We have recently joined the worldwide Fon network, by installing a Fon router at the school. We have always offered free (secure) wireless Internet access to our students. The Fon service lets us offer access to the surrounding neighborhood as well, without worrying about security issues. If you already share your Internet access with others through the Fon network, your username and password will let you use our wireless Internet for free. If you are not a Fon member, small hourly charges apply.

We were turned on to the Fon system by the organization We Love Tenjin. They are a group devoted to improving Tenjin in a variety of ways. In the past, this has included:

- giving names to all the streets (usually only major streets in Japan have names)
- producing maps of the Tenjin area
- organizing pedestrian-only Tenjin Picnic days
- arranging the beautiful Christmas illuminations

They put us in touch with Tenjin Wifi, an organization trying to increase the availability of Wifi access points in the Tenjin and Daimyo areas. To see a map of the current Fon spots around Tenjin, click here, and enter “Fukuoka” in the search box. Let’s hope they keep expanding!

There have been a lot of changes at GenkiJACS this year: converted to an NPO, almost tripled the size of the school, found perhaps the coolest thing in the world to greet visitors, and more. However, there is one change that we haven’t publicized as much as we should have. In June of this year, we completed the creation of our new comprehensive syllabus and curriculum, for all levels of study from complete beginner to advanced. This syllabus is the cornerstone of our lessons now, and enables us to provide an even better course of study for our students. We’re very proud of it, and hope to be able to publish at least some of it on this website in the near future, so that students will be able to see what they will likely study before they arrive.

To make this new curriculum possible, we had to make some changes to the structure of our courses. Here’s a comparison of the old and new course structures for each of our major courses:

Conversational Japanese Course
Old: 20 Japanese lessons per week
New: 10 grammar lessons and 10 conversation lessons

Japanese and Traditional Culture
Old: 10 Japanese lessons and 5 culture classes per week
New: 10 grammar lessons, 10 conversation lessons, and 3 culture classes

Japanese Through Pop Culture
Old: 10 Japanese lessons and 10 pop culture classes per week
New: 10 grammar lessons, 10 conversation lessons, and 5 pop culture classes

Japanese for Exams
Old: 10 Japanese lessons and 10 exam skills classes per week
New: 10 grammar lessons, 10 conversation lessons, and 5 exam skills classes per week


As you can see, all the courses now have the same core 20 hours per week of classes, divided into grammar and conversation. This was done because we felt that the old course system did not give a full rounded Japanese education to the students on the Pop Culture, Traditional Culture and Exams courses. The new courses are much more academically sound, and should ensure that all students progress much better in the full four skills.

We’ve also introduced one new course, the Intensive Conversation Course. This has the same basic 20 classes per week as the other courses, plus five additional hours of conversational Japanese per week. Since its introduction, this has been one of our most popular courses.

Last Friday was the last day of work for Kim, our former culture classes and events coordinator. Kim worked with us for a little over a year, and was much loved by students. She arranged all of the culture course classes (tea ceremony, pottery, etc.), and also the Friday night parties and other after-school events. We're very sad to see her go.
On a happier note, Kim's replacement, Makiko, is settling in nicely to her new job, and has big plans for future school activities. Stay tuned for more information!

We've started a separate blog in Japanese! It's written partly for host families, to keep them informed about what's happening at school, but should be a great resource for anyone who wants to know what daily life at the school is like, and to practice your Japanese reading at the same time! It'll be updated a couple times a week, so keep an eye on it here!

GenkiJACS Japanese blog

We've added an album of photos of the new (since June 2008) school location to our photo gallery. You can see the pictures here. These should give you an idea of what the classrooms and lounge area, etc. look like. It's a lot nicer than the old school was! Instead of cold metal walls, we now have 14 unique classrooms, each with its own "theme" of sorts. The construction this summer was the first stage of our project to build a school that is as interesting and fun as the classes and teachers are. The next stage is scheduled for May 2009, so GenkiJACS is going to get better and better!

New student lounge, overlooking the main street of the city


More photos after the jump!

» Read More

We finally got around to updating our teacher introductions page to reflect some of the new teachers who have been hired recently. Not all new teachers have been added yet, though, so we'll keep updating the page whenever we have time!
We also sadly said goodbye to a few teachers whose contracts expired at the end of summer, including Takako-sensei, who is off to work with JICA (the Japan International Cooperation Agency, similar to the US Peace Corps), teaching Japanese language and culture in Bulgaria!
If you have a message for any of the teachers who left, feel free to mail it to us, and we'll pass it along!

GenkiJACS was recently approved as a recognized school for the German bildungsurlaub, or educational leave program. Qualifying German nationals can now receive 10 days of state-sponsored study leave with us.
We have been approved for the following states: Berlin, Brandenburg, Hamburg, Hessen, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Niedersachen, Sachsen-Anhalt, Schleswig-Holstein
The Bildungsurlaub program allows employees to apply for up to 10 extra days of educational leave to study a foreign language abroad.
There is a little more info on our site here. For more information, contact us!

We received a letter recently informing us that the only official Western Union agent in Japan, Suruga Bank, is ceasing to handle Western Union money transfers. This means that students cannot use Western Union to pay school fees anymore.
Their official release (in Japanese) is here. The only thing approaching a reason given is that their partnership with Western Union has expired, and will not be renewed.
The other options previously available for GenkiJACS students to pay are of course still available: International or domestic bank transfer, international postal money order, credit card, Paypal and Moneybookers.

The Japan Times reports that London magazine Monocle named Fukuoka as the best city in the world for shopping! Reasons include the compactness of the central shopping district, the big selection of brand names, and the closeness to Asia.
Fukuoka was also chosen as the city with the 17th highest quality of life in the world – and only the second city in Japan, after Tokyo! Cities were ranked on a variety of factors, including friendliness, safeness, cleanliness, transport and more. Fukuoka is on this list for the first time, perhaps showing how much its profile has grown in recent years. As if you needed another reason to come here!
The original article is for Monocle subscribers only, unfortunately, but if you happen to be one of those, click here to read Fukuoka’s entry!

Alternatively, the article seems to be available as a PDF here, although perhaps not for long...

A couple of choice quotes:
“Friendly, cosmopolitan Fukuoka is tiny in comparison to Tokyo, but it beats the Japanese capital hands down with its cuisine and shopping.”
“these days it’s all about Fukuoka”

It's nice to hear that everyone else is finally catching up with what we knew years ago!

The busy summer season means that this blog doesn't get updated nearly as often as we would like, but much has changed in the last month or so that we would like tell you about. For today, though, we wanted to mention one recent thing that we are very proud of.
We receive students from several agencies, including Languagecourse.net, which is based in Barcelona. They ask returning students to provide feedback on the school they studied at. Throughout the last year, GenkiJACS received an average customer satisfaction rating of 4.7 out of 5!

In Languagecourse.net’s own words:
"Only the very best schools receive the Excellence Award ... to certify that superior customer satisfaction has been acknowledged by LanguageCourse.Net. The feedback of your clients showed that your school did excellent work in providing satisfied customers throughout the last year. Overall rating: 4.7 (out of 5.0)"

Here's the actual document: