Job: Assistant Director – Center for Global Education, University of Wisconsin (Whitewater)
Jobs 
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Posted by Jayme Tsutsuse (Kyoto-fu, 2013-Present), organizer of Cross-Cultural Kansai. Click here to join the JETwit Jobs Google Group and receive job listings even sooner by email.
Position: Assistant Director
Posted by: Center for Global Education, University of Wisconsin – Whitewater
Location: Whitewater, WI
Type: full-time
Overview:
Founded in 1868, the University of Wisconsin – Whitewater is a premier public regional university with an enrollment of over 12,000 students in 50 undergraduate majors, 13 master’s degree programs, and one specialist degree program. It offers high-quality, career oriented programs with a model general education curriculum. UW-Whitewater is part of the 26-campus University of Wisconsin System. Located in a community of 14,622 residents near the scenic Kettle Moraine State Forest in southeastern Wisconsin, Whitewater is within convenient driving distance to the metropolitan areas of Milwaukee, Madison, and Chicago.
CLAIR magazine “JET Plaza” series: Philippe Arseneau (Miyagi)
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Each month, current and former JET participants are featured in the “JET Plaza” section of the CLAIR Forum magazine. The January 2014 edition includes an article by JET alumnus Philippe Arseneau. Posted by Celine Castex (Chiba-ken, 2006-11), currently programme coordinator at CLAIR Tokyo.
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“In my experience, four factors made a difference in this awkward transition from Japan to Canada, from classroom to career, especially with regards to landing and holding a rewarding job: building a professional network; showing initiative; getting involved; and tailoring one’s job to one’s background and interests.”
Philippe Arseneau (Miyagi-ken, 1991-94) is from the Canadian Province of Québec and grew up in Montréal, the world’s second largest French-speaking city. Drawn to Japanese martial arts in his early age, Philippe developed an academic interest for Japan’s economic prowess while studying Labor Relations at the University of Montréal in the late 1980s. Changing his line of study to Anthropology, he specialized on Asian cultures and graduated with a Master’s degree after writing a thesis on “The Emergence of Initiation Rituals in Large Japanese Firms”. The JET Programme came as a fitting opportunity to deepen his understanding of Japan, and in the summer 1991 he was sent to Miyagi Prefecture where he taught English for the first year in the rural community of Tajiri, the second in Sendai, and the third in Natori. Soon after returning to Montréal, he worked as a sales representative for Japan Airlines until 2013. He now is a Japan lecturer at the University of Sherbrooke.
From Classroom to Career
Having graduated from the JET Programme nearly 20 years ago, I was asked earlier this year to deliver a keynote speech before representatives of the Canadian JETAA on the transition, difficult for some, from Japanese classroom to career at home. This paper is a concise version of it.
First, here is some background: I am a Montreal-born Canadian, raised in French, who learned English at school but more intensely through a series of summer jobs as a river guide in Ontario where I met my wife. And a couple of bilingual kids later, I am now pushing 50. I hold a MSc in Cultural Anthropology, with a focus on Japan. Admittedly not a market-oriented diploma. Weeks after submitting my final thesis in late spring 1991, I left to work as an ALT (AET back then) in Miyagi Prefecture where I would stay three years. A new Emperor had been anointed two years earlier. The economic bubble was starting to deflate. Japan banks were still the wealthiest on earth, the nation’s gigantic trade surplus fueled anger abroad and had caused an image problem for years, to which the JET Programme was allegedly meant to provide a partial solution by exposing western graduates to its culture in the hopes they would eventually go home to spread the gospel of a new and open Japan.
Like most ALTs, I taught English, but occasionally French. I also edited a JET prefectural newsletter called “The Miyagi Drum”. Nurturing post-graduates dreams, I spout on a new Japan cultural thesis and applied for doctoral studies at various universities around the world, expecting a grant or some kind of academic interest. Unfortunately, I never got to see the project through because of a career choice. And that brings me to the main topic of this article: professional life after JET. No doubt, the JET Programme can contribute to shaping one’s career as it did mine, though it offers less to those whose professional ambition lies outside the business of education– which was back then and perhaps still today the case with most ALTs. For want of providing highly transferable work skills, the JET experience managed at least to arouse curiosity among potential Canadian employers, but did not clinch me a job in and of itself. In my experience, four factors made a difference in this awkward transition from Japan to Canada, from classroom to career, especially with regards to landing and holding a rewarding job: building a professional network; showing initiative; getting involved; and tailoring one’s job to one’s background and interests.
