Language School - General Information Needed

[Grim Roach]

Good day, I'm going to consume 30 minutes of your lives.

I am interested in actually staying in Japan and I pretty much had the gist of what I should do.

About myself:

I have a college degree (International Studies related), and currently have a full time job at a large company, by the time I go in Japan, I'd probably have 2 years of work experience under my belt. Job field is just a regular desk job though.

How much I know:

I made several attempts to apply in language schools before and was unfortunately rejected leaving the expensively translated documents to waste.

I applied through the internet and sent the documents by mail... the hard mail not e-mail and once through a relative who lives there.

Now here's the problem:

Those attempts were around 2 years ago, although my determination is still as strong as ever, most of my knowledge have been lost... I changed PCs, the old one died. So much for digital documents.

Here are my questions:

1.) Unlike before, I plan on going there on a tourist visa and enrolling at a Japanese Language school. I believe this might give me a better chance at getting accepted, is this possible?

If so, may I have a site or link that tells me the procedure?

I'm targeting those 1 year language programs, but is this enough for a JLPT Level 1?

2.) What am I going to do AFTER the language school?

Do I seek employment or do I enroll for an actual school? If it's the latter: I'm thinking of those one year vocational schools.

3.) Will I get employed? Legally speaking?
Please feel free to ask more about myself in order to answer this question.
The degree I have is from a well-known school, it's recognized by my country and actually have a good name, so rest-assured it's not one of those shady schools.

Yeah, I know it's hard: I mean the economy isn't helping and my nationality doesn't actually have a good name...

4.) I need "all" the website/links I could get that can help me with this.

So far, this is the only one I have:
一般財団法人 日本語教育振興協会

This is pretty much the only place I can ask. I'm very serious and understand that this is a life changing decision, I'm mentally, physically and financially prepared for this. That's why I'm asking these questions. Furthermore if you feel that there's something I need to know, please tell it to me even if it sounds extremely discouraging and offensive.

I deeply appreciate your time.

 

[Grim Roach]

I won't use the edit button this time. Just to make my original post less of an eyesore.
I'm surprised that my topics from 2 years back are still around, I'm checking it out.

But my questions still stand.

EDIT:

I'm slowly finding the information I want one by one as I browse this site.

 

[prixs]

1.) Unlike before, I plan on going there on a tourist visa and enrolling at a Japanese Language school. I believe this might give me a better chance at getting accepted, is this possible?

I actually asked this from one language school and they told me it's not possible if you come with three month tourist visa. Language schools only do pre-college visa applications twice a year (<- correct me if I'm wrong). It also takes quite long period of time to get the pre-college visa. You might be able to do it with six months tourist visa and you're able to do it if you come with dependant visa/work visa or working holiday visa. I have seen application procedure plan in every language school's web site.

I'm targeting those 1 year language programs, but is this enough for a JLPT Level 1?

Depends your Japanese skills now. Some chinese have done it, though they've prehand knowledge about kanjis. If you're almost in level 2 then you could make it, but if you're only a beginner you can't. Level 2 might be possible and it's usually enough for schools.

2.) What am I going to do AFTER the language school?

Well, what do you want to do after you graduate from language school? Most people have a reason why they go there. They want to enter Japanese uni/college/special training college. Some need it for work, some go back to their home country and put their japanese knowledge in good use there. You can enter school in Japan if you want (after taking EJU exam/JPLT exam etc.). Depends.

I don't have an answer for if you'll get employed, but my guess would be a no. You don't have a degree from Japan nor you have that much of usefull work experience. Japan has enough Japanese to do desk work. But who knows? You might get lucky, maybe somebody needs just you.

Do more research. And find other forums.

 

[Glenski]

One year in a language school will definitely not get you to JLPT1.

Here is a link from The Japan Times for major language schools in Tokyo.
http://classified.japantimes.com/ads/jpsc/
Some seem to have weekly or monthly courses.

2.) What am I going to do AFTER the language school?

Strange question. What do you want to do for work? Most non-teaching jobs require a fairly high (JLPT2) level of Japanese. Look up DaiJob or Career Cross for examples. You are only going to have generic office experience and weak Japanese skills. I'd say make yourself far more marketable. Far! Ask yourself this: what can I do that a Japanese person in the same field cannot? That's essentially why they would hire you. Just to say you have a couple of years of American business office experience and a degree in International Studies (related) is not going to cut it.

 

[epigene]

I think all the information we can give you have been provided here and in your earlier threads.

The reality is that you're not going to get marketable Japanese language skills in one year. The exceptional students who do are mostly Chinese or Koreans who already have working knowledge of kanji characters.

Don't ever try to get into a language school (actually impossible under the current admission requirements) or try to find work on a tourist visa. Even if you manage for the length of your visa, this fact alone will make you target of the immigration authorities. You very likely won't be able to extend your visa unless you are able to give a clearly legal and justifiable reason for the extension. When the authorities find out what you are actually doing, you will be expelled promptly and even blacklisted and banned from entry for many, many years.

The job market is so bad that many Nikkei people (foreign nationals who are part Japanese) from Brazil and other South American countries are going home, despite the preferential treatment they receive from Japanese immigration authorities in terms of visa because of their Japanese background. They worked in the manufacturing industries (such as automaking) where language skill isn't the most important job requirement, but these jobs had disappeared with the recession. Frankly, these jobs aren't likely to come back after recovery as manufacturers move their operations to other countries to cut costs. A lot of them cannot speak/read/write Japanese well enough (read: near-native level) to land jobs in other industries.

BTW, why were your language school applications rejected, I wonder?