of a bachelor's degree, so four years from an accredited university. And if you only have a two years associate's degree, then you can also apply for a program, not the EPIC program, but the talk program. And those are pretty similar. So the talk program is also for teaching English in South Korea, usually for younger people because it's the associate on the associate's level, but it's pretty similar. So you can also go and teach English in South Korea with the talk program. And for more information, I would recommend checking out talk.go.kr. Then for the EPIC program, you should also have a Teflor T-cell certificate of at least 100 hours. But if you have a teaching license, or what does it say, a teaching license certificate, or if you're majored in education, it's not required to have a Teflor T-cell certificate. But if you do, it's still, it's a bonus, obviously. It's a very competitive program. So you wanna be at your best, basically. You wanna be, you have the best professional portfolio, right? Yeah, great. Then a little bit more about how much money you can make on the EPIC program. They have a pay scale, which you can see on the left side here, the table might be a little small, but basically they split it up into levels depending on your qualifications. So the more qualifications and certificates you have, the more money you can make. So that is also true. Okay, Tiana said, and the talk is mostly in rural areas. Yes, but the EPIC program, it can also be in rural areas. So one of my friends, she works here in my city, which is like 850,000 people, but on the outskirts. And so she works for three different schools, I believe. And so two of her schools are rural schools. So she actually needs to take the bus for 40 minutes, 50 minutes an hour, and go outside into the countryside and teach there. So it can happen in EPIC program too, that you have rural areas. But that shouldn't scare you because I think it's a more authentic Korean experience, right? And Korea is really, really small. So you can always jump on the bus or train and head up to Seoul. So yeah, but thanks for that, yeah. So yeah, back to the salary. So basically depends on your qualifications on how much you can make. But the highest you can make is 2.7 million Korean won. So you can be a millionaire in Korea. But basically 2.7 million won is like, I should have written it on here. It's like 2,500 US dollars. Let me check and make sure I have a currency app. 2.7 million is, yeah, 2,460 US dollars at the moment. So that's the highest you can make, as you can see here. And the lowest, the start is 2.1. So like under 2,000 US dollars, which might not sound like much, but considering the additional benefits, like a fully furnished apartment that you get, paid airfare in and out of your country, you also get a 300,000 Korean won settlement allowance, which is great. You get 18 days paid leave plus all national holidays and you get one month salary bonus on completion of the contract. And there is also a, there is also a national pension scheme that you pay into when you teach in Korea. And then when you leave at the end, you get the whole money back. And that's, depending on how long you stay, if you stay even just one year, it's a couple thousand. So it's like $2,000, I think. So if you stay longer and you, it's kind of like saving, right? It's kind of like you leave and then you have like this whole chunk of money, which is nice for when you go back and you know, whatever you want to do after that. Then also interesting to know that Epic hires for two terms each year, according to the Korean public school calendar. So applications for the spring term, they open on August 1st of the previous year. So they hire pretty early in advance. So you need to be early and positions for the fall term open on February 1st of the same year. So keep that in mind, if that's something that you want to do to just apply early. And like I said, it's not on here now, but check out the website, epic.go.kr for the Epic program. Let me look at some comments. All right, Ahmed says, I'm a teacher, I'm non-native, what should I do? Okay. Depends, if you're interested in Korea, if you have a passport from one of those countries here, no problem. Also, if you're an Indian citizen and you have a teaching license, no problem, you are eligible. If not, then you might have to wait a little bit for other options in this presentation. Then maybe South Korea wouldn't work in your case, unfortunately. Gwendolyn, hi. Can people who aren't from the eligible countries teach in South Korea? Difficult. Yeah, it's difficult. So also a similar question to Ahmed, but yeah, if you're not from one of those English speaking countries and you're not Indian, you don't have a license, a teaching license, it's still possible under certain circumstances. So for example, so the e2, the visa the teachers in Korea get is the e2 visa, but there's also other visa types that allow you to live and work in Korea. So maybe your country has the work and travel option. You could look into that. There's a work and travel visa for South Korea. Then there's also a visa for people who have Korean ancestors up to the third generation Korean, you can get a visa, then there's the spousal visa, you could get married, then move to Korea. There's also, there's a bunch of different visas. There's options, certainly. You might have to attend university first, you might have to take Korean classes, definitely. So if that's something that you're interested in and you really want, I recommend checking out the different visa options or speak with the nearest Korean embassy in your country and look for options that you have. Okay, then video says just to know when it says teaching license, will the 120 hour TEFL certification count as a teaching license? So the 120 hour TEFL certification is not a teaching license. So what that means here, I have to, sorry, turn this off, for Indian citizens. So a teacher's license in English. So that would be a, I assume that would be an Indian teaching license in English. Yeah, not a TEFL certificate, those are separate. So TEFL certificate is not a teaching license, it's a teaching certificate, they're on a different level. Typically you do not need a teaching license in order to teach English abroad, but because those are just for like your country. So if you want to be a teacher in your country, you get a teaching license. If you want to teach English abroad, you would get a TEFL certificate. But in this case, they require both for Indian citizens. So it always depends on the laws and regulations of the different countries and places. Yeah, I hope that answers your question. Okay, all right, excellent question from Alejandro. How good is the TEFL certification good for? Or how long is the TEFL certification good for? I got certified in October, 2017. Is it still deemed as relevant studies to apply for a teaching job? Yes, yes. So your TEFL certificate never expires. It's good forever, but obviously it's good to kind of, you know, stay up to date with teaching in general, teaching topics. You can also do like little specialization courses to just get a refresher. So like the specializations that we have is teaching English to young learners, teaching business English or teaching English online. So those are good for A, refreshers and B, like polishing, enhancing your resume. So I would recommend that. But 2017, that's not that long ago. You're good, you're good. Okay, cool. So this is it about the Epic program. Thanks so much for watching. We are ITTT, the leading provider for TEFL and TESOL training courses. If you like this video, please subscribe by clicking the button down here and click on any of the videos here on the left for more interesting teaching tips for getting certified to teach English abroad and online.