April is the time of change in Japan – the new school year starts, people move house, and quit old jobs or start new ones. We have two personnel changes at GenkiJACS too.

First, the bad news: Our accommodation manager Ayako-san will be leaving us, for the best possible reason! She’s due to give birth to her first child in June, and will go with her husband back to her family home in central Japan. We’ll have a message from her for everyone soon, but in the meantime, if anyone has a message you want to pass on to her, send it to [email protected] and we’ll pass it on to her!

Second, the good news: our former accommodation manager Mai-san will be coming back, this time with baby in tow! Her lovely daughter Maddy-chan is old enough to crawl around now. We’re all looking forward to having Mai-san back again, but maybe even more, we’re looking forward to seeing Maddy-chan each day!

Just in case you’re worried, administrative manager Yuuki-san will of course be continuing on as planned, and we look forward to serving all of our students with an even stronger team this year!

This year has brought a lot of changes to GenkiJACS, but possibly the one that most directly affects students is the coming and going of teachers and staff. We’re very lucky to have a group of wonderful people to work with here, and this post will keep you up to date on what those wonderful people are doing!

Away for a while:
Mika-sensei is currently in the US on a GenkiJACS internship at the College of New Jersey, teaching Japanese to students there for a little over a year. She left this January, so plans to be back at GenkiJACS in 2012. We all miss you, Mika-sensei!
Tsugumi-sensei is in the Dominican Republic, teaching Japanese and offering humanitarian aid with JICA, the Japan International Cooperation Agency, for a couple of years. She’ll complete her wonderful work in 2013, so should be back at GenkiJACS then!
It’s actually Mai-san‘s last day today as she enters 産休 (sankyuu, maternity leave). She’s due to give birth early next month, so will be away from GenkiJACS for a half-year or so. Wish her luck!
Natsuko-sensei is in the UK studying English for a couple of months, and should be back just before summer starts, hopefully with a perfect grasp of the English language!
Finally, Rie-sensei is currently in the north-east of Japan, visiting the disaster area to arrange for a donation to children’s charities there. Hopefully she’ll be back very soon, though!

Back from abroad:
Yuuji-sensei returned from his year in Germany this January. His year of studying there gave him many insights that have made him a better teacher than ever and, dare we say it, an even better human being.
Takako-sensei returned from her JICA stint in Bulgaria with a new perspective on Japanese education.

New faces:
Yuuki-san is our new office staff member. With Mai-san gone for a while, the ever-capable Ayako-san will take over her duties, while Yuuki-san slips in to Ayako-san’s role, and helps out with culture classes. Give her a warm welcome!