Job Discussion Forums

[shmooj]

Looked but couldn't find this topic here (maybe I missed it)...

I've been teaching in the eikaiwa scene. Now I have an MA and intermediate level Japanese , I've been considering abandoning this to move into full time college or university teaching in Japan.

I've heard though that there are many more bureaucratic and administrative hoops to jump through at that level.

What should I be wary of and am I likely to be ignorant of having had no experience there? Would you recommend it? Are there any colleges etc in particular that you would recommend?

Doumo arigatou gozaimasu in anticipation...

[Nagoyaguy]

Shmooz, I am in the same boat, and almost the same location!!

I am going to finish my MEd from an Aussie university next year. Now I teach as an ALT in some junior high schools VERY close to you! Let:s put it this way - I know where the Domi Super Center is, and often go to the Starbucks at Apita Galleria.

Have you considered the ALT route? THe pay is comparable to eikaiwa, and the conditions are a million times better. I get about 11 or 12 weeks off a year, regular hours 815-430, a car, and evenings free to either study or pick up a few lucrative private classes. I was actually considering doing something like approaching the local school boards directly and trying to contract with them as ALTs. Thinking Chiryu, Anjo, Kariya, Hekinan, etc. make more cash, keep the good hours.

Sound like a doable plan?

[PAULH]

Shmooj

I suggest you first have a look at the link on teaching at universities on http://www.eltnews.com and the debito.org site at

http://www.debito.org/univquestions.html

I would need to get more information as to what you are looking for or what specific questions you want to ask. You can email me if you have more questions. There are a lot of factors involved and debito org raises several points you should be aware of.

Keep in mind that for full time job you need a minimum of a masters degree in English, Linguistics or TESOL, at least 3 publications, a summary of your articles in Japanese is usually required as well as previous teaching experience. It is unlikely you will walk straight into a full time job with no university classroom experience and no publications.

You are probably better off looking for part time jobs, getting some college teaching experience while you work on the publications (by that I mean once published in academic or university journals, not text books or creative writing)

getting jobs in the university domain is not just about having the pieces of paper but its about contacts, who you know and being in the right place at the right time. LUCK also plays a big part as well. Many jobs posted in english will have dozens of people applying for them, and those that are written in Japanese will attract less people, sometimes you have to do some detective work, get to know people *through JALT or JACET for example, do presentations at conferences etc.)

[PAULH]

About Duties and Qualifications
Internationals are often hired for select positions that are meant to complement the majority of staff positions held by Japanese nationals. International ELT professionals are almost invariably expected to teach English speaking and listening skills as a primary responsibility. At the tertiary level, duties may also include English writing and reading skills as well.

Especially at national and public schools, foreign instructors teach the larger, survey-type, "service" courses, while Japanese nationals teach the smaller, so-called "advanced" classes geared towards junior and senior students working to complete their majors. Since university instructors and professors are expected to plan, implement and evaluate their own classes without help or collaboration, it is vital for candidates to show experiences and abilities that indicate a capacity to adapt quickly and teach independently.

Experience
Generally, it is preferred that all applicants have at least two years of experience teaching (in order of desirability) 1) at a Japanese university or college, 2) at a junior or senior high school in Japan, 3) at an overseas college where the subject taught was EFL. Being able to show a successful track record with Japanese students is extremely helpful. The reason is simple: hiring a non-Japanese represents a great investment in time and money; this will have been wasted if the international proves unable (as a significant proportion do) to complete the full-term of his or her contract.

Qualifications
Having a master's degree in either TESOL or applied linguistics has been considered de rigueur (though such a qualification is only now becoming common among Japanese teachers). Recently, however, a significant number of positions have required a degree in another speciality (such as business), either in addition to, or in lieu of, the more traditional TESOL-related degree. Three publications are the usual minimum requirement for employment consideration at many schools, especially for the "kyouin" positions. Having more is helpful, but be careful about seeming to pad your resume with marginally relevant publications.

