Is my JTE being mean or am I overthinking things

18 comments

1. You will have such a co-worker at least once in your life. I have also had this happen to me, and it also was an older middle aged woman who seemed to pick on younger female co-workers (she had a distaste for my female predecessor too, in general she seemed to not like the foreign teachers extra for some reason). It was very strange because everything always went smoothly when teaching with my other co-workers and I was praised as a teacher by everyone else.

   The important thing is to not let her behavior and comments color your whole impression of JET/being an ALT. Tolerate her, humor her, but above all don’t let her ruin your mood or take it personally. You are NOT off to a bad start, you just have a sour co-worker you have to put up with. Really…don’t take her too seriously.

   She may talk to other teachers, but so long as YOU do your best (take her commentary as suggestions to possibly improve, regardless of how she delivers it) and treat everyone well, it will not stick and you can still make a good impression on everyone else (for example, you could bring omiyage like snacks – it’s hard to dislike the person who is positive, smiling, and brings snacks to work). Perhaps your JTE is just feeling anxiety and stress about learning to work with a new ALT and that’s why she is taking it out on you. I’m sure you can find a better rhythm (or you will just learn not to take her seriously) over time. Things will get better, hang in there~

2. > My JTE came in right before class (she was on a business trip just prior) and just gave me a piece of paper and told me to have a conversation with the students. I was not briefed on anything else.

   This would have made me quite annoyed. I need to meticulously plan, even just mentally, how I will proceed with all my lessons beforehand. If I was given no info or preparation time for a first lesson in a new school, well, apart from being annoyed, I’d make it sure the JTE doesn’t expect me to do anything other than stand there and wait for their specific instruction. If you hand me a vague lesson plan last second and expect me to lead with no explanation, I’m sorry but I’m not doing it. Maybe this wouldn’t be a problem for many ALTs, but its just not how im comfortable operating.

   Anyway, she’s probably stressed from overwork and maybe a shitty situation outside of work. And apparently has a negative view of ALTs and so is taking it out on you. That’s on her, don’t take it personally. Since its only every other week plan A would be, go into “IDGAF ALT” mode, where I mentally put my hands in my pockets and ignore her rudeness while trying to get through the classes following whatever she wants as best I could.

   If situation was causing me an amount of stress that I was unable to ignore, to be clear plan A would probably be fine, but in the extreme scenario I couldn’t handle it, I would complain to my Kyoto S or perhaps the BOE. I’d tell them the situation at the night school wasn’t acceptable to me, and I want to stop going immediately. One thing I wish I could tell 1st year ALT self is, don’t be afraid to speak up when something is beyond your limits.

3. >_When I tried to make small talk with her, I mentioned that I walked to school in the rain because I am used to walking everywhere and I enjoy it. She replied in a pretty snarky tone with, “I think you should honestly learn to use the bus”._

   Never try and flip a negative into a positive in front of someone that is always in a shitty mood. You will have more luck making a connection by talking about all the things that make your day shit. Shitty people love to hear stories about other people’s failures/shortcomings.

4. Don’t let this one crappy co-worker taint your image of Japan or being an ALT. There’s crappy people in every job. This isn’t your fault at all.

   Just ignore her when she’s being mean. Or if you want you can ask her directly why she talks to you like that and whether there is something else going on. There’s a chance she could snap out of it. If you feel like you can’t talk to her I would talk to your VP and/or BoE about her behaviour, say she’s too difficult to work with and that it seems like she doesn’t currently want an ALT at this time…so you’re going to opt out of the night school.

   Do not let it go on for months and months. Fix it now.

5. I hate to sound daft, but she’s…just being a bitch. As others have said in this thread, you will have at least one of these coworkers in your working life. I’d encourage you to, if possible, not waste too much mental and emotional energy trying to get along with or appease this person. Remain professional, do the job as required (showing up, being typically ALT genki for the students, etc), and try and let any snark from her roll off you.

   Best of luck!

6. >It was dropped on me about three weeks into living in Japan that I would have to visit a night high school once every two weeks. This was not communicated to me by anyone. Not the BOE, not my high school, and I found out 1 week beforehand teaching at this other school.

   This happens a lot with my BOE especially after the pandemic started. Sometimes our PA would tell us but then sometimes we found out via official paperwork. We almost missed it one time because the writing on the paperwork was so small. My current visiting school was reallocated to me even though the ALT there was still here. She loved that school. The JTEs of that school tried to advocate for her to stay but the higher-ups at the BOE said no. When I tried asking the ALT liaison, she basically told us that it’s a decision from the higher-ups and we don’t have to tell you a reason.

7. Sounds like she’s taking out her frustration on you, definitely just her being rude. Maybe she had a bad previous ALT, somethings going on in her life or she’s just stressed with work but she’s clearly using you as a target for it. If things don’t get better, you can try bringing it up to your supervisor or BOE and see if you can be switched or drop the school. Else, might have to just suck it up, show up and do what is asked.

8. These night schools usually aren’t high on the list of schools that good teachers want to work at. In my prefecture the BoE would send teachers to schools like that as punishment. So my bet is she’s there because she was incompetent and/or someone who pissed off the wrong person or she’s extremely frustrated that she’s surrounded by incompetent people all day and at this point probably just assumes anyone she meets is incompetent.

   Not much you can do about it though. Just try to be decent at your job and not take her issues personally.