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Writer, researcher, and JET alumnus Matt Leichter (Saitama-ken ’03-’05) will give an encore performance of his lecture, “College Education: Certain Debt, Uncertain Income.” It will again be hosted by the Henry George School of Social Science in New York City. The event date is Wednesday, January 29, at 6:30 PM. The location is not the school’s normal address; instead it will be at:
NYC Seminar and Conference Center
71 West 23rd Street (corner of 6th Ave.)
New York, NY 10010
Here is the lecture’s abstract:
Soaring costs for education, together with limited job opportunities and stagnant wage growth, place substantial financial and psychological burdens on students.
Noted columnist and researcher Matt Leichter reviews tuition inflation, cuts in public funding and the business of lending to students. Mr. Leichter will also propose reforms to the system of financing college education.
Space is limited; please register to attend by emailing hgs.billy@gmail.com.
Job: Visitor’s Associate at Japan Society (NY)
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Thanks to JET alum Christy Jones of Japan Society (NY) for passing this on. Posted by blogger and podcaster Jon Dao (Toyama-ken, 2009-12). Click here to join the JETwit Jobs Google Group and receive job listings even sooner by email.
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Position: Visitor’s Associate
Type: Part-time
Overview:
The Visitor Services Associate maintains the Japan Society’s visitor service’s desk as an ambassador interacting with the general public. This includes greeting and welcoming visitors, answering questions, providing information about exhibits and programs, selling tickets, memberships, and catalogues.
Duties include: processing ticket orders and gallery admissions; selling memberships; light clerical duties; accepting packages; assisting visitors, trustees, donors, and vendors on the phone and in person, and assisting with related activities and projects. Read More
Thanks to AJET’s Sarah Stout and Kay Makishi for passing on this JET-relevant opportunity. Posted by blogger and podcaster Jon Dao (Toyama-ken, 2009-12). Click here to join the JETwit Jobs Google Group and receive job listings even sooner by email.
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Overview:
Each year, an independent committee of six experts – three each from the United States and Japan — selects one outstanding Japanese and one outstanding US citizen to be a resident Sasakawa Peace Foundation Fellow at Pacific Forum’s Honolulu office. This prestigious fellowship opportunity supports a mid-career academic or professional by providing the cost-of-living and institutional support to allow him or her to explore a security-related issue that concerns the alliance. Fellows are provided with the following: Read More
Job: Global Experiences Coordinator – Penn State (University Park, PA)
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Posted by Jayme Tsutsuse (Kyoto-fu, 2013-Present), organizer of Cross-Cultural Kansai. Click here to join the JETwit Jobs Google Group and receive job listings even sooner by email.
Position: Global Experiences Coordinator
Posted by: Penn State’s Liberal Arts Career Enrichment Network
Location: University Park, PA
Overview:
As a member of the College of the Liberal Arts career enrichment team, the Global Experiences Coordinator is a key contributor to the Network’s efforts to increase and support Liberal Arts students’ participation in a range of international experiences. The Coordinator will work with the Network team to provide overall career information and advice, including resume reviews and individual student meetings.
JET Talks: Temple by Temple Sneak Peek
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JET Talks is JETAADC’s speaker series modeled after TED Talks that features dynamic and interesting individuals to inspire innovative ideas and conversation on Japan within the DC community.
Chelsea is from Guam. Elayna is from Michigan. In 2009, they both moved to Japan with the JET Programme to teach English in Ehime Prefecture. While there, they traveled the 900-mile pilgrimage route in Shikoku visiting 88 temples in 15 days. With so many stories from the trip, they began looking for a way to combine their talents (Elayna illustrates; Chelsea writes) to tell these stories. Using Kickstarter, they successfully funded their project and returned to Shikoku to travel the pilgrimage route once more — this time creating illustrated hand-bound books, postcards, bracelets and more for the 270 donors that made their trip possible.
On Wed., Jan. 29, Chelsea Reidy and Elayna Snyder of bigricefield.com will make a TED Talks-style presentation at Georgetown University in Washington, DC (register today!) telling their story — from their time on JET through their book project, crowdfunding, and the relationships they built along the way. Until then, Chelsea and Elayna have shared some pictures from their journey…
Coming down from temple 24 we found a cat curled up on our packs.
Chelsea paused on the way down from temple 60. After biking up numerous hills, the road became to steep and we had to leave our bikes and finish the trek on foot.
This illustration was inspired by all of the help we received along the way. Here, a woman offers the girl fresh spring water.
You can find more pictures of their journey and illustrations from their book on the JETAADC blog.