Age
Age is another important issue: it is often very difficult for foreign nationals above the age of 35 to find full-time employment in Japan at the tertiary level unless they have either a significant amount of experience teaching in Japanese universities or an impressive publishing record. Having both is often necessary. If older teachers do manage to find work, it is often because a particular department really wanted them for a particular speciality.

To be fair to those departments who seem guilty of "age discrimination" here - one thing else must be said: if promotion in many places is still based on seniority, and if departments are under scrutiny and criticism for making promotion too much a matter of course (i.e. ageing), then it makes very good sense for a department to hire the youngest candidate available. Such age bias often applies to Japanese nationals as well as international candidates.

Japanese Language Skills
Finally, there's the sticky question of Japanese ability. Some universities include intermediate to advanced Japanese skills among their minimum requirements; many do not. The general rule seems to be this: Japanese skills are rarely necessary to qualify for short-term, "gaikokujin kyoushi"-type positions; most schools offering long-term "kyouin" positions, however, expect you to be reasonably conversant in the language before applying.

Furthermore, while schools located in the bigger cities (e.g., Tokyo, Kyoto, etc.) rarely ask for Japanese ability, schools located outside these metropolises almost invariably make Japanese skills one of their requirements. As the competition for employment among foreigners is often quite fierce in the major metropolises, learning some Japanese might be just the thing to separate you from the pack.

[shmooj]

All this is great stuff and I checked out the sites you mentioned. They gave me a lot of food for thought and discussion with the wife...

As for Nagoyaguy, yes you are close to me physically but perhaps not in other ways.

Sorry to disappoint you, but getting an ALT job around here would be, for me, professional suicide IMHO. I just coudn't convince myself that what I would be doing was in any way beneficial EFL-wise to those students. Meeting a class of forty once a month for an hour is not my scene. Being paid to sit at my desk for an afternoon, although at the outset very attractive, would drive me insane eventually. Both these are standard features of the job in Chiryu where my colleague's wife is ALT.

Also, there is the issue of pay. Being an ALT around here would not pay more than my eikaiwa job .

But hey, I wish you well with your idea of contacting the schools themselves and trying to find something yourself. I hope you can though I suspect that they may be less than forthcoming unless you have someone Japanese to act as chuukai for you. I may be wrong.

[PAULH]

[quote="shmooj"]Looked but couldn't find this topic here (maybe I missed it)...

What should I be wary of and am I likely to be ignorant of having had no experience there? Would you recommend it? Are there any colleges etc in particular that you would recommend?

quote]

Shmooj

I dont want to rain on your parade just yet but if I could just let you know a couple of things that have personally affected me and you will need to think about (for the record I am now applying for my second full time university position)

1. Full time contracts at private and public universities are from anything to one to three years. Normally they will indicate an automatic renewal (twice) of a one year contract. Three years in total. That means you will spend six-nine months settling into a positions, finding out where everything is how the school is set up, and in the third year you will spend six months sending out resumes and attending interviews. The last year is really just a lost cause as you are busy setting up your next job.

depending on the school and on the department there may be a requirement that you publish in the school journal. Sometimes contract renewals hinge on your output and number of publications. Quality is not an issue usually unless you aim to submit to a referreed journal. See if you can find out what the school policy is on publications- sometimes three is all you need to get in the door but if you want a serious chance and getting the next position they will look at what you did in the last three years. I had an interview (in front of 10 professors) on the weekend and they asked me in Japanese about an article I wrote 10 years ago. You have to be sharp and on your toes.

Further to this, if you are planning kids the pay is great but you have issues such as schooling costs, where kids will go to school, and it gets pretty stressful on everyone if you have to move around the country every three years. One of my colleagues has 3 kids and is applying for jobs from Kyushu to Chiba.

2. Age is a big issue now with university downsizing: there are less students, less money for the schools and a 40 year old with a pHd is not cheap. they are starting to seek university teachers who are 'younger' and you are considered over the hill at 40. Big worry when you have kids in school like i do, when they want phDs in their 30's

I would recommend university teaching for the salary, perks, the long vacations (though you are usually on campus if you are full time) the intellectual stimulation (thats if you are doing research and publishing on a regular basis) and the intellectual camadarie as you interact with other like-minded professionals and professors, attend conferences (which are paid for by the school, by the way).

