Job Discussion Forums

[denise]

Warning: this post is a bit longer than I had intended it to be, and probably isn't as clear as I would like it to be. Thanks in advance to anyone who replies!

For reasons not worth getting into (or that I cannot discuss without my blood boiling...), my school is closing its doors--not admitting any new students, and shutting down when the current students finish the program. (I teach at a satellite branch of an American university--"finishing" entails getting through the IEP program, where I work, completing the on-site college classes, and then transferring back to the home campus in the States.)

I feel a few different negative emotions--anger at the way the school was mismanaged in the first place; concern that the current students will freak out and quit; and pessimism at the administration's proposed plan to open a new program--if this one has failed, who's to say the next one will succeed?

The administration of my school is a bit divided--there's the teaching side, who are connected to the home campus but somehow governed by the "Entity", and there's the Entity, who control the management side but are not involved in the educational aspect. I feel very loyal to the educational side--my fellow teachers, my supervisor, and his supervisor. Conversely, I feel no loyalty to the Entity, because I think that they care more about making money than about running a good school. And of course I am loyal to the students--they are the reason I'm here in the first place, and I don't want this impending closure to affect them.

Our students (and us too! yay!) are just getting back from a two-week Obon holiday, over which they received letters telling them of the school's closure. We're having an assembly tomorrow, at which I believe the program directors (part of the educational side, not the management side) will try to allay some of their fears. Still, the topic may come up in classes. I am going to try my best not to let my anger seep into my answers, but still... hooooo boy, it'll be hard! I don't want to lie to the students or refuse to answer their questions, but I probably don't know any more than they do at this point. So frustrating!

OK, I am nearing the end of my rant. Have you guys/gals ever been faced with situations of conflicting loyalties--students/teachers vs. administration? How did you deal with it in the classroom? Come to think of it, how did you deal with it outside of the classroom?

Whew. Done. If you've made it this far, thanks! This has really been stressing me out recently! (Funnily enough, the thing that worries me the least is that I might be out of a job--I wasn't sure if I was going to stick around anyway...)

d

[king kakipi]

Personally, I would knock it on the head with the old "sorry guys, I know evern less about what is going on than you; (optional appendum:- "can YOU tell ME anything..?")" if students quiz you in class.

[Hondo 2.0]

When I was a private investigator, I attended a training seminar run by a police academy instructor. He told us that in a dnagerous situation these are a policeman's priorities:

Himself
His partner
The public
The bad guy

As a teacher, I think this translates to:

Yourself
Your fellow teachers
The students
The school

I don't know if I'm right or not, but I have the feeling that Japanese companies expect their teachers to have a diametrically opposed set of priorities.

[ntropy]

Yep. Sympathies with the students/teachers every time. The Entity is part of the Dark Forces. In the past, I've tried not to let the bitterness towards admin show (only makes you look bad) and said little. However, when asked a direct question, I answered honestly and sympathetically.

[Rice Paddy Daddy]

So, do you go back to Illinois, then?

[denise]

[Rice Paddy Daddy]

[denise]

It's the students who transfer to the States.

d

[ntropy]

[/quote]Ntropy--I agree that it would look bad for me (or any of us) to criticize the admin in front of our students. I will do my best!

[denise]

Thanks for all of the comments! Turns out that the students aren't terribly bothered, while we teachers get more and more upset every time the administration does something knuckle-headed.

What I have found the most troublesome is that we are often the last to officially learn things (although rumors fly at the speed of light here...) There's a website advertising the new program that will be replacing us, but did the management inform us?!?! NO!!! I found out about it when I looked over some of my students' shoulders in our computer lab and saw them looking at it.

Seems terribly unprofessional when teachers know less about what's going on than the students do...

Oh well. Looks like the naive belief that I deliberately and desperately clung to for so long--that schools were about education, not profit--has been shattered. Sigh.

d

[PAULH]

Hi Folks

thought you might want to hear a story about the admin getting in revolt against foreign teachers and using students to do it

After corresponding with a few listmembers offlist, and after reading the many frustrating messages about the plight of too many GKs, I highly suspect there is not much to be done in the case of the Faculty of Humanities at Hokkai Gakuen University.� Still, I�ll give it a try.

