| Sep 02 | Paternalistic view of universities (Japan Times) |
| The more I think about Gregory Clark's Aug. 17 article, "Saving Japan's universities," the more I am troubled by the author's offhand judgments and broad-brush pronouncements. The tone throughout is paternalistic and pejorative, and very little of value is suggested. The main problem Clark identifies is that Japan's universities do not provide students with a "feeling of achievement." The root of this problem, he says, lies in the fact that "Japan by nature is not a very intellectual society." |
| Aug 31 | Police to report principal for filming up woman's skirt in Sapporo (Mainichi) |
| Police are poised to report an elementary school principal accused of using a mobile phone to film inside a woman's skirt to public prosecutors, it has been learned. Police plan to send public prosecutors documents on the 50-year-old principal of an elementary school in Setana, Hokkaido, on suspicion of violating a prefectural ordinance banning people from creating a public nuisance. |
| Aug 31 | University ordered to rehire professor fired after trial period ended (Mainichi) |
| A private university here has been ordered by a court to rehire a former assistant professor who was fired after the completion of her trial period, it has been learned. During the labor tribunal on May 13, the Mito District Court ruled in favor of the former assistant professor in her 50s and ordered Tokiwa University to withdraw its decision to dismiss her, and pay the outstanding balance of her salary dating back to October 2009. However, the university protested the legal judgment at the tribunal and brought the case to the court, with the trial set to start on Aug. 30. |
| Aug 31 | Discipline in schools is not a bad thing (Japan Times) |
| Dear minister of education Tatsuo Kawabata, I have been working as an assistant language teacher (ALT) in your public school system for five months now. Although it might be considered a bit premature to pen a word to you after such a short time, I would like to draw your attention to some fairly standard behavior across the six schools I work at. I think it is also time to let you in on a little secret: Disciplining students is not a bad thing. It just depends on how it is done. |
| Aug 29 | Best Apps for Total Japanese Beginners (appolicious.com) |
| After many false starts, I have made up my mind to really learn Japanese. This means learning both the spoken and written language, a huge challenge. I've been buying Japanese apps right and left, trying them, and keeping the winners. This list is about those that made the grade, the keepers. It's for those who know NOTHING about Japanese and are starting from scratch. |
| Aug 29 | Why fret over a few bad signs? (Japan Times) |
| Regarding Amy Chavez's Aug. 21 column, "Pen mightier than samurai sword": I would like to state my support for some of Chavez's views, particularly because they are true of most East Asian countries. I would, however, argue that the article shows an obvious sampling bias. Two main reasons account for the signs mentioned by Chavez: tourism and the Japanese sense of aesthetics for the Roman alphabet. This misconceived sense of beauty is possibly due to pop culture, which also results in very poor Japanese being scrawled across many products in Singapore and Malaysia. |
| Aug 29 | Pro-N. Korean schools' tuition likely to be free (Yomiuri) |
| The Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology Ministry has decided to include pro-Pyongyang Korean schools in its policy that began in April of providing virtually free education at high schools. An expert panel at the ministry has drawn up a report stating it is reasonable to apply the policy to the pro-Pyongyang high schools. The panel likely will release the report to the public as soon as Tuesday. Education Minister Tatsuo Kawabata intends to respect the panel's decision and is considering announcing the school names sometime next month, according to sources close to the ministry. |
| Aug 27 | Gov't moves to include North Korean schools in Japan in subsidy program (Mainichi) |
| The government is taking steps to include North Korean schools in Japan in its subsidy program for high school education, it has been learned. The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology plans to scrutinize the 10 pro-Pyongyang high schools in Japan to decide whether to include them in the nation's free-tuition and subsidy program for senior high school students. The assessment will be based on the same criteria used for special vocational schools, which are already covered by the program. |
| Aug 26 | Wired youth forget how to write in China and Japan (AFP) |
 In Japan, where three writing systems are combined into one, mobiles and computers use the simpler hiragana and katakana scripts for inputting -- meaning users may forget the kanji, a third strand of Japanese writing similar to Chinese characters.
"We rely too much on the conversion function on our phones and PCs," said Ayumi Kawamoto, 23, shopping in Tokyo's upscale Ginza district.
"I've mostly forgotten characters I learned in middle and high school and I tend to forget the characters I only occasionally use."
