Quote:
Originally Posted by MMM
1) Be a native speaker of English from a country where English is the major language in Europe, North America or Australia/New Zealand.
2) Have a BA or BS from an accredited four-year college or university.
That's about it.
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I just wanted to point out that in NZ, Australia and the UK, in most cases a BA or BSc (<- =BS) is finished in 3 years- mine was, and it was fine for getting me a working visa. A lot of people not from North America who have degrees see people constantly mention the "4-year degree" thing and assume they don't qualify, which is not the case.
I also wanted to correct someone above- while Nova did go bankrupt, it did not collapse in 2008- it was immediately bought out by a company called G-Com, who continue to run it even now. It is not as large as it was before, but it is still there. G-Com also bought out Geos on its bankruptcy just recently.
As for what's happening with the English teaching market, Japanese people really just aren't signing up for English conversation classes in as large numbers these days. There was an English conversation class "boom" in the late 80s and 90s where everyone wanted to take classes, and that has basically finished. One of the reasons Geos went bankrupt is that they had something like 35,000 fewer sign-ups last year than they did the previous year. Of course that has a lot to do with the economic recession as well as the end of the "boom".
I first arrived in Japan in Japan in 1995 when it was joked that anyone with a pulse could get a job teaching English here, and it was pretty much true.
It's much harder now- there are still plenty of jobs, but definitely not as many as before, and there are lots more people applying for them, so you really have to stand out.