Job Discussion Forums

[rachaela]

My friend has an interview with Geos, I told her to check out the company on this site before she commits (I had a bad experience with a company, so I want to make sure she goes in knowing what to expect). So I would appreciate if you could write whether this is a good company to work for or not. Positive and negative comments are welcome.
Thanks
Rachaela

[madeira]

I'm sure there are lots of threads on GEOS already...

I liked working there. I worked full-time for about 4 years, and now work for them part-time.

Good points: You have your own classroom and your own apartment. You'll be living pretty close to your school. They pay for health care, there are lots of ways to get bonuses (although I didn't get so many..), the texts are mostly good, most schools have tons of supplementary material, the paperwork load has been reduced TONS, you get paid overtime, (IF YOU WANT TO DO IT), your co-workers, students and 'managers' will probably all be fine people. You have 2 days off/week in a row. If you want to leave the apartment, 1 months notice is enough.

Neutral: You have to socialize with the students after work a bit. You may have to plan parties.

Not so good: Actually getting the 24 Japanese lessons promised in the first contract is pretty tough. You have to push for them. Getting a raise is, um, difficult. Selling the books is tough for native English speakers; many of the books are too low, as you don't teach the lower levels. You may have 'managers' changed every 3 months or so. You'll probably be VERY busy. I had 8-10 classes Saturdays, up to 6 a day weekdays. A lot depends on the school, though.

Anyhow, I liked the company overall. Still do.

[Willy_In_Japan]

I was teaching out of 10 flipping books. After a year, I had pretty much all the lessons for most of the Sprint books made.....but still, a LOT of prep for very little prep time.

GEOS has been making teachers teach more classes. About 33 or so periods a week I had, and it was typical. Add that to telephone meetings, paperwork, and teachers meetings etc........it is quite a lot to get done in not a lot of time.

I didnt like their 'rule' about showing up 30 mins before your shift........i once showed up 5 mins before my shift started and was scolded angrily by the manager for being 'late'. Classes sometimes ended right at 10pm, and then I had to do paperwork. That coupled with an hour lunch on my own time, turned the days into 10 hour days. I would typically leave the apartment at noon, and get home at 11pm.

Other annoyances, were no monday holidays because that is your regular day off. Sell pressure.....sell books, sell lessons..... If you don't like your coworkers, your life isnt pleasant. I had a real bitch who was always trying to get me fired who was the "JET" or Japanese English Teacher. I was expected to go socialize with the students every week, and cough up a few thousand yen for the pleasure of extra work. It was nice that I could associate with students I liked after hours, but they dont like that kind of association, just the group 'parties'.

I didn't care for the fact that your holidays can be taken in 1 week blocks maximum. You get 10 days, but literally, you have to take 2 tuesdays, 2 wednesdays, 2 thursdays, 2 fridays, and 2 Saturdays, and NOT back to back. And, NOT beside Golden week. So, if you want to go home you get to have a grand total of 7 days at home.

They give you a stipend for rent in some areas, but that is clawed back by over priced Leo Palaces.

Pluses are, you are never bored. You have a lot of freedom in the classroom to teach your style. The pay is pretty good. Would I take the job again? Sure, but working as an ALT beats it by a mile I think.

[madeira]

Willy... You had to be there 30 minutes ahead of time? My contract said 15. Is that a new thing...?

Holidays. There has been a change. GEOS can't refuse holiday requests anymore. If you've got the days saved up, you can take them pretty much as you please. Even around Golden Week. Of course, you should take the interests of the business (and your students) into consideration.

Telephone meetings. If you're at a big school, your name won't get pulled very often. In 4 years, I did 3. One of which I hung up on, as I couldn't hear a danged thing.

[fizayded]

Im working at Geos right now. My schedule really isnt that bad, but mine is unusual, a quiet school. Im doing less than 30 lessons a week or so, I have a friend who is doing about 40 lessons a week. Of course he gets overtime but its really not worth it, especially since he cant prep during school time and I can.

My manager just left, Geos treats managers well if your school is making money, and like crap if you arent, I guess this is fairly common in Japan.

Other than that things are good, I get to school 15-20 minutes ahead of time (but there is some minimal paperwork to do anyway), they want you to sell students on books and renewing contracts, but Im not big on that. I figure if my lessons are good and fun then hopefully they will want to come back.

From what I hear, the big names are the same. Except nova sucks. Just know that if you come to Japan expect to be have about 50 or so hours dedicated to work week (40 hour week plus 5 hours for lunch plus whatever for commuting).

[Indiana Jones]

I'm very interested in Geos, but the website hasn't had any information on Australian contacts regarding applications and interview sessions for quite a while.

Does anyone have information on when Geos will be conducting interviews in Melbourne next?

There are several Geos language schools in Australia, but they "have no information." One school in Melbourne even told me that they have nothing to do with Geos (even though I pointed out the large Geos logo on the wall and reception desk).

I've heard some good things about Geos so I'm prepared to wait ...

[Willy_In_Japan]

Actually, my contract didn't mention anything (as I recall) about being at the school before the shift starts.

The '30 min before' thing was mentioned during the week of training in Toronto. They said, 'oh, by the way, it is JAPANESE CUSTOM to be at work 30 mins before your shift starts'.......so in order for us to 'practice' we had to be at training 30 mins 'early' for each of the 3 remaining training days.

Of course, in recruiting, they mentioned nothing of this. And, in fact, implied a 40 hour week......ie not mentioning that the days are 9 hours long due to lunch being 'your time'........add to this the required paperwork when your class ends right as you are 'off the clock' and 'Japanese custom' time, and the days are effectively 10 hour days.

I was in a small school, and was the only native teacher, so I had to do all the telephone meetings. The sprint classes are 45 mins, so even with 33 lessons a week, I wasn't getting overtime. From my understanding, they are cutting down on the teachers and adding more classes to squeeze higher margins out of the schools. So, I think 30-40 classes a week is going to be the norm, and less teachers will mean more telephone meetings per capita.

My Jet as mentioned, was a 'biatch', and soured the manager on me attitude wise. In fact, I put in for a week holiday for the last week of March so I could travel home to Canada. Because April is the month when people 'start something new' in Japan, she refused to Hanko my vacation request! Apparently, it seemed that 'no time' was a 'good time' to take my holidays.

I shouted at her and told her that I was going to send in the request tomorrow, 'with or without' her Hanko, and that she could explain to head office why my request didn't have her Hanko on it. It was Hanko'd the next day. As you can imagine, my work environment wasn't very positive.

I am sure that GEOS probably can't limit when you take holidays legally, but the fact is, that I am sure they will cite 'customer care' ("kihondosa" in GEOS speak") as a reason that you shouldnt take more than one week at a time and NOT beside Goldenweek. It might be ok in theory that you can take holidays when you wish, but in reality, they won't approve them.

Just my experiences with GEOS.

[Willy_In_Japan]

Indiana Jones,

GEOS runs a few schools in Australia. HOWEVER, these schools are sent students from Japan through their homestay branch. The only way in which to get a job at one of these 'overseas' schools, would be to put in at least a couple of years at GEOS in Japan. You can then apply to work for these schools in Australia. That is probably why they are trying to put you off regarding applications. They staff their overseas schools ONLY with staff with experience in Japan. Their thinking on this is basically that they want only teachers that follow their system, and are familiar with the problems Japanese students learning English have.