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| Aug 26 | Students face charges over suicide (Japan Times) |
| Police on Wednesday sent to prosecutors their case against three Kawasaki junior high school students accused of assaulting a classmate who took his own life in June. The boy left a suicide note listing the other students' names and describing them as bullies. Besides the three facing possible prosecution, a 13-year-old student was reported to a child consultation center. The 14-year-old victim killed himself at his home using hydrogen sulfide gas. |
| Aug 26 | 108 school judo class deaths but no charges, only silence (Japan Times) |
 Yasuhiko Kobayashi's 15-year-old son had skipped judo practice. According to Kobayashi, the boy's teacher was furious and stood waiting for him at the gates of his junior high school in Yokohama. The teacher forced the boy into the gym and made him grapple one on one. The former All Japan judo champion choked the boy until he lost consciousness.
When the boy came to, the teacher choked him again until he went limp, and threw him to the floor with such force that he suffered severe internal bleeding in his brain, an injury known as an acute subdural hematoma.
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| Aug 26 | Wish list: 60,000 school hires by '18 (Japan Times) |
| The education ministry plans to boost the number of teachers and other faculty members at public elementary and junior high schools in Japan by 60,000 on a net basis by fiscal 2018 to create smaller classes while dealing with students according to their learning levels, ministry sources said Tuesday. As part of its medium- to long-term guidelines for faculty deployment, the ministry also plans to cut the maximum size of a class to 30-35 students from the current 40. This would be the first class-size reduction move since fiscal 1980, when they were cut to 40 from 45. |
| Aug 26 | Universities need big investment (Japan Times) |
| Regarding Gregory Clark's Aug. 17 article, "Saving Japan's universities": Clark describes a dire picture of Japanese universities but offers no solutions. Universities should not be considered English-language schools or, where foreign students are concerned, Japanese-language schools. One may wonder about the purpose of having universities in Japan at all, since the Koizumi administration washed its hands of university funding and gave universities a false sense of independence, which in practice meant throwing them into the deep sea of financial ruin. |
| Aug 25 | Japanese cram school looks to Chinese workers (Asahi) |
| A Japanese company sees a potentially lucrative business opportunity stemming from the recent labor strife that has shackled foreign companies operating in China. Kyoto-based Kyoshin Co., which runs a cram school for Japanese elementary and junior high school students in Guangdong province, is expanding operations in China to provide language lessons to Chinese workers with Japanese bosses. The idea is to tap into the eagerness of Japanese companies to strengthen communications with their Chinese workers to avert labor clashes and discourage them from quitting. |
| Aug 25 | Nursing exam to include English translation (Japan Times) |
| A health ministry panel on Tuesday compiled a set of changes in the national nursing examination that include providing English translations to explain difficult Japanese terms for foreigners. The measures will be reflected in the next test in February, panel members said. More than 1,000 applicants have come to Japan from Indonesia and the Philippines under bilateral free-trade agreements, but the passage rate for the exam has been low because the kanji and technical terms used in the exam are believed to pose a high hurdle for foreign examinees. |
| Aug 25 | Communal housing for women finds niche (Japan Times) |
 Low-cost rental homes with communal rooms have become a godsend for some women struggling to start a career in Tokyo. Although people living in these kinds of accommodations often have to put up with cramped conditions, women who come from outside Tokyo looking for work can avoid finding themselves completely on their own. They can enjoy some camaraderie and get inspiration watching their roommates strive hard to achieve their goals.
