Everything I’ve heard from JET makes it seem like staying for year 4-5 is exceptionally rare and you have to be very good at the job to get those last 2 extensions. But from reading on here I see a lot more people than I would expect talking about staying 4-5 years.
I’m sure there is a level of ESID at play here, but generally speaking do you really need to be a super high performer to get offered a renewal year 4 and 5 or are BoE’s less selective about that than JET leads us to believe?
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This one really does vary wildly, with some contracting organizations putting a hard stop at 3 years. With those, it’s possible you may be offered the chance to transfer to a different CO. I think during COVID there was a great deal of uncertainty both for JETs and COs, so you saw people staying on longer and being allowed to stay longer.
For mine, they made it seem like only super stars stayed on to their 4th and 5th years. We had to write an essay in English and Japanese but many just had their coworkers translate the English document for them. I noticed a lot of people who arrived in my cohort with the idea of five years in mind burnt out quickly as they had very strong ideas of what their experience was was going to look like.
From my own experience, it seems like if you work for a city BOE, you’re highly likely to be offered a 4th and 5th year, and if you work for a prefectural BOE, it’s almost impossible.
It comes down to each individual BOE. Prefectural ALTs always have the option to stay for 5 years in my prefecture. Not sure about municipal ALTs though.
My BOE wanted us to stay as long as we can. So that worked in our favour.
In Yamaguchi, only municipal ALTs can stay in the same area for 5 years. Prefectural ALTs are capped at 3 years and have to transfer or leave after that.
I did 6. I was municipal for 5 and prefectural for the 6th.
And they were asking me to stay half a year more to see if they could give me a 7th.
I’m going to answer the question in chunks.
Mental health:
It gets exhausting to still be the foreigner after 6 years.
It’s exhausting to speak clear japanese, work for the city as a translator and interpreter upon request, and still have people who respond with “no engurishu” during the most basic interactions.
I know I look very different, eyes up here and ears open, good God.
A lot of your friends you came with/ made in the first year will leave and you are stuck with new ALTs going through the excitement of things while you are the old jaded ALT who is there for support cuz now the BOE thinks of you as the ALT to be the middle man.
You have more Japanese friends and enjoy being by yourself than going to ALT events cuz same shit different day.
Economy:
Money is good. Income compared to costs . You hopefully have at least saved around $30k which will help when you transition.
Health insurance:
How cheap it is to get health care alone is insanely enticing for ALTs from US.
Work:
You are either in camp ‘want to do the same work you did without improving upon it or changing it’ or ‘I will spend more time to improve everything and try changing things’.
If you do your job at the level they find acceptable municipal will ask you to stay the 5 years usually. Prefectural checks to see if you are actually doing well and will offer 5 years.
Statistics:
The year that came after mine had a lot of unicorns. (10+) which was really a large number. Mine had like (3 and me).
Then again most of the (10+) found their wives and husbands in Japan (among ALTs or natives)
Hope this helps.
Edit: I’ve seen people get offered 5th year who did absolutely nothing, played actual video games at their desk and attended like 2 classes a week. The bar is extremely low at some places and Japan hates conflict. (Don’t be that person plz)
I had 2 self evaluations and an interview with the principal a year at municipal. I explained everything I did and did well and failed to do and we talked it out. I was in super traditional school and I had to have serious talks while my friends had coffee with the principal and chatted. (Envious!!!)
In prefectural I didn’t do any self evaluations. I was told I did great by my supervisor. I also did the job of 3 ALTs….COVID times sucked.
During my 3rd the BOE offered me a permanent position, which would mean exiting JET. I was flattered, but asked if would be possible to do a 4th year before going home and they agreed. They really wanted me to stay and made me a few offers to try to get me to stay longer.
Some placements just don’t offer beyond 3, but it really isn’t hard to go longer if it is allowed. As long as you treat teaching like a real profession and follow most of the cultural work norms you will be fine.
The guy after me was apparently pretty terrible. His girlfriend came a couple months later and secretly lived with him. He used sick leave to go on vacation and was stupid enough to post pics on social media. He would also show up to school late and would complain if he had to teach more than a couple classes a day. The BOE didn’t renew him for a second year. Don’t be like him.
Some placements do not allow it, but many do and it’s not difficult to do. Often people don’t want to. Work conditions can be shitty and many want to leave or move onto something better before.
It’s not terribly difficult to do so at least in the area I am in. As long as you do your job, don’t cause too many issues with the Board of Ed and not mess with any of the students you’ll be signed on for your 4-5th year.
JET used to have a 3 year limit, and some placements still adhere to that. My old placement had a 3 year limit and wouldn’t budge on the matter even in the face of corona border closures. My transfer request was approved and I’m able to finish out my last two years at this new placement. Transfers are rare from what I understand, and only happen when certain conditions are met. I was told mine was approved mainly because I had applied when Japan’s borders were closed and no one had any idea when new ALTs would be able to come.
Before leaving, I was under the impression that 3 years was the max, with 4-5 being an exception across the entirety of Japan. However, every situation truly is different, and my city lets you do the 5 years no questions asked. They more or less treat 5 as the default unless you royally fuck up.
In my city, they assume you’re staying 5 years.
It’s always on the table.
The only way you won’t be offered the full 5 is if you really, really fuck up. There’s been people who just stop showing up to work or become major headaches – and they’d be allowed to stay the full five (they usually leave before that though)
Better the foreigner you know than the one you don’t. You have to do something horrible to not see 4-5 in most areas.
While, generally speaking, everyone here is right in that for a LOT of placements it’s very easy to stay for 5 years (6 for me, thanks Corona) there are some placements where that just isn’t an option at all. I’ve got a friend in… I believe it’s Saitama? where more or less the entire prefecture, or at least prefectural JETs (high school) are hard capped at 3 years. They do take part in the licensing program where you can work towards an actual teacher’s license, etc, but in terms of JET it’s a hard cutoff at 3 years.
It really varies a ton. In my case, I think it was in my 2nd year when my supervisor was like, “Something to keep in mind: if you want to stay after five years, we could probably arrange a private hire contract….” XD And that’s what I am, now.
Pretty easy as long as you’re not placed in an area where they cap at 3 years. Even then, people can sometimes get a transfer to another location for the last 2 years if they want.
I did 5 years, then direct hire for 1.5 years until I changed fields. Keep in mind, direct hire isn’t guaranteed (I was at a private school, so they have more flexibility). It’s generally easier to keep an ALT than replacing them every year or two. Most schools like the stability and familiarity of a long-term ALT.
Being renewed for the full 5 years is not what’s hard, it’s wanting to keep doing the job/living in your random placement for that long that makes it hard to stay so long.