I’ve read a lot of stuff on here over the years and on X such as “Get a better job” or “Switch industries” when you say that teaching doesn’t pay that well. But what if I simply don’t want to switch industries because I’m comfortable teaching and I’m good at it? Or I like the work/life balance that I currently have?
You’ll never be rich as an ESL teacher (I’d say international school teachers do better, and they do, but the yen is weak and their benefits have also been getting slowly eroded over the years). But you can live a comfortable life if you find ways around The Eikaiwa Trap, as I call it. Because the hours are so strange—normally an afternoon start with an evening finish—it makes it hard to pick up other work.
Your next contract? This is my advice.
You should probably go part time at your eikaiwa and keep it as your main teaching job (maybe for 3 days a week) and then find a few side ones at other companies through Gaijinpot or Ohayo Sensei. Figure out what your actual daily rate is at your eikaiwa—just take your salary, divide it by 20—and then you sort of have a jumping off point as to what your minimum acceptable daily rate should be in order to maintain your current standard of living. Because there are other companies that might pay you better per day and you could easily end up making more; or they pay the same but you can go home at a reasonable hour, have weekends off, see friends.
I know too many people who have been teaching at eikaiwas for so long that they don’t even have a social life involving non-eikaiwa teachers since they’re rarely able to do anything. They’re too busy working weekends while everybody else is relaxing.
If you’re at schools as an ALT and have evenings off, maybe try to dedicate some of your time to looking for evening/part time work. It doesn’t have to be after work every day, which can lead to burnout. But maybe a couple days a week. It gives you some extra cash and breaks the monotony of dealing with JTE’s and being a walking dictionary.
This is what’s worked for me. And I just wanted to share this with people who might want to stick with teaching but also want to make more money.
by LiveInAndLovinTokyo