【RocketNews24】Five of Japan’s best locations to ski and snowboard
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Posted by Michelle Lynn Dinh (Shimane-ken, Chibu-mura, 2010–13), editor and writer for RocketNews24. The following article was written by Philip Kendall (Fukushima-ken, Shirakawa-shi, 2006–11), senior editor and writer for RocketNews24, a Japan-based site dedicated to bringing fun and quirky news from Asia to English speaking audiences.
For those of us up in the northern hemisphere, winter is already in full swing. And for skiers and snowboarders, that can mean only one thing: the snow-covered mountains are calling and it’s a race against the clock to get the most out of them.
Treated to generous snow dumps each winter and coupled with the fact that so much of the country is mountainous, Japan is one of the best locations in the world for ski and snowboarding fun, not to mention some of the best powder snow in the world. But which resorts should you be sure to visit before the powder turns to slush? Check out this list of five of Japan’s greatest, and our favourite, places to ski and snowboard!
Job: Program Coordinator – Humphrey Fellowship Program, Vanderbilt University (Nashville)
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Posted by Jayme Tsutsuse (Kyoto-fu, 2013-Present), organizer of Cross-Cultural Kansai. Click here to join the JETwit Jobs Google Group and receive job listings even sooner by email.
Position: Program Coordinator
Posted by: Humphrey Fellowship Program, Vanderbilt University
Location: Nashville, TN
Type: full-time
Overview:
Posted by Albert David Valderrama (Ibaraki-ken, 2010-present), JET Programme ALT/PA, co-founder and National Co-Representative of API AJET, and Chief Editor of @API.
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@API Issue #004 is out now! Read the full issue at goo.gl/NDIFEs or click the image below.
@API Issue #004
Inside this issue:
- A reflective essay by JET alumna, Melody Wong, API AJET co-founder and former National Co-Representative.
- A report on the “Ganbappe Philippines Charity Event” in Fukushima.
- A bilingual interview with Arturo Toyama Higuchi, CIR from Peru (courtesy of the CIR Network).
- And many more!
What is @API?
“@API” is a web-based magazine put together by contributors and members of the Asian Pacific Islander Association for Japan Exchange and Teaching (API AJET).
What is API AJET?
Asian Pacific Islander AJET (API AJET) was created during the summer of 2012 following many talks about the specific issues the API community faces.
This special interest group (SIG) aims to create a supportive environment for all APIs living in Japan. We also hope to increase awareness about API issues and incite dialogue among curious JETs and non-JETs. Furthermore, API AJET hopes to act as a tangible resource for anyone interested in understanding an API’s unique perspective (as a foreigner) in Japan.
The group is open to all. Join to share, discuss, and learn about the API experience. Membership is free!
For more information go to our website at api.ajet.net, email us at api[at]ajet.net, or find API AJET on Facebook and Google+.
Career: Resources for Professional Development in the Nonprofit Sector
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By Ellen Abramowitz, (ALT Shiga-ken 2012-13), a New York City native with a background in international energy, environment and sustainability nonprofits. She hopes to continue to promote community-based change in how people interact with their environment through education and action-based programming.
Currently, there are about 1.5 million nonprofits in the United States. These organizations are present in many fields including government and policy, economics, health, environment and the arts. If you are looking to advance your career in the nonprofit sector, or volunteer with a nonprofit organization, there are certain skills that are always needed by these groups, which generally achieve great results with a small staff and a tight budget. Gaining skills in project management, grant-writing, fundraising and budgeting – even if it is not your focus area – will help you stand out from other candidates.
Resources:
The Foundation Center (foundationcenter.org) connects people who want to change the world with the resources they need. They provide information about finding grants and donors. In their New York City location, they provide many free and low-cost classes monthly on topics like proposal writing, budgeting and networking. These are necessary skills for anyone interested in a career in nonprofits. Here is the January calendar:
http://foundationcenter.org/newyork/jan_2014.pdf;jsessionid=P55IMQU0MNKKZLAQBQ4CGXD5AAAACI2F
Another helpful resource is Read More
Life As and After JET: Building Bridges
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Recently posted on JETAA NSW site by Eden Law (Fukushima-ken, 2010-11):
The JET Programme has lead to many opportunities and careers, sometimes rather unexpectedly. Our Life After JET articles by former JETs gives an insight about their lives after the programme, and how it has shaped their careers and paths. We hope that it will prove useful as an insight for potential applicants into what we as ex-JETs got from our experience, and maybe provide some nostalgic memories for others. Please feel free to contact us if you want to write about your own experience!
