Statement of Purpose

13 comments

1. A couple questions:

   1 – Have you tried Googling or doing YouTube searches about SOPs?

   2 – Have you read this [subreddit’s wiki](https://www.reddit.com/r/JETProgramme/wiki/index/) (particularly the “I don’t have Japan/Teaching/volunteer/international/etc experience. Am I eligible?”)?

   3 – Have you tried searching this subreddit?

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   If you have already, then you already know there’s a large amount of people that don’t have teaching experience/background that got in, as well as numerous tips on SOPs.

   JET is like a job like anything else, so the first and most important question you need to ask yourself is:

   * ***Why do*** **you** ***want to come to Japan/JET?***

   This is what your SOP will be about.

2. if anything they want someone without teaching experience or a background in teaching. I had zero and they accepted me! Like with any application just sell your positive attributes and the rest will come naturally.

3. Hey, feel free to give me a dm. I had Japanese experience but no teaching career or degree aside from tutoring more or less. 🙂

4. Hello! This is my first time posting on Reddit but I’m going to be applying too! I don’t have much teaching experience, just a year or so but all my other jobs have been retail ones. I think you should just talk about your personal goals when making it to Japan as well as your positive attributes.

   You want to talk about how you’ll contribute to Japan and the education system as well as taking the knowledge you’ve learned there, back home to tell others! I think you’re going to do amazing and I hope you get accepted! Good luck.

5. A large majority of JETs don’t have a history of teaching!

   Rather than focusing on the teaching side of JET, focus on the cultural exchange aspect and how that can relate to your personal goals!

6. Not to come off as rude, but I feel like the connection between JET and HR/your future is pretty clear.

   The E in the JET program stands for exchange. Exchanging information about your culture and learning about others’ cultures. I feel like any HR rep would benefit greatly from that type of cultural knowledge and experience.

7. My last year in my job was in HR actually and I’m going to Japan this year. I did use my experience in HR guiding new employees as a plus but remember that we are going as English speakers to act as Assistant Language Teachers to exchange cultures. So that would NOT be an issue at all.

8. I’m going through the same thing right now. 4 year business degree, business related job experience, etc. I want to go to Japan more than anything, but have had writer’s block for 2 weeks now ):

9. I worked with my University’s career center on my SOP. My mentor advised me to focus on my study abroad and Japanese experience. I had teaching experience, but ultimately left it out of the SOP at her discretion. I got shortlisted.

   I think the benefit that you have coming out of the HR world is that you’ve literally been the person *who has to go through the pile of applications and narrow it down to best potential candidates* . So you know what’s a red flag or a “don’t even waste time straight to the shredder without even finish reading” application looks like.

10. I too don’t have any prior teaching experience. I’m a business grad who did a lot of travelling and also multilingual so when I was writing my SOP I related those in how my interest and JET would intersect.

11. I’m an IT major, worked in IT for a number of years, spent time in the Army as an aviation mechanic, etc. Talked about some of that in my SOP, mainly the Army stuff as it directly applied to my ability to adapt to new surroundings. Shortlisted and went to Japan in 2019. Loved every minute of it until Covid hit and I was locked in a teachers room for months with nothing to do, no classes and no more ability to travel on the weekends.

    You really don’t need any experience teaching, though it may help just from a lesson planning perspective. I totally winged it with resources I found online and had a blast with my students as T1 in our conversation classes. I was a T2 tape recorder in all other classes as they were focused on test-prep and not actual learning.

    Anyway, all of this is to say that you don’t need to be a teacher, and despite you feeling like you can’t relate your experience to the program, I can almost assure you that your experience is applicable in some form. Have you trained anyone at work? Do you have to explain things or converse with new people that you aren’t yet comfortable with? Do you have to do any planning in your role? Do you have remote, offshore or otherwise “foreign” workers? Do you interact with those people frequently, and if so are there considerations that you must make when doing so?

    You really have to take a step back and familiarize yourself with the idea of “soft skills” because those are the ones they want you to identify in this circumstance, not whatever HR-specific knowledge you might hold.

12. I majored in science and had very little teaching experience before applying and got shortlisted. Feel free to message me, I’d be happy to talk to you about it!

13. [https://medium.com/@rahil.chadha7/my-jet-programme-statement-of-purpose-adea1b03b318](https://medium.com/@rahil.chadha7/my-jet-programme-statement-of-purpose-adea1b03b318)

    Here’s a link to my SOP – I didn’t have any formal teaching experience (corporate background). Hope this helps 🙂