Full disclosure: Miyuko now leads marketing at Pensight. This is her story as a language learner and teacher, before that.
Three languages, three beginnings
Miyuko's English started with a move. She was nine when a parent's job transfer took the family to Southeast Asia, and English stopped being a school subject and became the language of everyday life.
French started with curiosity. At 16 she began teaching herself. At 17 she got the chance to study abroad in Belgium, and later she was invited to the University of Geneva as an exchange student.
Three languages, three very different ways in. That turned out to matter when she started teaching.
The essay that became a textbook
In high school, Miyuko attended an English exam prep school. One of the essays she wrote in class was picked as a model answer for the school's essay writing textbook, a book that went on to sell tens of thousands of copies and became a standard for students preparing for English exams.
It was her first sign that writing, not just speaking, was where she could help people most.
Starting with what students love
Miyuko taught English for years, mostly at a small cram school in Tokyo. Her students were elementary schoolers preparing for junior high entrance exams, including essay-based admissions.
Instead of starting from the textbook, she started from the student. She asked each one about their hobbies and what they were good at, kept notes on every student, and built a program around what she learned.
One sixth grader loved Taylor Swift. So her essays started there: quoting lyrics, and explaining, step by step, why Taylor Swift mattered to her. The goal was the same as any essay class, a clear, logical argument. But now she had something she actually wanted to say.
The turning point: seeing the person
Learning to read each student's personality changed what she taught, and how. And once she left the cram school and started tutoring privately, it changed something else too.
She began showing students the path she had opened up herself through essay writing, from her own university admissions to landing a job in New York. Seeing a real example of where the skill could take them helped each student understand what the coaching was worth to them. That let her shape both the program and the price around each person.
From there, she became an essay writing consultant, coaching university applications, MBA applications and LLM applications.
"If you love it, you'll get good at it. If you're good at it, you'll learn to love it."
The detour
Along the way, Miyuko taught a lot for free. Looking back, she doesn't see it as wasted time. Every one of those sessions added to her experience.
On pricing itself, she points teachers to her teammate's story. Read how Yuki went from $35 to $1,000 per session →
Her advice to teachers and learners
Her message is simple: enjoy it. There's a Japanese saying she lives by, suki koso mono no jouzu nare: you get good at what you love. It's true for learners. It's true for the people who teach them, too.
