Hello!
I’m currently looking at moving to Japan, I’ll save you the details, it’s the same as everyone else, I just find the culture, language and history interesting, and have some friends there.
For my background, I’m Irish, with a MA in Applied Linguistics, 3 years teaching experience, a TEFL (online one), a university teaching accreditation (from Madrid), and my previous job was as the Academic Director for an EF school in the UK. I don’t get have a PGCE or CELTA / DELTA.
Given all of that, do you think I’d be eligible for JET, or is there a better alternative you’d suggest? From what I’ve read, JET seems to be a sweet gig, in terms of pay vs what you’re expected to do. I’d be open to going into management too if that was possible.
I’m currently deliberating between JET in Japan or going back to live in China. Obviously China pays better, but the culture & history doesn’t interest me half as much as Japan does.
The window for applications have just opened at the Japanese embassy in Dublin, so any advice would be appreciated!
Thanks ~
11 comments
With an MA, I’d look in to applying for temporary university positions. They pay *far* more and last for a few years. As a real teacher, you’ll be frustrated being a JET or an ALT, as they often don’t make any pedagogic decisions. Your frustration may be compounded by the relatively low pay.
However, the application period for full-time temporary positions is very close to ending (and has already ended for many places), so hurry.
If anything you are over qualified, but go ahead an apply.
The thing about JET though, and many people often forget this, is that they recruit locally. Meaning, how difficult or how easy it is will depend on where you live. If you live somewhere like Los Angeles then it can be very competitive as the pool of applicants is much larger. Each region is given a quota so whether or not you can get hired has more to do with who else applied from your region. Ireland has a smaller quota, but Ireland also has fewer applicants. What I am trying to say is, while I would say your chances of getting a job from one of the larger regions in the US would not be very good because of being overqualified, you might have a chance in Ireland.
One other thing to consider. With your qualifications you can directly jump into university teaching. There are a few, and I really mean only two or three, universities that still recruit applicants from overseas. The place to look for these jobs is on the TESOL (USA) website. For example, Kansai Gaidai is looking for an Assistant Professor and based on what you’ve listed here I think that they would be very interested in you and it would be a position that starts sooner than JET. The application window for this job closes October 11 so you will need to hurry and get your application in.
[https://careers.tesol.org/job/55735/-english-as-a-foreign-language-assistant-professor-april-2024-/](https://careers.tesol.org/job/55735/-english-as-a-foreign-language-assistant-professor-april-2024-/)
Good luck!
P.S. Another university that hires from abroad is Kanda University of International Studies, but their application window closed in July. [https://kandaeli.com/recruit/](https://kandaeli.com/recruit/)
Why would you go from Academic Director to JET??
JETs a good way to start out here if you want a low responsibility gig. After a few years with your qualifications you could easily go to a good international school or start the adjunct pool for uni work or just skip jet and find a full time international gig to begin with. You’ll definitely be overqualified by a mile and it will probably be frustrating to have to take the back seat and have someone tell you how to teach when they probably are doing a less than stellar job of it themselves.
If your goal is to stay in uni you’ll need to get a PhD for a decent full time gig and nowadays most places want 2 or 3 published articles even for part time spots. I’d also consider looking at teaching in korea as the pay and inflation seems better than what’s going on in Japan.
I’d second the other posts about uni teaching. Have a look at the [JACET job board](http://www.jacet.org/job-openings/) to get a feel for what schools want.
China and Korea are perhaps nicer for the shorter term (eg, money), but if you can swing a decent job here, IMO japan is a better place to live/work over the medium/longer term.
JET is entry level you are overqualified as others have said. Apply anyway and see what happens
JET is better than the rest of the entry level jobs but it’s still entry level. You seem a bit overqualified.
There’s Westgate which is dispatch Uni. They pay a little less than JET but you may like it more.
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You will be professionally unfulfilled in JET. I wish that I had gone to China, got my teaching credential while teaching there and saving bukus of money, and then gotten a job in Japan at an international school.
You are too good for JET. Go get a uni job
I have a MA in Applied Linguistics and extensive college-level ESL experience in the US— originally I was also going to apply to JET but I was able to land a uni gig. It’s the best job I’ve ever had— lots of work for sure, but I love my students, the pay is good, and we get semester breaks just like the students do. I don’t want to disclose my uni for private reasons BUT I suggest searching job listings on JALT. That’s where I found the listing (and a number of others that sounded promising). Good luck!