Job Discussion Forums

[Omeo]

Japan is definitely a country I want to teach in once I begin my TEFL career, but it may not be the country I start out in. How hard would it be to get a job in Japan if I'm teaching in, say, Europe or South America? What's the best way to do that, too?

[JimDunlop2]

Irrelevant. Your experience teaching ESL in other countries won't amount to much in Japan... At least not in your ability to find a job. I've known more than my fair share of people who have taught in several countries before as well as those who haven't taught before in their lives... Both groups have been able to find work here... (And at the same time, both groups have also gone home jobless, unable to find one).

How to do it? Um, look at the ads on Dave's and other job-posting websites & apply.

I'd recommend reading through the sticky FAQs on this forum to get more info, then post up some more specific questions if you have any. This is a good forum and there's lot of information here.

Good luck...

[abufletcher]

One major problem you'll experience is that the rest of the EFL world is on a different yearly schedule. I was working in Mexico before taking a job in Japan and had to "bail" on my previous job to take this one and that's not something I like doing.

As Jim says, employers in Japan seem to hold very narrow views on the value of teaching EFL in other countries. I remember getting a rejection letter from a YMCA run language school in Tokyo many years ago. At the time I had a BA and MA in Linguistics, a California TESL certificate, and 6 years of full-time university level overseas EFL experience (in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Oman).

Their advice: "Perhaps you should first come here and get some Japan experience."

BTW, if you're planning on making a long-term career out of EFL I'd recommend that you get an MA immediately (don't wait). I wouldn't recommend Japan as a good place to learn professional EFL skills.

[Glenski]

Ditto to the above responses.

If you are not in Japan, you have only a few options to get interviewed, and they are all in native-English speaking countries. NOVA, AEON, GEOS, ECC, and the JET Programme all interview outside of Japan, but only in places like the USA, UK, Canada, NZ, and Australia.

If you can't return to your home country for these interviews, your only hope is to come here with about US$4000 in your pocket to support yourself for 2 months and look for work. Make sure you don't come during a dead time of year.

With no teaching experience in Japan, expect to start at the bottom rung of the ladder -- conversation schools and JET programme.

[Omeo]

So right now, my tetative plan is to start out in Turkey and then go to Japan, and it sounds like the only way I'm going to get to Japan is to either come home for the interviews or go to Japan and support myself while I look for work. Is that an accurate assessment? Also, if I have to come home to be interviewed, how hard is it to schedule my interviews so that they're all in the same week so I don't have to stay long or make multiple trips? Are they pretty flexible with that or no? Thanks again, guys.

[Glenski]