Sorry if this post is kind of similar to posts made in the past. Anyways, I am a TESOL degree holder working in Japan as an ALT. I graduated from a TESOL program in college (which mainly focused on ENL/ESL but I had things like student teaching internships, training on pedagogy and classroom observations), but only have a BA. I currently teach in the countryside and don’t really like it, and would like to move elsewhere for circumstances mostly not related to my job. I also find the ALT position I am in to be rather unfulfilling. Teaching is my passion, and my dream is to eventually become a university professor or lead teacher in the future. I chose to forgo the teaching license examinations back home due to COVID, and because the license only lasts for 5 years then expires since I would not be in my home state (they have very strict rules). My dilemma is should I take a risk and look for other jobs, or should I stay with my unfulfilling ALT job while I do a distance online master’s TESOL program? I would look for jobs after I receive my master’s. I’d like to get advice from those currently in this industry. Thank you!
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You’re in about the toughest spot you could be from progression in the field of teaching in Japan unfortunately. There’s a massive gap between entry level and “legit” teaching positions here as far as qualifications go, especially if you want to be in one of the major cities. What you need from here depends entirely on if you want to move in to college teaching, or to become T1 as a core teacher in J/S HS.
College is more straightforward, the minimum for cold applications is an MA, 1-3 years experience (usually in Japan), and 2+ publications of some sort. If you’re willing to work in the countryside or at a lower tier school, you can get away with less, and if you have connections through adjunct/part time experience it gets easier as well. The minimum will always be an MA + connections, but the jobs are not secure. Currently most college contracts are a revolving door 5 year contract to avoid having to hire people full time with full contracts. So every 5 years you’re going to have to move to another university most likely. Tenure/full professorship is not a thing unless you get a PhD, 5-10 pubs, and 5+ years experience with connections.
For J/S HS, it’s…. complicated. Basically Japan does not recognize *any* qualifications or licensure outside of its own system, and without a license you cannot legally be T1 for a core credit (“real”) class. There are some special/limited licenses, but how to get those and what they qualify you for varies and they can be exceedingly rare to get. There are definitely schools and contexts that ignore these laws/regulations, but on paper you still would not be classified as a “teacher”, rather, still an ALT. If you want the special teaching license, you need a sponsor, usually the principal of a school you’ve worked at/are working at, and there’s a process of verification of skills/knowledge that varies prefecture by prefecture. If you did manage to get it, you can do all of the same things that the Japanese teachers do, including homeroom teacher positions.
Honestly it’s probably a better idea to stick with ALT’ing and using all your free time to build up your credentials (that master’s program and Japanese if you aren’t N1 already).
I was in a very similar boat that you find yourself in now. I was unfulfilled teaching as an ALT and wanted to take a more active role in teaching. I moved to eikaiwa and found myself with less free time and just as little fulfillment. Most eikaiwas have people who never taught telling you how to teach. It’s grueling.
You’ll need a teachers license if you want to pursue a career in K-12 education. You can luck into a private school position but the license would make you more attractive/qualified for the special license which is a requirement to be a homeroom teacher in a Japanese school. If you want to go abroad to another country you’ll need a teachers license. The only situation where the teachers license is not useful or beneficial is if you want to teach adults.
Apologies in advance, but I won’t sugar-coat what you are up against. I know this post will get downvoted as being negative, and exceptions will be trotted out that you need to try, but those five people in the know will give me an upvote or just keep quiet as I should
For the last ten years or so, our buddy Hakubun messed up a system that was already suffering. (Look up Hakubun if you have never heard of him).
English University teaching, in general, is mostly dead-end, and non-Japanese will almost always get the nod because they usually have an MA or better, can work on committees, teach in Japanese, and do office work pawned off to the departments, and can write peer-reviewed research. A license to teach from a foreign country has little to no impact, in general. An overseas license may even work against you, lest you be intent on “shaking up the system with exciting and meaningful classes.” lol.
Japanese university professors are vetted on a Ministry-mandated system, and you get a ranking of how high you can teach and advise (marugo). If it looks like with can’t even get the lowest level, they will pass you over unless you are part-time or on a year contract, as then they don’t have to submit your documents.
In most cases, pedagogy, internships, classroom observations, and other such “things” are not really valuable for most universities and might even be a disadvantage.
Considering the committee work, academic society expectations, and ability to advise students in Japanese, why would a Japanese university hire you over the competition?
In very general terms, for 99% of open positions, the only reason you would be hired is if it was for a contracted position of 20 or 25コマ of conversation classes with little to no research funds and no expectations of service to the school or department.
For the remaining 1% of positions where the university cares, an MA, Ph.D., college-level teaching experience, and vetted research papers (papers are ranked from 0.0 to 5 depending on the field) on a Scopus-registered journal will be tallied. Only the last three to five years of papers officially count. After that, they are stale for evaluation purposes.
Thus the competition goes from none to extreme and there is not much in between.
If you want to teach university in Japan, check out 教員公募 and take a look at what you will need. Download an application just to look at the volume and amount of material needed just to apply, and remember that many highly-qualified Japanese and non-Japanese candidates have pages of papers and books and experience and don’t even make the first cut.
> I currently teach in the countryside and don’t really like it, and would like to move elsewhere for circumstances mostly not related to my job. I also find the ALT position I am in to be rather unfulfilling.
Then you should not stay any longer.
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> Teaching is my passion
Then you should get a teching license. You may have to spend a few years in your home country
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>my dream is to eventually become a university professor
Please keep in mind for university professors, *research* is their primary passion. Do you like doing research?