Hokkai Gakuen is an old, established private university in Sapporo.� Our faculty was formed about 11 years ago and was split into Japan Studies and Eibei Bunka, which they translate as ABC--the cultural study of America, Britain and Canada.

In the beginning they hired eight GKs, three of whom were to primarily teach the culture of their home country--America, Britain, or Canada.� These three would also have a few English classes.� Contracts were for two years at a time with no limits stipulated.� Verbally, we�ve always been told that we could stay for as long as we�d like.

From the beginning, the GK position has had some favorable conditions.� For instance, we all have our own spacious offices, book budgets, domestic travel budgets, and office budgets.�� We�re asked to have our pictures taken with the full faculty, and about four times a year we are invited to department dinners, which is about the only time we ever talk to the Japanese.� One of the biggest perks is the time off: when we are not teaching, we can go anywhere we want.� These aspects allowed us to assume that we were a fairly integral part of the department.

I arrived in 1998 with MAs in Asian Studies and American Studies, and was working on my Ph.D. in the latter field.� Thus I was the designated American culture lecturer.� My first year, I had four culture classes and three English classes.

The liaison between the GKs and the tenured faculty seemed to be the only foreigner with tenure, though this was never spelled out.� This spotty method of communication only became worse with time.� For example, in 1999 all but two semesters (split between two different classes) of the GKs� culture classes were given to Japanese professors without explanation or apology, and our English load went up to eight classes per week (it is now ten).� This despite the fact that the Canadian teacher has a Ph.D. in Canadian Lit (the British teacher, a retiree from Hokudai, also had to retire from Hokkai Gakuen and our department never bothered to find a qualified British culture GK after that).

Collectively, we GKs have taught at many universities in Sapporo and elsewhere and our impression was that our English language program was not only going along smoothly, it was also improving.� Rumors drifting down from our department, however, were not good, so we finally had a meeting with the dean, at which he announced that the university�s position was that they hoped� we�d all quit, but if we wanted to stay, we could stay as long as we�d like.� Also, the time left at the school should be viewed as a chance to improve the CVs so we could move on.

Naturally, this did not go down well with the GKs and one teacher left immediately (he was never replaced).� For whatever reason, the department quickly reversed itself, though based on subsequent behavior, it�s reasonable to suspect they�d like us gone.

The real trouble started over a year ago when complaints began to come in from night students about the part-time English teachers.� The department took action and pressured one part-timer to �resign,� and it�s possible this also happened to a second part-timer. �

Soon after, I was hit with something similar and thus began the most bizarre experience I�ve ever had.� With 13 years of teaching under my belt (11 in Japan), I was confident last fall that all my classes were going well.� Then, one fine day, the kyoumuin called me out of the blue and we had this conversation:



Kyoumuin:� Students will write a formal complaint to the dean about you.

O'Brien:� I see.� What are the problems?

Kyoumuin:� I don't know.

O'Brien:� What class or classes have problems?

Kyoumuin:� I don't know.

O'Brien: Which of my students have problems?

Kyoumuin:� I can't say.

O'Brien:� Good-bye.

Kyoumuin:� There WILL be a formal letter written to the dean.



Thus began a seven-week trial in which I was kept completely out of the loop.� Not once did any faculty member ask me even one question.� I gave an impromptu survey to every class to try to identify the class, but the results were all highly favorable.� Eventually, through rumors, I found out what the class was and was shocked because it was a freshman class that was going well.

To make a long story short, one student or a small group of students led a campaign to get the class to write a letter complaining about my class.� In the end, they not only wrote the letter, they distributed it individually to each Humanities professor, to the school president, and to the university chancellor.� Only at the end did my department admit there was a letter but they certainly would not give me a copy (I later got a copy elsewhere with the names deleted).

Why would freshman, of all students, do such a thing?� It seems a non-teaching employee who happened to be banished to our floor took it upon herself to launch a campaign against all the foreign teachers.� Worse, her husband is a professor in Eibei and graduated from Hokudai, the main supplier of our professors.� Though it was clear that this woman had organized the whole thing, our brave faculty opted to put the blame on me.�� (BTW, the charges in the letter were nonsense and could have been easily refuted in about 15 minutes if any Japanese had bothered to check).

Though I had just been verbally assured that my two-year contract was intact, I was now given a one-year contract because of my alleged poor teaching.� (When I complained to the administration about this, they pleaded ignorance about my problem and said THEY had instructed our department to give all the GKs one-year contracts from then on).