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| Aug 24 | Teachers of English face unregulated, unfair system at universities (Japan Times) |
| Dear minister of education Tatsuo Kawabata, Regardless of education and experience, once an English instructor starts work at certain universities in Japan, they are placed at the bottom of the list for promotion or advancement - a practice which ignores the internationally recognized principle of being able to transfer experience from job to job as long as one remains in the same profession. Surely, this can't be right. |
| Aug 23 | Graduate employment crunch (Japan Times) |
| The education ministry's survey of schools as of May 1 sheds light on difficulties that high school and university graduates are encountering in the job market. The government and the corporate sector should take a serious look at the results of the annual survey, which were made public Aug. 5, and consider ways to increase employment. At universities, there were a record 2.559 million undergraduate students and a record 271,000 graduate students as of May 1 - an increase of 32,000 and 7,000 from the year before, respectively. Women accounted for a record 42.1 percent of the undergraduate students and 30.3 percent of the graduate students. |
| Aug 22 | Do university administrators care? (Japan Times) |
| Regarding Gregory Clark's Aug. 17 article, Clark is right to point out that students, teachers and employers are complicit in creating universities in which thinking and learning do not take place. However, are Japanese administrators shocked to read that? Certainly, if university administrators in other developed countries believed that thinking and learning did not take place within the walls of their universities, they would be scandalized. Perhaps Japanese administrators believe that there are two ways of conducting higher education: the foreign way and the Japanese way. |
| Aug 22 | Temp staff teachers lower the bar (Japan Times) |
| Regarding Minoru Matsutani's Aug. 11 article "Screeners question if benefits (of the Japan Exchange and Teaching program) outweigh the costs": I think it is a big disservice to The Japan Times' readers for writers not to mention the horrible working conditions for teachers dispatched to schools by temporary staffing companies: (1) a salary that is near poverty level - average is less than ¥190,000 a month - and (2) no insurance, benefits or pension. |
| Aug 21 | It takes a lot of guts in Katakana Land (Japan Times) |
| One struggle in learning Japanese is getting a grip on all the various loan words that have slipped into the vernacular from abroad. Lots of these are high-tech creations that have more or less formed a new-world pidgin. I bet "Google," for example, now communicates anywhere on earth, from the Silicon Valley to Eskimo igloos to the steamiest corner of the Amazon warehouse. A chunk of other loan words have entered Japanese from English, which should make learning them a piece of cake for native English speakers like me. |
| Aug 21 | Pen mightier than samurai sword (Japan Times) |
| You've probably heard that Japanese people are shy to speak English because they are afraid of making mistakes. Every night before I go to bed, I pray that this English language phobia will spill over into English writing. As one visitor to Japan said to me, "You could spend your life correcting all the poor English on signs and menus in this country." Why is it that the Japanese, who are so shy to speak even good English, are so bold to abuse the written language? Especially when it comes to using permanent mediums such as signboards that broadcast errors to hundreds of thousands, if not millions of people. On signs and menus, no one seems to care if things are misspelled or incomprehensible. That's your problem! |
| Aug 20 | 'Hikikomori' finds way into Oxford Dictionary of English (AP) |
| "Hikikomori," a word that has come into common usage in Japan in recent years to signify the abnormal avoidance of social contact, especially by adolescent males, has found its way into the third edition of the Oxford Dictionary of English published Thursday. The word is one of more than 2,000 new entries in the dictionary, whose first edition was published in 1998, according to Oxford University Press, the dictionary's publisher. The vuvuzela, the plastic horn used to cheer teams during the soccer World Cup in South Africa earlier this year, also won an entry in the latest edition. |
| Aug 20 | Rewards, roadblocks for volunteer teachers (Japan Times) |
 Ikuko Sahara, representative of a volunteer group teaching Japanese to foreigners in Tokyo, knows it's no picnic living in a foreign country without being familiar with the language. Sahara, 51, has lived in Britain, Norway, Sweden, France and Singapore over the course of 17 years thanks to her husband's career.
"I know well how tough it is being in an unfamiliar foreign country," she said. "I hope to help my students by teaching useful words, even if it's just one conversational phrase and one greeting."
Volunteer teachers like Sahara are not uncommon in Japan. In fact, they account for more than half the people teaching Japanese to foreigners living in Japan, according to the Cultural Affairs Agency.
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| Aug 20 | Educators fret fate of nation's language (Japan Times) |
 Last year, more than 10,000 people spoke out against the government's apparent disregard for Japanese-language education when it submitted a bill to effectively abolish the National Institute for Japanese Language. The semigovernmental institute, established in 1948 by the government, has been researching the spoken, written and other aspects of the language as it is actually used today. It is the most authoritative research entity on the language and promotes its study by tracking modern usage and providing raw data crucial to the management of national language policy.
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| Aug 20 | Going back to school for alternative art (Japan Times) |
 A first-time visitor to 3331 Arts Chiyoda might be equally intrigued and confused. To the left of the entrance, there's a wide open space with only tables and chairs; in the center, a small booth with shelves stuffed with toys; to the right, a stylish cafe; and, around the corner, huge photos of expressionless faces. "This is a new model for alternative arts," says Mitsunori Sakano, one of five artists who together conceived 3331, a community-based multidisciplinary arts center housed in a converted old school building. Sakano, along with Yuumi Shishido, Takuma Ishiyama and Tonomi Ohzone is a member of Command A, a company headed by artist Masato Nakamura, famous for his installation work and art projects through his nonprofit organization Command N.
