Do you speak English or Spanish fluently? Do you want to use those skills to see the world… by boat?

Peace Boat is offering an exciting opportunity for a voyage departing December 17, 2015 and returning to Japan on March 30, 2016. We can’t think of a better way to skip an otherwise cold and dreary winter in the city.

Peace Boat is a non-profit organization that offers a great opportunity for people with language skills to further develop their abilities, while contributing to the strengthening of global civil society. For each voyage, Peace Boat recruits volunteer interpreters and language teachers to support its programs onboard.

Did you know? Peace Boat’s first voyage was organized in 1983 by a group of Japanese university students as a creative response to government censorship regarding Japan’s past military aggression in the Asia-Pacific. They chartered a ship to visit neighboring countries with the aim of learning first-hand about the war from those who experienced it and initiating people-to-people exchange. This tradition continues, and each Peace Boat voyage embarks on excursions across the globe, making connections between continents and communities.

The organization is now preparing for its 90th trip, and they’re looking for enthusiastic, highly motivated, dynamic individuals with a minimum of 18 months of full-time language teaching experience. Applicants should be highly advanced speakers of English or Spanish, although it is not necessary to be a “native” or “first-language” speaker. Teaching certification, a graduate degree, and/or Japanese ability is highly regarded.

This is a volunteer position but voyage expenses are covered.

If you’re interested, you can download the application pack. National interviews are scheduled to be held on September 12 and 13 (Saturday and Sunday) at the GET Office in the Takanobaba area of Tokyo. Interviews for overseas applicants will be conducted via Skype around the time of the national interviews.

The Volunteer Language Teacher application deadline is 17:00 (Japan Standard Time) on Friday, August 14, 2015.

Find out more at peaceboat.org/english.

—Vivian Morelli