English Teacher Needed in Takamatsu, Kagawa

[englishbizkagawa]

Hello,

A new and quickly growing English language school in Takamatsu, Kagawa is seeking qualified English teachers. Our company, englishbiz, is growing due to our core values of "teaching" rather than "entertaining". Experienced teachers in Japan know the difference. Our students are mostly elementary school-aged kids, and more than half of our current students have come to us after being in a major eikaiwa chain school.

No singing or dancing required. We do not play games, but rather develop our curriculum on real English learning strategies. We know what we are doing as both a company and school, and have developed our curriculum which we believes works well, but are also very glad to work cooperatively with innovative teachers who want to help us work with kids and bring their own creativity to the classroom. Salaries begin at 250,000 per month, travel expenses covered by the company. Interested parties are welcome to send their info to englishbizkagawa at gmail. Please send your CV, a letter about yourself as a teacher and a recent photo.

Thanks to LJ forum for allowing us to post here on these boards. Have been lurking quite a bit, and enjoying the threads.

M. Groenewold
englishbiz, Takamatsu, Kagawa

[allblacks]

Welcome to LJ and best of luck finding a suitable candidate for the position. I especially liked the NO SINGING OR DANCING comment!

[englishbizkagawa]

Thanks for the nice note. Much appreciated.

Indeed, I am pretty serious about the no singing and dancing required (but... I do confess, we do sing the ABC song with the very youngest learners on occasion..) At any rate, even there it is not REQUIRED.

To give a little background on the situation, I am a long-term teacher in Japan and I think that by now I have taught in almost every situation where English is taught in Japan (except for the big eikaiwa chains--a serious omission perhaps). I came to Japan on JET from 92-95, I taught private high school, tandai, college, university, graduate school, big company classes, small eikaiwa, and for a very short dark period I even worked for a dispatch company. After having a number of very challenging working environments, and getting kicked in the shins more than a few times, I decided that I need to grow my own school from scratch. I wanted to do things "right" and to make a school and system of learning where people would be proud to work, and where parents feel a strong need to send their kids. We`ve been at it for a short time, but the growth has been quite dramatic. I really believe that it is because of the "no singing no dancing" policy and tone. Our school is founded on educational principles and everything we decide to do it measured against our "purpose".

We are really looking for a good teacher or two to join us here in remote Shikoku. I know that the location is not as glamorous as say.... Toyama or Fukui... but anyway, we have a company I am proud to be building and we need real educators to come and give us a hand.

Thanks for letting me post here LJ. I really do appreciate it.

Cheers all,
Mark

[SamhainP8]

Have you got a website link?

It would give you a bit more credibility, otherwise it sounds like a great story but you could just be trawling for resumes.

[Wage Slave]

http://www.englishbiz.jp

Nice looking site. I might tap you up later to find out who built it.

Good luck with your search. What you are doing is the antidote to the NOVAs and Geos's. Power to your elbow. I'm in the process of starting my own school with very similar aims and objectives. Eventually, fingers crossed, there will be a network of them countrywide.

Imagine that. Schools owned and run by teachers rather than weirdo shysters. Schools that are actually run to do their job well.

[angryboy]

Imagine that. Schools owned and run by teachers rather than weirdo shysters. Schools that are actually run to do their job well.

What??!!Are you serious?Can these places actually exist?

Jokes aside,good luck.

[Tall Tall Tree]

http://www.englishbiz.jp

Nice looking site. I might tap you up later to find out who built it.

Think so? The table-based and left-edge-hugging design, the blatant keyword packing, the inconsistant font sizes and colors, the tacky animated rainbow arrows and other poor image usage, and the fact that there's just way too much content on the front page… This is not a professionally-built site. (Or if it is, however much was paid, it was far too much.)

[Wage Slave]

http://www.englishbiz.jp

Nice looking site. I might tap you up later to find out who built it.

Think so? The table-based and left-edge-hugging design, the blatant keyword packing, the inconsistant font sizes and colors, the tacky animated rainbow arrows and other poor image usage, and the fact that there's just way too much content on the front page… This is not a professionally-built site. (Or if it is, however much was paid, it was far too much.)

Ah but you are judging it from am American point of view, Lots of glaring colours, tacky animations and all that other stuff is required here. If it isn't there, it doesn't get read. You can't fight the the customers' beliefs and expectations.

Given all that I think it is the best and the most tasteful, I have seen so far, for an English school in Japan. I am told it reads very well in Japanese whatever you may say about fonts and web design in America.

[allblacks]

I agree with the above. The site comes across a lot better than g-com etc and their ilk. I dont teach anymore by choice but if I did it would be with someone like these guys. Good stuff indeed.

[englishbizkagawa]

The website is something that is a continual work in progress. We did not hire out to have a flashy site made but started up on a total shoestring budget. We are a total start-up so as we progress and grow we will also take more time to polish up the site.

Running our own school is a job that takes most of our waking hours, so we just keep pushing along.

Thank you guys for the nice comments regarding the content and intent of our work. We are in full agreement that English schools should be run by people who have actually worked in one. Perhaps a parallel can be made between someone working in the mail room and then learning about their company from the inside and growing into their future role. I feel a keen responsibility to treat teachers with the respect they deserve. Also as a parent, I am becoming more and more empathetic to people who work hard to send their kids to school and try to improve their kids' education with after-school lessons. The English teaching industry has seen some pretty shady characters. I hope that our school can work against that tide.

[wilde_oscar]

It's been a while since the last post here - are these guys on the GBU part of LJ?

[Edogaijin]

I noticed on the website that they want people with 'neutral' accents. Does that mean the guy in the videos who has a strong North American accent will or has been fired?

[wilde_oscar]

What is a "neutral" accent? Maybe that South Korean robo teacher?

[InTheColdLightOfDay]

What is a "neutral" accent?

Swiss.