What’s to feel positive about? The average pay keeps going down, there are less positions available available and ALTs/Eikawa are viewed as increasingly unnecessary thanks to online/apps
I had great experiences personally, but the pandemic is really forcing things to change. I personally hate online learning and will always advocate for in-person teaching… but at the end of the day, it’s up to the BoE’s, and they want to save money. So of course, online is the cheaper option.
And now I’m force to confess that after being an ALT, if they do the change for what I think should be an absolute requirement, I would’ve never made it in due to financial concerns. Basically, make it like how teaching in Korea is: ALTs must have a MINIMAL of a TEFL degree-or at least certification-, and preferably one of the better ones; i.e. not the random $40 you find on groupon.
Also doesn’t help that courtesy of Japan’s “soft power” in the form of various entertainment (anime and such) as well as “Look how beautiful our country is! Come and visit!” you’ve got a ton of people just looking for any way into Japan for about a year or so, so the companies can literally pick and choose. Especially with a two-year backlog now.
One of these days people in power will realize the entire program is a pointless waste of money.
As long as people are willing to come to Japan and work for very little money, dispatch companies wont be forced to raise wages or conditions. Hard to see any positive changes in the near future.
A lot of people here are feeling negative, and that’s fair. Being an ALT will always be a low reward job with fierce competition just to get in. That’s not changing and will probably get worse.
One positive thing happening in schools here is the increasing levels of content taught in English education. More content = more need for ALT. I don’t see the job becoming obsolete any time soon, at least as long as most teachers here continue to have low English speaking abilities.
The whole concept of the ALT is silly. Why would you hire people with no educational background or experience to teach? The only requirement is that they were lucky to be born in certain countries. Most of the time they don’t even teach much anyway, just do reading exercises and other activities. It’s obvious the concept was thought up by non educators with an alternate agenda (appease western politicians during a period of anti-Japan sentiment).
The future is bad. There are people with really difficult to understand English pronunciation, without proper teaching degrees or licenses willing to work for next to nothing.
A local kindergarten in my area was known as the “rich kids school” hired nothing but non native speakers who can’t even pronounce the silly English names they force the kids to use.
Luckily my city uses direct hire ALTs but unless they are given the ability to actually *teach* rather than dance around with the silly Japanese ABC song, then there is no really hope for English education in schools
It’s been on a continual downward slide for many years, and I don’t see that changing.
8 comments
What’s to feel positive about? The average pay keeps going down, there are less positions available available and ALTs/Eikawa are viewed as increasingly unnecessary thanks to online/apps
I had great experiences personally, but the pandemic is really forcing things to change. I personally hate online learning and will always advocate for in-person teaching… but at the end of the day, it’s up to the BoE’s, and they want to save money. So of course, online is the cheaper option.
And now I’m force to confess that after being an ALT, if they do the change for what I think should be an absolute requirement, I would’ve never made it in due to financial concerns. Basically, make it like how teaching in Korea is: ALTs must have a MINIMAL of a TEFL degree-or at least certification-, and preferably one of the better ones; i.e. not the random $40 you find on groupon.
Also doesn’t help that courtesy of Japan’s “soft power” in the form of various entertainment (anime and such) as well as “Look how beautiful our country is! Come and visit!” you’ve got a ton of people just looking for any way into Japan for about a year or so, so the companies can literally pick and choose. Especially with a two-year backlog now.
One of these days people in power will realize the entire program is a pointless waste of money.
As long as people are willing to come to Japan and work for very little money, dispatch companies wont be forced to raise wages or conditions. Hard to see any positive changes in the near future.
A lot of people here are feeling negative, and that’s fair. Being an ALT will always be a low reward job with fierce competition just to get in. That’s not changing and will probably get worse.
One positive thing happening in schools here is the increasing levels of content taught in English education. More content = more need for ALT. I don’t see the job becoming obsolete any time soon, at least as long as most teachers here continue to have low English speaking abilities.
The whole concept of the ALT is silly. Why would you hire people with no educational background or experience to teach? The only requirement is that they were lucky to be born in certain countries. Most of the time they don’t even teach much anyway, just do reading exercises and other activities. It’s obvious the concept was thought up by non educators with an alternate agenda (appease western politicians during a period of anti-Japan sentiment).
The future is bad. There are people with really difficult to understand English pronunciation, without proper teaching degrees or licenses willing to work for next to nothing.
A local kindergarten in my area was known as the “rich kids school” hired nothing but non native speakers who can’t even pronounce the silly English names they force the kids to use.
Luckily my city uses direct hire ALTs but unless they are given the ability to actually *teach* rather than dance around with the silly Japanese ABC song, then there is no really hope for English education in schools
It’s been on a continual downward slide for many years, and I don’t see that changing.