Working visa for teachers

People who can’t apply (or not anymore) for a Working Holiday visa will certainly be looking for a Working visa.
There are lots of kinds of Working visas, so we’re going to focus on Working visa for teachers.

A Working visa allows you stay in Japan 1 or 3 years and is renewable.

Here is a very interesting page about japanese visas in general : Types and categories of visas

« Professors » may obtain this visa, with these conditions : « Activities for research, research guidance, or education as professor, assistant professor, or assistant, etc. at universities, equivalent educational institutions, or technical colleges (koto senmon gakko). » (MOFA)

Unlike most of the other jobs giving the possibility of getting a Working visa, professors do not necessarily hold a Bachelor degree (or equivalent).

However, the reality is a little more complex. In order to get such a visa, you should get « sponsorship » from your future employer, and in most of cases, a valid contract.

There are, then, 3 possibilities :
- Your future employer is a university : priority will be given to teachers who hold a Bachelor degree
- Languages schools : many will require a Bachelor degree to make visa procedure faster and easier.
- A few may give a chance to anybody.

As you can see, Bachelor degree holders stand more chances, which is quite understandable.

Usually, when a degree is required, it will be written explicitely in jobs ads.
It is also very important to check if « visa sponsorship » is mentionned. If not, employer is ceraintly looking for a « permanent resident ». It costs you nothing to ask if sponsorship is available, though.

If a school accepted to sponsor you, then you don’t have much more to do. Your employer will request a « Certificate of Eligibility » (CoE) to their regional immigration authority.
Once they hand it to you, you should be able to get your Working visa within a few days. Go to japanese embassy, apply for Working visa with your CoE and that’s it.
However, under particular circumstances, your embassy may still reject your demand. It is a very rare case, though.

As you can see, getting a Working visa is not the easiest thing on world! When you get a job interview, make sure everything is clear and ok with your future employer.
Feel free to share your experiences and advices with us!

This entry was posted on Dimanche, décembre 7th, 2008 at 9:18 and is filed under Teaching in Japan. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.