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Ryan28
Joined: 09 Apr 2005
Posts: 7
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 Posted: Tue Apr 12, 2005 9:35 pm Post subject: Any advice appreciated |
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| Hi, this is my first post. I've read some of the other threads and seen some good advice dispensed so maybe you guys can help me. I've got a B.A./Ph.D and I've taught in Japan with Nova (a hellish 7 months), a private high school and ECC. All together I've got close to three years experience as an EFL teacher in Japan. I really enjoyed working with ECC but, and I mean no offence to anyone still doing it, I would kind of like to move on to better and brighter things now if possible. I'm back home at the moment but seriously thinking about going back to Japan. As I've said I don't really want to go back to a Nova/ECC type deal though. Can anyone suggest a way into the university tutoring/lecturing arena? My Ph.D is in History/Politics so it's not exactly ideal but ..... Anyway I know about ohayosensei, jobsinjapan, gaiginpot and obviously Dave's but can anyone throw a bit of new light on this issue for me? Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Cheers. |
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PAULH
Joined: 28 Jan 2003
Posts: 4672
Location: Western Japan
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| Posted: Tue Apr 12, 2005 10:01 pm Post subject: Re: Any advice appreciated |
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| Ryan28 wrote: |
| H said I don't really want to go back to a Nova/ECC type deal though. Can anyone suggest a way into the university tutoring/lecturing arena? My Ph.D is in History/Politics so it's not exactly ideal but ..... Anyway I know about ohayosensei, jobsinjapan, gaiginpot and obviously Dave's but can anyone throw a bit of new light on this issue for me? Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Cheers. |
do you have a Masters degree, or just a combined Masters PhD.
Firstly, its unlikely you will get hired for a university position while you are living overseas. You will need to be in Japan for interviews. With no publications you will likely not be considered for full time jobs though there are some schools that do hire without publications. Part time is your best bet, but most universities wont sponsor your visa if you are part time.
getting jobs is about connections, networking and knowing people. You can read the job ads such as http://jrecin.jst.go.jp and http://www.jacet.org has listings. You will need what the university asks for and being able to speak Japanese is recommended.
Foreigners are generally hired as language instructors and teaching oral communication classes. Testing is also another area where schools look for experience, as many schools now offer TOEIC classes. You will unlikely be hired to teach history in English to Japanese students and such ESP teachers would need high level skills in Japanese. Jobs do exist but they are very rare and most non-English teaching jobs go to Japanese academics.
Last edited by PAULH on Wed Apr 13, 2005 12:06 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Ryan28
Joined: 09 Apr 2005
Posts: 7
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| Posted: Tue Apr 12, 2005 11:23 pm Post subject: |
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hey Paul H/Daniel?
Many thanks for your reply. I don't actually possess a Master's Degree. I was working towards a master's by thesis and when I submitted the thesis I was advised to switch to a Ph.D. course. So in effect I went directly from a B.A. to a Ph.D. which isn't all that uncommon in the West but is relatively unheard of in Japan I believe. My Japanese is nowhere near good enough to teach any sort of course through Japanese. Ideally I would love to teach in my own specialist area but I'm realistic enough to accept that finding a job teaching English is far more likely. The trip to Japan wouldn't necessarily faze me given the right circumstances as I have plenty of friends that I'd like to see anyway. Once again thanks for the reply and I will definitely be checking out those two websites from now on. |
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pnksweater
Joined: 24 Mar 2005
Posts: 173
Location: Tokyo, Japan
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| Posted: Tue Apr 12, 2005 11:42 pm Post subject: |
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I'm no expert on the university job market as this is my first university position in Japan. It seems that the main difficulty in getting a university position is locating one that is hiring. These aren't exactly the kind of positions that are regularly advertized through normal Japan ESL job forums.
I got mine through connections with my university back in America. It was a position specifically aimed at drawing teachers and recent graduates with experience working with their exchange students abroad to the university in Japan. None of the other teachers in my office got the job through this venue. However, of the four new teachers in the office two were hired from abroad (they were teaching at unis in China and Tailand) with telephone interviews.
Of course now that I have a university position it is much easier to find lisitings of other positions available through the job board or interpersonal connections. It may be helpful to land a few part time university positions and work those until you can land a full time position (visa status providing).
