Hi everyone,
Please remove if this is in the wrong place. 🙂
I’m a Maths/Science teacher of 7 years experience in Australia and I’m looking at a change. I’ve looked at advertisements for teaching at International Schools (usually spinoffs of UK private schools) in Japan that deliver lessons in English and all they say is “Competitive International Salary” or words to that effect. I’m looking for what that means roughly so that I can tell if it’s even worth starting to jump through the hoops.
Hope someone can help or point me in the right direction!
9 comments
Best case scenario, probably between 5 or 6M yen per year.
If I ever get into Leadership at a school, salaries will be made public. So tired of that practice.
I worked as a direct hire assistant language teacher. Had a coworker with a Canadian teaching degree who started as ALT, but got upgraded to a proper teacher when they decided to open an international program. He managed to get them to agree to pay the equivalent of what he’d make in Canada. Maybe you can try negotiating that?
Hello, Australia pays more than most international gigs. China and the Middle East are the few exceptions. There are some countries that come close due to CoE and saving potential, but in terms of salary in the paycheck Australia is difficult to beat.
For non-boarding schools, 5m to 6m sounds about right for mid-high level international schools. However, you can get more than 6m at quite a few schools nowadays. For example, schools like Nishimachi start at 500,000. a month.
It is difficult to match public school salaries from most western countries if you are an experienced teacher. I am at the highest level of the salary scale back home in Canada so my salary would be ~$99k CAD (10 at Category 6). Even the highest level international schools in Japan would have a rough time matching that. At the end of the day, a lot of the experienced teachers coming to Japan are not only coming for the pay. I hope you enjoy your time here!
Hey, I’m also a teacher from Australia who is currently working at an international school here. From what I’ve personally seen/experienced you’d be looking at about 5.5m minimum. If you have experience specifically in the same curriculum as the school, you might be looking at 6m+. Leadership goes up more.
CoL is a big difference. I came from Melbourne and pay difference was maybe 35% paycut to what I made in Australia. But I’m currently traveling more here _and_ saving at least AUD$1.2k per month on top of that. Back home I stayed home mostly aside from term breaks, and saved about $500 a month.
Feel free to DM if you wanna discuss further.
Salary for teachers in international schools in Japan is abysmal.
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With the pending economic downturn looming, my advice is, don’t come. I guarantee you, in the near future, many international schools in Japan will fold.
Competitive means the lower the short-listed candidates are willing to accept.
In general, you will make less money in Japan than you would in your home country. What “makes up” for this fact is that Japan is a safe, clean and stable country. How important money is depends on the individual so we can’t answer this exactly.