Most of the Korean nurses preparing to land a job in the U.S. said they were anticipating better working conditions in America.

More than 100 nurses and nursing students interested in American jobs gathered at the Korea Human Resource Development Institute for Health & Welfare (KOHI)’s education center in Seoul, Thursday, to attend a briefing on strategies to get employed as a nurse in the U.S.

Nurses and nursing students participate in a briefing session on strategies to get employed as a nurse in the U.S. at the Korea Human Resource Development Institute for Health & Welfare (KOHI)’s education center in Seoul, Thursday.

Participating nurses and nursing students said they want to build their career under better working conditions in the U.S.

“I got interested in getting a job in the U.S. after I heard that nurses’ work environment there is very different from that in Korea,” said a nurse. “Not only working hours and conditions are better but U.S. jobs offer higher salaries.”

The nurse noted that Americans seemed to have higher recognition of nurses than Koreans. “I heard that it was easier for nurses to receive employment visa than other job-seekers. I came here to learn how to do it in detail,” the nurse said.

The widespread culture of senior nurses’ bullying against newcomers, called “taeum,” (burn to ashes in Korean) also affected nurses to consider working in the U.S., a nursing student said.

“I came here because I worried about the controversial taeum culture. I’ve heard about taeum since I entered the nursing school and I’m worried,” the student said.

A male nursing student said he thought leaving for the U.S. would be better than having to go through unfair clinical training and taeum bullying. “Even in our school, I hear a lot that nursing jobs are very demanding,” he said.

He said he came to the briefing because there were not many places to gain information about getting employed in the U.S.

Government officials at the Human Resources Development Service of Korea (HRD Korea), which jointly held the briefing with the Ministry of Employment and Labor and KOHI, said they could feel how much the presentation was popular.

“Seventy percent of the participants are nurses and nursing students. I received so many phone calls asking about the event,” said Park Hee-young, deputy head of the Busan Overseas Employment Center at HRD Korea. “Although we hold the briefing session once a year, we will always help nurses land a job overseas.”

minju9minju@docdocdoc.co.kr

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