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English teachers say sayonara to a not-so-super Nova
TEACHING English in Japan: a working holiday in a truly strange and different country (to those of us not Japanese); getting paid for talking your own language in a classroom; spare time and funds for culture in Kyoto, night-clubbing in Shinjuku, deep powder snow around Nagano. Or whatever. It seems so cool and out-there —…
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Nova faces long road back
With Monday marking one month since English-language school operator Nova Corp. filed for court protection, there is still no prospect of students receiving refunds on tuition fees and many Nova employees have chosen to leave their jobs. G.communication Co., a Nagoya-based language-school operator, has taken over Nova operations and resumed offering lessons at 25 branches…
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Nova boss lived in cloud-cuckoo-land
“The superintendent at my apartment says to me, ‘Your rent is three months overdue; I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you to leave,”‘ says Adele, who came from France six months ago to teach at Nova. “So I did a frantic Net search and found a place charging ¥40,000 a month. One six-mat room in…
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Ex-President Sahashi claims he is victim of NOVA crash
Ousted NOVA Corp. President Nozomu Sahashi told the Sunday Mainichi in an exclusive interview — the first he has given since the collapse of the English conversation chain — that “before I apologize to everybody, I want to get NOVA back on its feet.” Sahashi, 56, vanished from public view as NOVA struggled throughout the…
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Hungry Nova teachers teach for food
A labor union representing former teachers at failed Nova Corp. launched a program Saturday that enables students to pay for language lessons by buying them meals instead of paying tuition fees. Nova has closed its schools nationwide, depriving nearly 300,000 students of classes and keeping the teachers out of work and pinched for money. At…
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Worried NOVA students crowd into Osaka hall for meeting
The NOVA Students’ Association held its first meeting here on Friday, with many students appearing worried as they listened to the explanations about the company. About 1,000 participants poured into a hall in Osaka with a capacity of about 250, prompting the sponsor of the meeting to quickly find another location. The group was formed…
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G.education officially takes over NOVA
Preparatory school operator G.education has officially taken over NOVA, the failed operator of Japan’s largest English conversation school chain, company officials said. The takeover took effect after a representative for G.education and receivers for NOVA signed an agreement on the handover on Tuesday. Osaka-based NOVA filed for court protection from creditors under the Corporate Rehabilitation…
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New NOVA school opens
A company that has taken over NOVA Corp., the failed English school chain, has opened a new school here, company officials said. G.education, based in Nagoya, remodeled its “EC” English school as a NOVA school and opened it near Nagoya Station in Nakamura-ku. The company will hold meetings for NOVA students and new students on…
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The takeover of Nova
The court-appointed trustees of Nova Corp. have given up trying to rehabilitate the nation’s largest language-school chain and have chosen a Nagoya-based company to take over part of Nova’s business. Although the trustees’ quick decision suggested that a business solution was at hand and the new company says it will “basically hire” all Nova teachers…
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Reemployment offers likely for half of Nova staff, teachers
Nagoya-based G. communication Group, which will take over business operations of the failed English-language school chain Nova Corp., announced Monday it had issued unofficial job offers to 1,760 foreign teachers and Japanese staff formerly employed by Nova. G. communication plans to issue job offers to a further 694 people from Nova who have registered their…