9. Dealt with an extremely similar bitch during my stint almost a decade ago now. After a few months, I laid out all the shit this woman was telling me to my supervisor at my main school. As the teaching community is fairly small in the inaka, apparently this bitch had a reputation. I got some great advice on how to interact with her from my supervisor and was able to continue working with the bitch for two years without letting her get to me.

   Perhaps you can try talking to your BOE or supervisor about it.

10. Ugh, I’m sorry you’re having to deal with that. If she was acting like that just the one time I’d say to give her the benefit of the doubt and assume that her bad mood had to do with her business trip and she was just unfairly taking it out on you. But since it sounds like this has happened multiple times then I guess she’s just like this. Are you in contact with your pred? Is they able to give you any advice?

    I had a relationship with a JTE start of kind of rocky once and things greatly improved when we just booked a meeting room, sat down, and explicitly stated what are expectations were for class and what we expected from each other. It turns out our issues mainly just stemmed from us having different ideas of how class should run and what it means to “team teach.” We were able to compromise and come to a solution and now she’s one of my closest JTEs.

    I’m not saying that everything will turn sunshine and rainbows for you, but since this JTE seems to have no problems with bluntly sharing her opinions, maybe a blunt chat about what you expect from each other and from class could be productive?

11. You got a bitch. Good luck dealing with them.

    In every government office, place of retail, or a business with upper-middle management you’ll have at least one who employee who will nitpick and make your life hell for the sake of bureaucracy because of a superiority complex that’s the result of a sense of high performance but low confidence resulting in
    toxic behavior.

    In your case the office bitch is your JTE. Good luck trying to get brownie points and walking on eggshells because that’s the only way you’ll likely survive their attitude.

12. I came to this thread ready to read some overreactionist typical post but… unfortunately… you probably just got a rude JTE, and you’re stuck until the first chance at rotation. I did have one of those and I just did everything by the rule book. No small talk, no talk outside of business matters. Be cold back. If your Japanese is high level you can of course be petty about little stuff but if not then I’d just stick to the script.

13. It’s hard to say.

    Some JTE are jaded from past experiences and it takes a while to break through that shell to get them to warm up to you.

    Other JTE are just approaching the crabby stage of their lives. I knew one who I could tell really loved teaching but was too temperamental for the job.

    Some are horrible at handling stress and lash out at everyone.

    I’m not defending the JTE, but sometimes there are underlying issues that you probably won’t learn about until they are done and over with.
    The best thing is just to do your best and ignore all the negativity. It you’re in it short term, just hang in there. JTE rotate in and out of schools frequently so you might not have them next year. However, if they ever become threatening make sure to keep a log of what they say and do.

    Also, Sometimes they change. One of my former JTE scared the crap out of me at the beginning. But then he was my biggest cheerleader once he warmed up to me.

14. This sounds almost exactly like a JTE at my school who moved to the school in my 2nd year. She was incredibly rude and condescending to me and tried to embarrass me in front of the students by mocking my Japanese skills.

    I later found out that the other teachers thought she didn’t speak English well and that she was probably insecure around me. I thought her English was fine and I told the teachers that. She was super saccharinely sweet to all the other JTEs and the kids, but rude to me. It was like night and day how her personality would change. I think our personalities just didn’t mesh well and that she didn’t respect me as a young foreign woman. No matter how hard I worked or how good my lessons went, or how kind I was to her, she was always kind of mean to me. She softened a bit over time because I tried to defer to her as much as possible, but I always dreaded going to class with her.

    Sometimes there are just going to be people who you don’t get along with and that’s normal. Japan is a very indirect society, so I recommend talking to another JTE you trust/like about the situation and ask their advice. They might either give you advice or kind try to smooth things over with the other teacher for you.

    It kind of sounds like things just started off on the wrong foot with this person and that that was not your fault. You can only go in and be your best for your students and as nice to her as possible. It’s hard, but whenever someone doesn’t like me for some silly reason I just try to laugh about it in my head. As much as possible, don’t take it personally and don’t let it hurt you. This is probably a person who feels guarded and hurt for some reason and is taking it out on you.

    Again, reaching out to other JTEs is the best course of action. I did that whenever I had any issues and they appreciated how indirect I was. It felt, to my western mind, like I was gossiping behind their backs or something (I much prefer to be direct), but my co-workers explicitly told me that they appreciated how I handled these situations “in a Japanese way.”

15. She’s just a raging turgid bitch.

    Teachers/supervisors/principals will tell you literally zero info, then act offended when you fuck up. I never even officially got told how many schools I have, just one day found out I’m going to a 5th one next week.

    I have one like that, though to my face she is ‘nice’, she constantly gaslights and subtly jabs me in ways she knows I’ll feel. Like deliberately changing things or saying complicated things, to force me to ask for more help, or saying something is good then saying it’s scrapped.

16. It’s not your job to deal with her, yes you have to work with her, but you don’t have to put up with her attitude. It’s pretty common for us to get walked all over when we get here because we are usually to scared to say anything.

    Treat it like any other work place. If someone is treating you poorly tell them that it is unacceptable behaviour in the workplace. The worst that will happen is she doesn’t care.

17. Just be the best you can reasonably be. It’s hard to tell what other people are going through.

18. Im sorry you’re dealing with that. Ive been shortlisted and Im not there yet, but what are the consequences for standing up for yourself? Basically, if you’ve had enough and you say, “Listen, I dont know what your problem is with me, but you are being rude and unprofessional in a work environment and I wont tolerate it. So you can either work with me in a professional manner, or I’ll report you”

    Like I see a lot of JETS tip toe around rude JTEs. Im not the one, because I’ll be rude right back 😅