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Assistant language teachers in trying times
Meanwhile, local boards of education have started to realize they cannot get competent, experienced teachers either by subcontracting to private firms or through the JET program because many of them come to Japan just out of college without any background in education. Taito Ward in Tokyo said it plans to stop outsourcing ALTs to private…
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Attention G-communication teachers and staff
G-Education and its parent company G-communication repeated NOVA’s pattern of broken promises when they suddenly announced the dismissals of 800 former NOVA teachers and staff who had been promised work at G-comm in January. The declaration, coming just a week after the company president publicly repeated assurances of re-employment, leaves many facing once again the…
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Agencies reap tidy profits as temp numbers soar
A record-high 3.21 million people worked at least one temporary job in fiscal 2006, an increase of 26.1 percent–another record high–from the previous fiscal year, according to a Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry report. The annual turnover of temporary agencies was about 5.42 trillion yen–an increase of 34.3 percent from fiscal 2005, the report said.…
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Foreign teachers still waiting for jobs
AUSTRALIANS are among hundreds of foreign teachers who had been hoping for fresh jobs to start the new year but remain unemployed after a firm taking over part of the collapsed Nova language school chain stopped hiring. Nova, whose schools were once ubiquitous across Japanese cities, filed for bankruptcy protection in October, leaving thousands of…
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Firm reneges on promised jobs for Nova teachers
National Union of General Workers Tokyo Nambu, a Tokyo-based labor union [and predecessor of Zenkoku Ippan Tokyo General Union] whose ranks include many ex-Nova teachers, also decried G.education’s sudden announcement. “It was all very sudden. It was a big shock to people,” said Catherine Campbell, who is currently in charge of the Nova case at…
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The G.rinch That Stole Christmas
G.communications has gone back on its promise to hire all former NOVA teachers who apply, announcing on Christmas Eve that 600 applicants would not be rehired. Reasons given for the decision include difficulties in reopening schools, and the company’s plans to relocate the Ochanomaryugaku (interactive TV lessons) operation overseas in order to cut costs. This…
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Up to ex-NOVA 800 teachers left out in cold by new owners
Up to 800 foreign language teachers formerly employed by NOVA Corp. will not be hired by the failed English conversation school chain’s new owners. Officials at Nagoya-based G.communication Group said they are looking into finding employment for around 200 ex-NOVA teachers with affiliate companies, leaving the remaining 600 or so unemployed. G.communication Group bought out…
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Jobs for life
Death by overwork in Japan HARA-KIRI is a uniquely Japanese form of suicide. Its corporate equivalent is karoshi, ?death by overwork?. Since this was legally recognised as a cause of death in the 1980s, the number of cases submitted to the government for the designation has soared; so has the number of court cases that…
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The myopic state we’re in
Fingerprint scheme exposes xenophobic, short-sighted trend in government As Japan sinks into elderly obsolescence and threatens to retire to the economic backwaters, it needs more openness, not less. Yet our leaders insult [non-Japanese] residents by calling them names and policing them further. Not to mention the purposeful xenophobes, capitalizing on a complicated world, who whip…
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‘Eikaiwa’ firms face Nova fallout
Too big, too fast, and with too little quality ? that’s the consensus view of many industry analysts on former language-school market leader Nova Corp., whose collapse left over 420,000 students and 4,000 non-Japanese instructors without an “eikaiwa” home. The Nova affair has already hurt many people: Hundreds of instructors have had to leave Japan…