[shmooj]

It's 9:15. One hour ago I was at the school in the middle of a semi-private class with two students when I had a revelation.

I was absolutely loving the class. We were having a blast, we were learning high quality English, I'd known one of these students for four years and the other almost a year, we were doing everything from detailed phrasal verb usage rules to discussing the cultural origins of Room 101 and Big Brother from George Orwell (who they'd never heard of). And at that moment, in the midst of all this I realised that if I ever work at a university here I would never have this kind of teacher-student relationship.

You could have knocked me down with a feather.

One major reason I love teaching is because I love my students. THey make it for me. To see a student improve week by week over four years is an immense privilege. ANd then to hear them say "If it wasn't for your classes etc etc" is incredibly rewarding.

Where else would I get that but at a private language school?

So, while I realise that higher pay and longer holidays are all very nice, at the end of the day, as Johnslat said in another topic, "money can cost too much" and I would dearly miss the human element of teaching in a private school.

Sounds like university isn't for me then is it?

[nomadder]

Very significant moment.

I've done eikaiwas and will probably again but also thought about university-money and vacation. You bring up an oft missed point about actually feeling like you're really contributing something and the benefits of the relationships with your students. Eikaiwas often get a bad rap but there are many things to think about.

Good revelation. Hmm?

[PAULH]

shmooj

I agree it is a bit harder to connect with students when you have 40 or 50 kids in a class but there are days you do connect with individual students. I think it depends on the school or institution you are in. I am in an almost all-male atmosphere (design majors have more women in them) and sometimes it can feel rather impersonal, especially when you are dealing with up to 500 students a week.

My junior college classes I enjoy though, as they are mainly women and have only 20-30 students in them, a good number. If students are motivated and you make the class interesting for them it can be a lot of fun, even with larger numbers.

Working at an eikaiwa is probably Ok when you are in your 20's and 30's and single, but when you get in the family way, get fed up with the long hours, and overtime etc, your eikaiwa salary just doesnt go far enough on putting food on the table or putting aside for the future.

[Gordon]

I have to agree with PAULH (usually do anyways). It would be almost impossible to support a family on an eikaiwa salary. Not all classes in unis are large and impersonal either. I have one that meets in my office, I serve them coffee and tea, it's a great casual atmosphere to teach.
The unis also have travel/conference budgets, research budgets and more time off than you need. I'll never tell them that though.

[shmooj]

POints taken.

I should point out though that I am not working at an eikaiwa. I'm working at the eikaiwa

I'm working as Teaching Manager with a reduced load of contact hours in exchange for responsibilities as syllabus/materials designer, trainer and PD facilitator. Consequently, I'm not on your average eikaiwa salary. I could definitely support one possibly two kids on this salary - esp as the wife can pick up part time work pretty much anywhere in early childhood ed. if times get hard. We've done the maths so I'm pretty confident about this.

PaulH you say "there are days" when you have this kind of contact. At my school, in contrast, there are days when you don't have this kind of contact with students IOW it is almost a routine occurence. I have a private/semiprivate student class almost every day of the week which gives me this kind of connection. Not to mention a host of relationships that originally started at the school and are now based in the local community.

What I'm wondering too is whether I would lose these kind of relationships if I worked at private schools in other countries.

[Wolf]

[Gordon]

I was talking in general terms about the eikaiwa jobs. If you make 250,000/month and have a wife and child to support, that is pretty tough. Then when you have kids, you'll probably be down to one salary or pay through the nose for daycare. So to make up for it, you now need to teach lots of privates just to stay afloat. Not worth it in my books.

[Vince]

I went from an eikaiwa to a vocational college. The school didn't seem to be very selective. I was white, on a spousal visa, had a BA in English, spoke a little Japanese, and had some teaching experience. They hired me on the spot, gave me a textbook and workbook, and pointed the way to the classroom. I later found out my boss was embellishing my qualifications to the students. It's unfortunately part-time, so I have to scrape up classes elsewhere during the ridiculously long vacations.

[shmooj]