Hello,
Gavin here. We’ve just received our own soap box here at Smith’s School of English Kyobashi. I’ve been working here for about 2 years now and as time passes I continue to enjoy the relaxed, professional environment more and more. Kyobashi is the location of the Smith’s School of English franchise system head office, but we also have a multi-classroom English school which is open in the evenings.
You can see our Kyobashi School’s Japanese website here.
http://www.smithweb.co.jp/php/kyobashi.php
Smith’s is an interesting kind of place to work.
You can see a few words from the company on our main site here.
http://www.sse-franchise.com/
It’s one of the only English conversation school shapes that I know of in Japan where not only the management, but the ownership as well rests in the hands of the teachers themselves. This means that we get a chance at responsibilities and benefits from various areas outside of just teaching. I personally started out as a part time English teacher, moved on to full time English teacher and now these days I find my time in the office split up rather evenly between working with not both students and Smith’s School of English franchise owners in an administrative respect as well. It’s this type of variety in responsibility that makes my daily efforts rewarding. I can see how I’m an integral part of a fast moving, growing company.
Even as this company continues to grow and evolve to accommodate new English schools, new English teachers, and new students, it’s nice to see that it still stays true to its original Smith’s School of English intentions. Throughout my time here I’ve attended various seminars and seen new policies and systems instituted to accommodate the company’s expansion. All of these decisions though, remain consistent with the school system’s original goals. It’s that very consistency that let’s me know where I stand within the company and where we’re heading as a team in into the future.
Ok, when I start waxing philosophic that’s my cue to end the post. So enjoy the rest of the soapbox and if I think of anything else I’ll post it here.
-Gavin