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Teaching English

raven_guest

Gackt's Girl
26 May 2007
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I've been researching and you have to have a degree to teach English in Japan? I have no degree but have teaching experience, would that not be good enough?
 
Both of you are wrong.

I'm guessing that raven guest is British by the flag under the avatar. Brits are eligible for working holiday visas, which don't require a degree. You can get a WHV and teach in many places, although some employers require a year or two of college on top of that (e.g., NOVA). For more details, read here.
The Working Holiday Programmes in Japan

There are other ways to work legally here without a degree.

1) student visa
2) cultural visa
3) dependent visa
4) spouse visa
5) a few other visa types but with fairly rare circumstances.

Look these up at the Ministry web page.
VISA

You can also get a work visa without a degree (the usual requirement) if you can prove at least 3 years of teaching experience.

I have not seen that second web site before, marsans, and while it looks nice at first glance, I can see some spelling errors and factual mistakes. Buyer beware.

Better sites to visit include
www.eslcafe.com
www.eltnews.com
http://thejapanfaq.cjb.net

Look at the FAQ here, too, especially for information that I've contributed.
 
What are some of the factual errors on the second site glenski, so I can unlearn the misinformation.
 
It's Sunday, and I want to enjoy my family, so this will be a short list.

They said that "the one exception" to getting airfare paid is JET. Rare case, yes. Only exception? Nope.

You don't need it [experience] if you're looking for a plain meat and potatoes entry level English conversation instructor position. The fact of the matter is that the biggest English schools hire students left and right without experience.
Um, they don't hire students. They hire teachers.

your salary is fairly attractive, 250,000 yen per month, for those just starting out. Some schools pay more.
Opinion about whether 250K is "fairly attractive", especially if you live in Tokyo. The factual error here is the omission, not the fact. Yes, some schools pay more, but a lot pay less, too!

Nice summary to compare Big 5 eikaiwas. However, none of the employers actually provides the visa. Immigration does.

AEON has changed how much it subsidizes for rent. It is no longer anything over 42,000 yen. It is anything over 55,000 yen.

If memory serves, NOVA does not give national holidays off. In fact, this is one reason why NOVA is nicknamed NOVAcation. After the first 6 months you are allowed to take off 10 days of paid vacation.

Expect to be paid 250,000 yen per month for a standard contract. This is the "minimum wage" for full-time sponsored ESL instructors.
They are covering their butts by putting those quotation marks in, but there is no further explanation for what they mean, so I will strike out by saying that there IS no minimum wage of 250K for ESL teachers.

A comment about the JET Programme (constantly misspelled as Jet Program) is: "Annual turnover is a meager 2500 to 3000 positions." Considering that there are 6000 positions, I'd say 50% turnover is more than "meager".

Don't be surprised if after you're gone, your host wipes down the floors where you walked. Note: this applies to private homes, cultural landmarks and such, and not to department stores, banks and post offices etc.
Balderdash!

They ask for "visa processing fees" or some other administrative fee. Payment of these fees is the responsibility of your employer and not you.
There are no visa processing fees that an employer has to pay. It is up to you to pay the 4000 yen for the stamp. A generous employer may do so, but it is not obligatory.

Keep in mind that Nova, Aeon and many other giant English conversations schools don't hire from within Japan.
While true most of the time, this is not an absolute.

Most large chain schools don't hire teachers over 35.
No substantiation to this at all.

Full-time positions start at 250,000 yen.
They used to, but a huge number these days are lower. This site has not been updated for a year, but this information is pitifully out of date.

Don't get me wrong. The site is loaded with good, accurate information. It definitely needs some proofreading, but by and large it is a good site.
 
Thanks Glenski for taking the time to weed through that site, I also noticed that AEON's starting contract is now 270,000 yen. It seems like it contains a good deal of useful tips, but also errors.

Again, thanks for taking the time to go through it.
 
They are covering their butts by putting those quotation marks in, but there is no further explanation for what they mean, so I will strike out by saying that there IS no minimum wage of 250K for ESL teachers.

This is the "minimum" that Immigration will allow them to pay before they consider it 'too little' to survive on in Japan and deny applicants (therefor the company) a working visa for them. In recent years theres been talk of people with contracts offering less gettings visas showing that Immigration doesn't have a hard limit, and its not 250,000 any longer.

There are no visa processing fees that an employer has to pay. It is up to you to pay the 4000 yen for the stamp. A generous employer may do so, but it is not obligatory.

A company would have to have someone do the processing, which means filling in forms, going there, handing in lots and lots of forms... most use a lawyer, and they charge money.

At the very least someone has to do it, and that someone is paid to do it.
 
This is the "minimum" that Immigration will allow them to pay before they consider it 'too little' to survive on in Japan and deny applicants
Do you have some evidence or information that shows that this is what immigration uses as a benchmark?

A company would have to have someone do the processing, which means filling in forms, going there, handing in lots and lots of forms... most use a lawyer, and they charge money.

At the very least someone has to do it, and that someone is paid to do it.

That depends on the company and like Glenski wrote as well the company has no obligation to PAY for it, it is up to the visa holder, which as you may know is not the company.
 
This (250,000 yen/month) is the "minimum" that Immigration will allow them to pay before they consider it 'too little' to survive on in Japan and deny applicants (therefor the company) a working visa for them. In recent years theres been talk of people with contracts offering less gettings visas showing that Immigration doesn't have a hard limit, and its not 250,000 any longer.
Minimum they would allow? People have made 250,000 for two decades as a set standard at most eikaiwas, but there is no legal minimum that says this figure is required. The only requirement is for foreigners to make at least as much as a Japanese doing equivalent work. There is no "talk" about offering less; in the past 2-3 years, contracts have offered far less and people take it, so I guess immigration turns a blind eye to equivalency and just decides based on whether you can live on that wage. I've seen salaries offered as low as 150,000 yen/month for FT work! Lately, it seems that the "average" is 200,000 to 250,000.

A company would have to have someone do the processing, which means filling in forms, going there, handing in lots and lots of forms... most use a lawyer, and they charge money.
At the very least someone has to do it, and that someone is paid to do it.
They don't have to provide tons of forms. A contract, proof of who they are (and what size the company is), plus a tax record.
 
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