Eventually, winter break came and I put it behind me.� Then this spring all hell broke loose as a flood of complaints came in about various teachers.� It was beyond obvious that the above-mentioned woman was behind it, but again no faculty wanted to face up to it, so they acted as though the complaints had merit and proceeded to question or discipline foreign teachers. �

Then, the ante was raised when a part-time teacher was accused of actual illegal behavior: sexual harassment, striking students, etc.� The department decided to summarily fire him, but in this case we seven GKs stepped in and demanded a more Western treatment of the issue.� It was very quickly shown that no such illegal behavior had ever taken place, but the Japanese just shrugged it off.� Their solution was to �allow� the instructor to continue but they created parallel classes and allowed students to choose to stay in his or go to the new one. �

At this point, it was so obvious that the woman causing the problems had to go that we GKs petitioned the school to get rid of her.� Privately, we were applauded by many high-ranking people in the university and all reports were that she would soon leave.

Now, however, we find that she�ll continue to her retirement, and the scuttlebutt is that for us to renew our contracts, we might have to take a pledge to treat this woman with respect.� Naturally, we 7 GKs have discussed our options but there is no way we�re ever going to get any kind of agreement on what to do, so we�ll probably do nothing.

It is at this point that I open discussion about the issue.� Clearly, our university has given no thought whatsoever to our rights and reputations, leading us to wonder, �Do we as GKs even have such rights or reputations to defend?�

What about a legal response?� Informally, the feedback I get is that Japan is not big on libel and false accusations, most particularly when it concerns gaijin.� Is this impression wrong?� If so, what might be done?� I�m the most hawkish of our group and would likely proceed with legal options if they were promising.

Finally, how might we handle job protection?� It seems all too clear to me that the faculty can use the complaints themselves as reason not to renew individual contracts.� What protection do we have?� Based on earlier PALE advice, I�ve floated the idea of joining a union but not one other GK was interested.

As I stated in the beginning, I don�t think we are in a good position at all, but if I go down, I want to go down swinging.


Yours,

Pat

[denise]

Yikes! And I was already having a "bad Japan day" before I read that...

d

[PAULH]

Denise,

now you know what we are up against every three years. You never know what kind of s___t will fly in your general direction.

Paul

[guest of Japan]

Denise,
I meant to respond earlier to express my sympathy to your problem. If I were to take a guess at your school, I'd say that you have a lot of teachers with salaries which your school doesn't want to pay. By closing the school and reopening a new one the school can skirt by legal problems and then get teachers at a fraction. You mentioned before that you don't make an exceptional amount, but I bet some of the older teachers are still working under bubble contracts. After three years of continuous employment the school is stuck with those teachers and their ever increasing salaries or they face the wrath of Japanese labor law.

I've seen the complaint arise countless times about how eikaiwas are out to make money and education is secondary if it occurs at all. But, after working in two private high schools and a big four eikaiwa I can honestly say that in Japan in education money is first, second and third. After that education or the illusion of education makes an appearance. I'd bet dollars to donuts that university education is the same.

I'll give a quick example of the system. At my last high school virtually every student was accepted. Yet, teachers were given the responsibility of writing entrance exams for two different times. It cost the students about 30,000 yen to take the exams. It only cost the school paper and ink for the photocopier, yet they made enough money on the exams to pay two years salary for the teachers who wrote the exams. Of course for the teachers it was just additional work added to their already busy schedules (mine too, as I did the English listening portion). The test had two main functions: make it appear that it was difficult to enter the school, and make money.

As for the story PaulH placed, I'd say that is worthy of being an NHK drama after they finish the Korean girl one. It's right up there with my favorite GTO (Great Teacher Onitsuka).

Anyway keep us posted on the development of the situation. I sincerely hope it works out for you.

[Mike L.]

I'd gather all the evidence together and start talking with a lawyer.

Those GK people need to get more informed on legal issues.

Join the union too!

I'd tape those conversations with admin. Those could be useful later!

Especially the old bag! She's probably pretty good at incriminating herself!

Continue being unpleasant for the old bag too!

If they want you to sign something tell them to make the old bag sign something too!

Mention discrimination in your conversations with admin.

If they threaten not to renew the contracts say all 7 of you threaten to go legal etc etc.......