How to move on from ALT to Private High School Teaching

Why choose private schools?

Some years ago a former university instructor who moved on to another career said something that really struck me - after a few years of university teaching she burned out on the low expectations. The students were not focused on English learning but to fulfill an English language requirement for their undergraduate studies. What I gathered was that the skill level of the university students was not much higher than my middling high schoolers. Fair enough, English language training is a valid mandatory study, but the university situation didn’t sound like the right fit for me.

The private school English departments tasked me with teaching literature and composition, so my students and I found it stimulating to read short essays and stories, novels, and practice essay writing. Later on, I was asked to create a program of studies that incorporated social issues through various teaching approaches. It was fun for my students and stimulating for me.

These days, my teaching context is best described as cross-curricular, drawing on my students’ knowledge in their other courses and demanding of them writing and presentation skills. I’m proud of their achievements.

So how do you get to do what I do? It took a lot of foundation work. I started as an ESL instructor in my home country with a postgraduate TESOL diploma but that didn’t get me all the way to where I am now. A lot of the knowledge and skill I gained through experience and research in Japan.

My first taste of Japan’s education context was through the JET Program placement in a small city where I acclimatized to Japan’s education culture. Over time, my Japanese language proficiency improved. Eventually, I passed JLPT N2 which has made it easier to cope with meetings, correspondence, and discussions with my students in and out of the classroom.

How do you get in?

Schools start with the cherry blossoms, photo Sidneiensis

A lot of the chatter on forums says you need to network to get these jobs. However, the few times I’ve been approached by current or former teachers looking to recruit on behalf of the private school, there were some red flags. For one thing, the schools hadn’t advertised the positions, so it makes you wonder if their HR is not competent with promoting the positions through the usual channels. It may be the school may not be able to adequately describe what their needs or expectations are for new teachers.

I opted for recruitment/placement companies. The first of these companies I worked for had a long relationship with the school. The teachers inducted me through a series of interviews and asked for an essay, portfolio, and a demonstration lesson with feedback from the teachers. While the salary is lower than direct hire it’s still a good way to start building the foundations for direct-hire later on.

Are there job listings?

One resource for finding these kinds of positions is Ohayo Sensei, a long-running website that lists teaching positions twice a month. It’s one long webpage, but it’s easy enough to search for private high school positions. Another source of job posts is JALT job listings. Occasionally, private high schools post positions on Japan REsearch Career Information Network (J-REC).

Connecting with the Community

An insight into the private high school job market is to get involved with professional organizations. At conferences and online events, you meet people who can point you in the right direction. Some professional organizations that welcome contributions from teachers at all levels of education are Japan Association of Language Teaching (ALT) and its many Special Interest Groups, English Teachers in Japan (ETJ), and OTJ.