Teacher Shuffle

        As I mentioned in my Junior High School Graduation post, the school year in Japan ends in March and begins in April. And there is a short time in between. This year there were only 10 days. Besides having to wrap things up from the previous year and prepare for the next year, many teachers also have to change schools. Every year, teachers are shuffled around the school system in the prefecture. Generally, around 5 to 10 teachers per school are moved. There were ten teachers who left this year, and ten who arrived, including our principal, school nurse, and librarian. We also lost one of our English teachers, who I really enjoyed teaching with.
        One of the biggest losses for me, however, was one lady, who took care of the office. She set up our lunches, made coffee, and kept the flowers beautiful. One thing you should know about Japanese schools is that we don’t have a cafeteria. Students eat in their classrooms, along with their teachers, and some teachers eat in the office. I ate in the office, and this lady took care of me. Whenever there was some fish heads, or octopus, or any other thing I have trouble eating, she would make sure I had something to eat. She also taught me many important ways to joke in Japanese.
        Anyway, teachers have roughly a week and a half to wrap things up, move if they need to, prepare for the coming year, and if possible, rest. Besides that, there are a series of dinner parties and school ceremonies (assemblies) to thank the outgoing teachers and to welcome the new ones.
        If that weren’t enough, the teachers often don’t know they’re moving until about a month beforehand. If the teachers have any say at all in their placements, it’s not much. And teachers have to keep it a secret until the last day of classes. After the students left on the last day of school, there was a meeting to say who was leaving and where to. Teachers sometimes don’t even know what year they’ll teach until a few days later. As an American, where some of our teachers taught at the same school for 30 years, I have trouble understanding any benefit in this system. It seems to me that they could shave some time off the summer vacation and add that to spring vacation in order to ease the transition. (Japan’s Ministry of Education, are you reading this?)
        Our new teachers arrived on April 1st, no joke. At Japanese Junior High schools, there is one office where all the teachers have desks arranged by year. They don’t stay in their homerooms. The students stay in one classroom, and the teachers go to those classrooms. So, when the new teachers arrived and found out their placements, we had to rearrange the office. We move the actual desks around the office, instead of moving our stuff to another desk. I moved to the place next to mine, which is where I was the year before.
        I’m sure, because of my limited Japanese comprehension, that there’s a lot I don’t understand about this whole transition system. In any case, it’s a confusing and busy, yet exciting time. And I must say, I’ll miss it.