An Overseas American problem.

Hello i'll try to quickly explain my problem. First of all I am an American citizen holding an Australian permanent residency. I have checked with JET Australia and one of the requirements is that you must hold a bachlors degree or have considerable teaching experience. My first question is, Does an ESOL certificate give you the credintials you need for acceptance into the program?

My second question is based off of my information. As a perminent residence visa holder do I have to apply for citizenship here in Australia before applying. Another of the criteria in the application was to apply in the country of your citizenship. I have no plans on returning to America so do I need to apply for a citizenship here before lodging an application.

A little background information on me. I have completed year 12 schooling here in Australia and hold a HSC certificate. Im currently takeing a skip year before starting a Universtiy degree in I.T next year. If possible I would have liked to postpone my degree for 3 or so years to live in Japan. The reason being is that I have always had a dream to live there. This started from about the age 15 and I am now 19 going on 20. I would like to go to Japan to enjoy the culture and the language. If anyone can be of any help in giving me information on possible ways to get to Japan even if I have to come back after a few years please post it.
I also would not mind teaching English in Japan. In fact I was hoping to do that for a career after Universtiy with JET in hopes to stay long enough for a permanent residency. I beleve I can cover living expences with private English Lessons or I can instruct in private piano lessons.

Much thanks for all who will post serious responses to my questions. I hope you can help my dream of going to Japan come true. Once again, thankyou very much.

I am afraid JET will not accept you without a degree as it is required by Japan Immigration that you have a bachelor's degree in order to qualify for a working visa. The ESOL certificate is not a substitute I am afraid.

Why not attend university in Japan instead of Australia? That way you get an education and a chance to live there.

I have considered university there but the fees for an overseas university student are very high and I dont earn very much as im currently living away from home and have bills to pay. Where as in Australia HECS can be used to pay for half and also as a loan for the other half. It also takes a shorter period of time to get a degree in Australia than in most countries. So now I know that ESOL wont work is there any other possible ways? eg. volunteer work ect. If I apply for Australian citizenship I am aware that there is a Work-holiday program available. This at the moment seems a viable solution to getting there although how long I can stay there would be an issue. If anyone lives in a country that has a work-holiday visa available and/or have extensive knowledge on this area if you could please post any given information here. It would be of much help for me. Thankyou very much for your replies they have been very informative and have helped me gain a knowledge of where I currently stand at the moment.

I am from New Zealand and originally came to Japan on a working holiday visa. Australian citizens get a total of 18 months' stay in Japan on a WH visa- you must be under the age of 31.

Once the WHV expires you must leave Japan unless you qualify for another kind of visa- i.e. if it's a working visa a degree is still required (this is how I was able to stay in Japan past the end of my WHV).

Perhaps by that time you might be able to enrol as a student at a Japanese university, in which case you could stay on a student visa.

Ok ive been giving it some thought throuhout today and getting a student visa seems do-able. Based on the post above I could go on a Working holidays visa from Australia to Japan and hence get a job / place to stay set up. During the tim that I am in Japan can I apply for either a visitors visa (if Japan has such visa) or a student visa? Is that possible? If anyone has a link on the requirements to get these visas could you please post a link for them? I tried to google it but didnt come up with anything relevant to the question at hand. Thankyou very much you all just dont know how much help this is giving me :D

Bear in mind that changing your citizenship purely to get a working holiday visa is quite a serious thing to do just to legally stay and work in Japan for a short period of time. Australian citizenship is no simple procedure.

Also advise you investigate Australians who have been granted a second 6 month extension on their WHV, I'm one and was refused it several years ago because I had settled down too much in one place. First extension was no problem but I did travel a bit.
Once your WHV visa expire's, that's it. You can no longer work there legally and you would be right back to where you started. It is after all to "promoting greater mutual understanding between Japan and Australia" :)

If you are simply looking to spend a year there to experience life then it's a great idea. If you are looking to move there, it won't help one bit.

IMHO saving up a lot of money and going to Japan to study would be the best idea. Unfortunately its also the most expensive.
Note also, you cannot change from a WHV to a student visa. This is not documented, only hinted in the requirements but can be confirmed by contacting the consulate in your city.

- If you are eligible (in terms of citizenship) for Working Holiday Visa from Australia - please be sure to check if you are eligible, because this scheme is not available to US citizens at all -, you can apply for that, then come to Japan on that WHV status, under which you are allowed to pick up some casual jobs for up to 1 year or so.

- If you apply for a university in Japan and get accepted, then you apply for a Student visa (acceptance by the university, payment of one-year tuition in full, and the ability to show that you are able to support yourself during the course of your study without any paid work are conditions), under which you can study in Japan, and after a few months' of good attendance and good grades, you could ask for a separate permission from Immigration to do part-time work (up to 20 hours I believe).

- The same if you apply for a Pre-college visa to attend a Japanese language school in Japan.

If your aim is to be able to live and work in Japan *for a while only* I mean a year or so, then the quickest way seems to be to apply for Australian citizenship and come under the WHV scheme. Note that after you use up your time on WHV status, since you do not have a bachelor's degree, you will not be eligible to extend it any further. The aim of this WHV scheme is to help young people experience travel extensively and experience life in a different culture while providing them with a way to earn some pocket money to help with travel expenses.

If your aim is to be able to live and work for a long-term in Japan, you will need to obtain a bachelor's degree. Whether that is going to be in Japan or in Australia would depend on your financial situation and your preference, as well as your interest in Japanese language as well.

If you study a Japanese art or language full time you can get a cultural visa through your school. Many of the students in my Aikido Dojo get their visas through the dojo.

I would love to study japanese full time Accually that would be the main purpose of me going there other than enjoying the scenery,culture and food learning to speak Japanese. Hearing about this cultural visa has got me interested. Does anyone here have any information on cultural visas?

I found this website and was wondering if its any good.

http://nihongo-center.com/en/visa/index.html

After giving it some thought I would first like to enter Japan and study Japanese this will give me the chance to get a feel to living there. "i hve been there on short vacation before like 3 days" although I would like to take several months to live there and get a feel of things. It states you need a student visa but would s working holida visa allow you to study as well? thanks since it would be really easy to get over there for the term on the schooling on the work holiday visa and also it allows me to work for things such as food and other necessities.

Yes you can study on the working holiday visa if you want. It's a terrible waste of a visa you can only get once in your life though.

Nihongo Center is qualified to act as guarantor for student visas

Why not take advantage of that? better option and will give you more flexibility rather than studying and working all the time. Or is it more an issue of money?

Just some extra info you may have already researched about the Australian Citizenship application procedure.

http://chingrimaachh.com.au/blogs/shrimpy/2009-feb-03-l...

Looks like it can be quite a length process :( That would allow you a lot of time to save money though no matter which route you go down.

Thanks for the wise words everyone. Yes I do notice that the Australia citizen processes are fairly lengthy but I plan on starting this process either next week or the week after. To comment on a post above yes it is a matter of money lol although the options in that site i linked were within my budget and working in Japan under the working holiday will alow me to make enough for foods and going out where as In the time that my citizenship papers are going through I can work to save enough for fees and lodging during that time peroid. Also thanks to the above post for looking at that info for me. It does take along time and I find that it should at least be processed faster lol but thats life for ya. I read recently under a student visa you aren't alow'd to work. Does anyone here know the reason for that? Also I'll continue to do some more research here on the different visa's and if I have a problem ill post here again. Thankyou all very much You have deffinately helped me get some clear answers and ive set a few goals recently based on what you guys are suggesting that should help me get there. Thanks again :D