Nathan Poore was an Oita CIR from 2004 – 2007, after which he used his JET experience working as an Events Coordinator and Translator for Waseda University in Tokyo until returning to Australia in 2010. He gives us a fascinating insight into what CIR does, as opposed to the life of an ALT.
In July this year, it will be ten years since I first arrived in Japan as a participant on the JET Programme. Looking back at my JET experience, my fondest memories are of the wonderful people that I had the pleasure of meeting and getting to know personally during my placement. Apart from being an unforgettable experience on a personal level, JET also became a fantastic professional opportunity. I learnt and developed a wide range of transferrable skills, even though I often did not realise this at the time.
As an undergraduate student, early on I had decided that I wanted to apply to the JET Programme. The grassroots exchange opportunity on offer to live and work in Japan, whilst utilising and improving my Japanese language skills was exactly what I wanted to do after graduation. A number of friends had also successfully participated in the programme, and highly recommended the experience. With the support and encouragement of my Japanese lecturers, I submitted my application. After an interview, I was fortunate to be accepted to the programme in the role of Coordinator for International Relations (CIR). My placement was in a small town called Ume*, located deep in the mountains of southern Oita Prefecture, Kyushu.
I arrived in Japan in July of 2004. My new supervisor and a few other colleagues made the two hour journey north from Ume to greet me at Oita Airport. Nearly ten years later, I still remember how friendly and welcoming my new colleagues were at the airport that day. I soon realised this sense of openness and warm hospitality were characteristics shared throughout the town. I spent the first few nights in Ume with my supervisor and his lovely family. It was summer, and those first days were spent in a haze of introductions to colleagues and neighbours, trying out the delicious local cuisine and attempts at getting used to the southern Oita dialect. I remember feeling at the time that my textbook Japanese was too formal, and I was eager to learn as much of the local language as possible.
My role as a CIR was to facilitate grassroots cross-cultural exchange activities in my area. In reality, this meant organising cultural events for the local community, visiting schools and other facilities, attending local events and basically getting out amongst the community and interacting with as many people as possible. Working together with my Japanese colleagues and other CIRs placed nearby, I planned various cultural events from proposal stage to running the event on the day. This involved gaining the support of my direct supervisor and section chief for each project, starting with a written proposal. With often limited or no budget allocated for these kinds of activities, it was important for me to consider the resources already available to receive the green light. I had many ideas (not all of them practicable) and after each project I sought feedback to try and make the next one more successful. During my time as a CIR, some of my particularly memorable events and activities included teaching Australian-style bush dancing to senior citizens, accompanying a group of locals on an official trip to Queensland as an interpreter, and publishing a commemorative collection of essays from all of the previous CIRs placed in Ume, to name a few. I could not have achieved what I did without the support and guidance of those around me, both inside and outside of the office.
My local CIR network was an incredibly diverse, talented group of people from across the globe, always happy to offer their support and share their skills and expertise. As many JET participants will have experienced, my role as a CIR extended further than the usual nine to five. Whether I was buying groceries at the supermarket or attending a local festival, I was always meeting new people and having conversations about life in Australia and Ume. These kinds of interactions were some of the most enjoyable and memorable for me personally. After living in Ume for three years, I was fortunate to have made many close friends, and feel truly grateful for the kindness extended to me. On a professional level, participating in the JET Programme taught me to be flexible in my thinking, and how to communicate and work successfully with different kinds of people. I learnt how to be resourceful, resilient, and proactive in order to achieve my work goals. I improved both my written and spoken business Japanese, in addition to public speaking in both English and Japanese. I gained experience in event planning, translation and interpreting, and teaching children and adults. These types of skills and experiences that JET participants gain are highly transferable across various roles, and personally speaking I have greatly benefited from my JET experience in my professional life since completing the program.
For new JET participants, I highly recommend getting involved with your local community as much as possible to make the most of your experience. For those who are returning home, I encourage you to stay in touch with your friends and colleagues from Japan, and get involved with your local JET alumni chapter, which is a great way to network and maintain your connection with Japan.
*Ume amalgamated with Saiki City in March of 2005, together with seven other nearby towns and villages.
Job: Assistant Director of Student Services at Showa Boston
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Thanks to JETAANY board member Clara Solomon for passing this on. Posted by blogger and podcaster Jon Dao (Toyama-ken, 2009-12). Click here to join the JETwit Jobs Google Group and receive job listings even sooner by email.
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Position: Assistant Director of Student Services
Type: Full-time
Overview:
Showa Boston Institute has an immediate opening for a full-time Assistant Director, in the Student Services Department. This new position works in collaboration with the Director and the Assistant Director to design, implement, and assess intercultural services and programs designed to help achieve the Showa Boston Mission.
This position will supervise the following areas or initiatives within Student Services: Health Services, Resident Services, university outreach, data management, coordination of short-term programs, student orientation, and assessment. Read More
JQ Magazine: Film Review—Hirokazu Kore-eda’s ‘Like Father, Like Son’
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“As in his other films, Kore-eda’s action unfolds in minute detail and slowly evolving scenes. His static camera and well-balanced visual frame reference Ozu, another director concerned with Japan’s modernization and the traditional family.” (© 2013 FUJI TELEVISION NETWORK, INC.AMUSE INC.GAGA CORPORATION. All rights reserved.)
By Lyle Sylvander (Yokohama-shi, 2001-02) for JQ magazine. Lyle has completed a master’s program at the School of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University and has been writing for the JET Alumni Association of New York since 2004. He is also the goalkeeper for FC Japan, a New York City-based soccer team.
The winner of the Jury Prize at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival, Hirokazu Kore-eda’s newest film, Like Father, Like Son, features a stronger narrative arc and story than his previous films, which include the metaphysically philosophical After Life and the naturalistic Ozu-like Nobody Knows. In fact, the film’s plot reads like a Hollywood high-concept pitch: two families discover that their children are not their own due to a switch at birth. Developing a “nature vs. nurture”-type approach to the subject, Kore-eda gives the families different socioeconomic backgrounds.
Ryota Nonomiya (Masaharu Fukuyama) is a high-achieving architect who lives in a modern Tokyo high-rise apartment with his wife Midori and their six-year-old son Keita (Keita Ninomiya). The other father, Yudai Saiki (Lily Franky), is a working class shopkeeper who lives on the outskirts of the city in a nondescript housing block with his wife Yukari (Yoko Maki) and the young Ryusei (Hwang Sho-gen). By presenting these two disparate backgrounds, Kore-eda examines the nature of father-son relationships and familial influence in modern Japan.
Much of the film’s action concerns the responses to the shocking new information. Do the families try and “switch” the children again so that the original wrong can be corrected? Now that they are inseparably involved in each others’ lives, do they try and raise the children together? Or do they simply carry on as before, complicit in their knowledge that neither child is living with his biological parents? Kore-eda examines each of these scenarios as the characters try to confront a situation that life has not prepared them for.
Job: IT Positions at Eureka Co. (Tokyo & Nagano)
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Thanks to AJET Council Member and Block 4 Representative Sarah Stout (Yamanashi-ken) for passing on this JET-relevant opening. She notes it was originally posted to the AJET Block 9 Facebook page by Nick Woolsey (CIR Tottori-ken, 2011-13) who currently works for Eureka.
Nick says, “For those of you who are not re-contracting, do any of you want to stay in Japan, move to Tokyo, and not teach English? That is exactly what I wanted last year when I was looking for work, and the company that hired me is looking into hiring more foreigners this year! If you have any interest in the IT industry, fill out this brief application and we’ll get back to you to schedule an interview. A good time to meet in person might be on or around the After JET Conference in Yokohama on February 20th! Hope to see you soon!”
Notably, the application specifically mentions interest in former ALTs/CIRs, even those who have no previous IT experience: “No previous IT experience required, but any programming experience, web development, or other advanced computer skills you may have will be positively reviewed. Eureka Co. LTD also encourages applications from former ALTs/CIRs who have developed enough Japanese language skills to function in a Japanese office setting and interact politely. Candidates with additional language skills are also viewed favorably.”
Posted by blogger and podcaster Jon Dao (Toyama-ken, 2009-12). Click here to join the JETwit Jobs Google Group and receive job listings even sooner by email.
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Position: Associate Engineer
Type: Full-time
Salary: Compensation will be calculated on a per article basis plus incentive.
Overview:
For over 30 years in the Nagano and Tokyo regions of Japan, Eureka Co. LTD has offered clients superior hands-on support in a number of IT related fields including systems engineering, database management, programming development, and IT consulting. Our competitive advantage is fitting the exact needs of our clients with the highest possible quality.
We are currently seeking new team members who are passionate about IT, and have a strong desire to learn more about the industry. For associate engineers, we expect you to complete a wide range of on the job training assignments in team projects to contribute value to our company while developing necessary IT skills. This training will allow you to lead projects of your own in the future. Read More
