Aoba Japan International
Clearly using a burner for this. However, I’m giving you all the heads up.
I can only speak for the High School, and I can can confidently say I would NEVER work here again.
Pay is a joke. People were declined raises this year (around 3%) because they didn’t do enough activities outside of teaching. The admin say they came up with a new plan for next year, and average raises will be WAY less than previous structure. They say you can get around 7% (but that’s only if you do stuff in your class, do projects for your school AND do projects for the entire network and business) but there is no clear explanation as to what that looks like - and when asked - leadership couldn’t answer. If you start at the base (which they lowered for next year), and you got a 7% increase each year (nearly, if not impossible), it would take you over 15 years to reach over 10,000,000¥.
Leadership here is anything but leading - they are always in meetings with each other, never in the classroom, never in the hallway. The principal maybe knows 20 kids out of 150 names. He also mixes up teacher names. Rarely responds to emails from parents. We have a lot of kids leaving (and teachers) because of him. (This isn’t a guess, parents have used his name as the reason)
Discipline isn’t a thing. Kids skip class, chew tobacco, most definitely are high half the time. Some kids have attendance below 80%, a good chunk of kids have over 75 tardies. What does the principal do? Nada.
Staff morale: I’ve worked all around, and this place is so depressing for teachers. Luckily, they all get along. However, a group of teachers(social committee) were given a small amount of money (about 2000¥) per staff for the entire year…if you live in Japan, this amount is enough for 4 beers each for the entire year. The amount for social events and morale is nothing. Teachers had to put together their own teacher appreciation day because leadership didn’t. Teachers also have to cover classes. Don’t even get started on the coverage emails
From the principal, they are always wrong with tons of errors - teachers and coordinators usually fix it on our own.It’s a business. It’s barely a school, besides the teacher and students. Business people who don’t even teach or work in the school make decisions for us. That makes no sense.
Turnover: this year, 9 out of the 13 teachers are leaving. Many breaking contract because of the state of the school. The kids are great, and I hope these new teachers (I heard they are trying to combine many positions to hire Less people and make the new teachers teach more) are great.