Hi everyone! I recently got the email to complete the 1st virtual interview for Amity. I was wondering if anyone has had some recent experience working for Amity. I’ve seen the comments from a few years ago, but I wasn’t sure if anything has changed since then.
If I were to pursue a job with Amity, I’m planning on treating it as a way to get my foot in the door to try to get other teaching positions or to get into another industry (if possible). Any insight into working there is appreciated, so I know what I could potentially be getting myself into.
4 comments
Every eikaiwa is different, and, likewise, every school is different. Amity by and large is similar: the core conversational classes are very straightforward to teach and the training is handled pretty well. There are awful and wonderful managers out there, and both competent and incompetent coworkers. I know people who lasted about two months with Amity, and I also know a handful of non-Honsha teachers who’ve been there for more than seven years and continue onward.
The biggest changes are a stronger focus on sales after rejoining with AEON, which is unfortunate, but not every manager will dump that pressure on foreign teachers, especially not new ones. Other changes also exist but they’re incidental, especially compared to the awful pay or hyper aggressive curriculums of other schools.
As long as you don’t mind wearing a suit 9 months out of the year and understand that brat kids and monster parents are potential (but not guaranteed) hazards, you’re set.
> I’m planning on treating it as a way to get my foot in the door to try to get other teaching positions or to get into another industry
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You haven’t done your research. That job is the exact opposite of “foot in the door”. It’s a black mark on your CV that will take over a decade to recover from. These jobs **are not teaching.** It’s fantasy learning where your job is to keep people smiling not progressing. 8 out of 10 people that take these jobs leave Japan within 24 months as intended. By year 5, 99% have left Japan permanently. It’s a gap year activity, not a path to residency.
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Either come to Japan with experience in the career you want or go to language school and try to get recruited. Don’t bother with eikaiwa or ALT jobs, they are minimum wage migrant traps.
> I’m planning on treating it as a way to get my foot in the door to try to get other teaching positions
Choose a teaching path **before** you come to Japan, get a qualification/MA/license, and learn Japanese. Otherwise, you’ll just be shuffling between eikaiwa and ALT jobs.
> or to get into another industry (if possible).
Ask in r/movingtojapan.
I have second knowledge of a person working there. My friend who is a Japanese woman graduated uni last year for her first job lasted less than a year. She said she hated all the unpaid overtime contacting parents to buy books or programs to meet her sales goals every month. She likes teaching kids, but hated the administrative work after she finished classes for the day to do sales.
My co-worker’s husband who is a foreigner works there and he hates the sales part.
Trying to change jobs here is sometimes easier said than done. There people posting here how their company is terrible but they are stuck there because of the low pay or can’t save money to find another position.