Be aware that the job pool for university positions is shrinking sharply due to a lack of inrollment (declining birth rate and all) and a general belt tightening taking place nationwide.
I would reccomend coming to Japan on a eikaiwa type job and apply for positions as the come up. You will be available for interviews, have a working visa so that you can take on the odd part time uni position, and be able to dispose of your position relatively guilt free when you land enough part timers or a full time position.
Oh, and Paul is right about the qualifications... but that doesn't mean that they're written in stone. I have zero academic publications, and as a new teacher my experience at the university level is limited to my years of students teaching. My masters is, though, from a related field. While speaking Japanses is a great asset, many of my coworkers speak minimal Japanese. However, my university is unusual in its treatment and hiring process for it's foreign English teachers. All 23 of us are in our own western style office with a bilingual student assistant to help out with any stick situation. Each school is different. |
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PAULH
Joined: 28 Jan 2003
Posts: 4672
Location: Western Japan
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| Posted: Tue Apr 12, 2005 11:46 pm Post subject: |
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| Ryan28 wrote: |
hey Paul H/Daniel?
Many thanks for your reply. I don't actually possess a Master's Degree. I was working towards a master's by thesis and when I submitted the thesis I was advised to switch to a Ph.D. course. So in effect I went directly from a B.A. to a Ph.D. which isn't all that uncommon in the West but is relatively unheard of in Japan I believe. My Japanese is nowhere near good enough to teach any sort of course through Japanese. Ideally I would love to teach in my own specialist area but I'm realistic enough to accept that finding a job teaching English is far more likely. The trip to Japan wouldn't necessarily faze me given the right circumstances as I have plenty of friends that I'd like to see anyway. Once again thanks for the reply and I will definitely be checking out those two websites from now on. |
So all you have at the moment is a BA and you havent graduated from a PhD course. Schools here arent interested in almost finished and ABD (All But dissertation). there are a few people I know now working on Masters degrees by distance etc but in general you need to have graduated and have your Masters degree in your hand, not something in between. Get your PhD and then they may consider you. (a PhD though sought after will probably be more than you need for teaching English to freshmen, but many schools want PhDs so they can cut down the numbetr of applicants and say they have pHds on staff. At the moment in Japan, schools ask for higher qualifications from foreigners than they ask for Japanese staff. Many of the people hiring you will not have a pHD and a few will only have a BA in a university, esp. some of the older professors. thats the way things are going. With a PhD ABD you may be considered for part time work teaching one or two days a week to get your foot in the door. A majority of places expect and demand a completed Masters degree.
I teach at a university now and students by and large are monolingual and English levels are extremely low. The average TOEFL score is about 250 or 400 on the TOEIC. Students could not handle a lecture in English on a non-language subject, unless they were high level English majors, and/or returnees. Somewhere like Jochi /Sophia in Tokyo may be your best bet but my guess is jobs are very competitive and they dont advertise often. PhD would be the minimum requirement. As I said publications are required for full time positions, you wouldnt teach seniors or graduates unless you were full time, and you would need a teaching record in a university in Japan. Everyone starts at the bottom here. |
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PAULH
Joined: 28 Jan 2003
Posts: 4672
Location: Western Japan
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| Posted: Tue Apr 12, 2005 11:57 pm Post subject: |
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| pnksweater wrote: |
| IOh, and Paul is right about the qualifications... but that doesn't mean that they're written in stone. I have zero academic publications, and as a new teacher my experience at the university level is limited to my years of students teaching. My masters is, though, from a related field. While speaking Japanses is a great asset, many of my coworkers speak minimal Japanese. However, my university is unusual in its treatment and hiring process for it's foreign English teachers. All 23 of us are in our own western style office with a bilingual student assistant to help out with any stick situation. Each school is different. |
Not all universities require publications, but a recent article showed that out of 50 job applications over 50% demanded 2 or more publications. With 40 or more people applying for a position, you are at a serious disadvantage with no publications.
Also, even if you have none to your name, your school will expect you to publish in the school journal and often contract renewals are contingent on your publishing output, even if it means only one or two articles. Many part timers where I am speak only a little Japanese but full timers many schools ask you to have some Japanese ability for meetings, reading office memos. If you have a japanese assistant thats great but many schools do not have people just to help the non-Japanese speaking foreigners. There are Japanese staff in the teachers room but most only speak Japanese and basic English. |
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Ryan28
Joined: 09 Apr 2005
Posts: 7
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| Posted: Wed Apr 13, 2005 12:25 am Post subject: |
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| Thanks again guys. Just to clear it up. I took my viva voce back in January 2003 (my reason for leaving Nova - though I'd have found another one if necessary!) and I graduated with a PhD in October 2003. I have one publication though of course it's not in a linguistic-related field. I appreciate what you guys are saying about taking a job with one of the language schools and then working into a university job on a part-time basis initially. I'm desperately hping to avoid this approach if at all possible though. I do have 3 years of prior teaching experience in Japan so I'm hoping that might count for something. I guess I'm just going to have to be patient and hope something suitable turns up. |
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PAULH
Joined: 28 Jan 2003
Posts: 4672
Location: Western Japan
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| Posted: Wed Apr 13, 2005 2:08 am Post subject: |
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| Ryan28 wrote: |
| Thanks again guys. Just to clear it up. I took my viva voce back in January 2003 (my reason for leaving Nova - though I'd have found another one if necessary!) and I graduated with a PhD in October 2003. I have one publication though of course it's not in a linguistic-related field. I appreciate what you guys are saying about taking a job with one of the language schools and then working into a university job on a part-time basis initially. I'm desperately hping to avoid this approach if at all possible though. I do have 3 years of prior teaching experience in Japan so I'm hoping that might count for something. I guess I'm just going to have to be patient and hope something suitable turns up. |
Apply to a language school with a PHd and you run the risk of them saying you are over qualified. Even a Masters degree is too much for many of the bigger schools, as they are looking for BA grads just off the boat. Someone who has spent 10 years in academia may have a hard time fitting into a commercial private language school where the business is profit-centered rather than on education.
You still need to get your foot in the door somewhere, be flexible about where you work and see it as being a place where you can make contacts (you wont find them in language schools, so you have to network and get in a uni somewhere).
This was mentioned before, but school rolls are dropping, they are cutting back on hiring, reducing classes, and making current FT teachers teach more classes. More people applying for jobs with shrinking pay. You do have a chance, but you need to have a growing list of things to even be considered and there are universities also where conditions are not that great, and jobs are being farmed out to dispatch companies and eikaiwas.
For more info on Universities look at the links on http://www.eltnews.com and on http://www.debito.org/univquestions.html |
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Ryan28
Joined: 09 Apr 2005
Posts: 7
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| Posted: Wed Apr 13, 2005 6:09 pm Post subject: |
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| Thanks again Paul. Those 4 websites will be valuable resources and provide me with an excellent starting point vis a vis being aware of the opportunities that exist before I make any firm commitments one way or the other. I really appreciate your help. |
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joncharles
Joined: 09 Apr 2004
Posts: 132
Location: Beijing
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| Posted: Thu Apr 14, 2005 7:21 pm Post subject: |
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Paul, maybe an option would be to look at some of those new schools opening up recently that teach the entire curriculum in English. I have had a student leave our school and move to someplace in Mie Prefecture to attend an all English school.. I believe there is one in Shizuoka too. If they are hiring Native speakers now, I don't know.. they probably have a backlog  |
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PAULH
Joined: 28 Jan 2003
Posts: 4672
Location: Western Japan
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| Posted: Thu Apr 14, 2005 9:40 pm Post subject: |
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| joncharles wrote: |
| Paul, maybe an option would be to look at some of those new schools opening up recently that teach the entire curriculum in English. I have had a student leave our school and move to someplace in Mie Prefecture to attend an all English school.. I believe there is one in Shizuoka too. If they are hiring Native speakers now, I don't know.. they probably have a backlog |
If you are thinking of Katoh Gakuen it is still a Japanese school which uses an immersion program where some subjects are taught in English instead of Japanese. the foreign teachers there are licenced by the Japanese Min of ED to teach in Japanese schools. they have Japanese teacher licences. Another point to consider. |
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