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| Aug 19 | Written papers aren't so hot either (Japan Times) |
| I agree with Norihiro Nose (Aug. 12 letter, "English teachers won't be ready"), who writes that Japanese English teachers won't be ready for the new high school guidelines beginning in 2013. I also agree that it is a shame to see Japanese politicians and other leaders at international top meetings not being able to communicate with their foreign colleagues. I don't agree that students at elite universities like Tokyo University or Kyoto University have very high levels of English reading and writing skills. |
| Aug 19 | Business English revives schools (Yomiuri) |
| The recent corporate trend of making English the "official language" within companies has given a tailwind to the formerly faltering English language school business. As a number of companies aim to establish or maintain a global presence, English language schools are working to develop educational programs more practical than those offered by their rivals for businesspeople who need to use English at work. Such a move came after companies, including online shopping mall operator Rakuten, Inc. and Fast Retailing Co., the operator of casual clothing chain Uniqlo, required their employees to use English as their official in-house language. |
| Aug 18 | Business Japanese Proficiency Test to be scrapped (Mainichi) |
| A Japanese-language proficiency test geared toward non-Japanese who are searching for employment in Japan or with Japanese companies overseas will be discontinued at the end of the current fiscal year, it has been learned. The Business Japanese Proficiency Test (BJT) -- established in 1996 by the Japan External Trade Organization (JETRO) and administered by the Japan Kanji Aptitude Testing Foundation (JKATF) -- has been used as a criteria in reviewing applications for residency in Japan by non-Japanese. As such, its discontinuation is likely to affect foreigners who have been preparing for it. |
| Aug 18 | Broome students swap thongs for Kimono (abc.net.au) |
 A group of four students from St Marys College in Broome have been on an eye opening trip to Japan.
The overseas trip, their first, also took in Broome's Sister City of Taiji, where they attended the local school and were billetted with families.
Clintisha Jimbidie, Koiki Hamaguchi, Chaumani Maher, Jacob Watters were bubbling with enthusiasm shortly after they returned, depsite the jet lag, and how they were overwhelmed by the welcome.
The year 10 and 11 students were guests of honour at a civic reception, where the whole crowd applauded their arrival. Teenager Jacob Watters later entertained them with magic tricks!
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| Aug 18 | Why not give the oyaji gyagu a rest when in Rome (Japan Times) |
| Perhaps it was the jisaboke (jetlag) or a lasagna-induced food coma, but it took time for my mind to register the scene before my eyes - a cosplaying gladiator speaking Japanese in front of the Coliseum in Rome. The Italian sentry - garbed in a feathered helmet, crimson cape and body armor, and wielding a shield and sword - paraded up to my Japanese friends and energetically offered, "Shashin totte agemasu yo!"("I insist on taking a photo for you!"). |
| Aug 18 | Little prince takes museum tour (Japan Times) |
| Prince Akishino and Princess Kiko on Tuesday took their 3-year-old son, Prince Hisahito, to the National Museum of Nature and Science in Tokyo's Ueno district. Prince Hisahito enjoyed looking around the stuffed animal exhibits and other displays, pointing at a specimen of a flying squirrel hanging from the ceiling and listening to the sound of locusts that streamed from a speaker after a button was pressed. |
| Aug 17 | Local authorities scramble to attract much-needed vets (Yomiuri) |
| An increasing number of veterinarians have chosen careers in the private sector instead of working for local governments in important positions that would deal with infections such as foot-and-mouth disease and bird flu. In the past decade, the number of veterinarians has increased by 20 percent, with most of the new animal doctors choosing to work for private clinics that offer better benefits than their civil service counterparts, who have decreased by 4 percent over the same period. To make the civil service more attractive, local governments are easing age restrictions on new hires and even granting scholarships. |
| Aug 17 | Saving Japan's universities (Japan Times) |
| The consensus says Japanese university students are lazy and apathetic. Unfavorable comparisons are made with Chinese studying here. Yet those same students at their annual autumn festivals can show an enthusiasm, professionalism and attention to detail superior to anything at a Western university, or a Chinese university for that matter. When I try to find the reason for all this effort, the main reply is mokuteki tassei kan, or the feeling of having achieved something. |
| Aug 17 | JETs press to keep program intact (Japan Times) |
| U.S. alumni of the Japan Exchange and Teaching Program are calling on the Japanese government to continue the international exchange and teaching program, now under review for spending cuts, saying it is essential for bilateral understanding. In a press release issued Sunday after its three-day annual meeting in New York, the Japan Exchange and Teaching Alumni Association of the United States said the program is "crucial to Japan's international outreach and to increasing mutual understanding between Japan and the U.S." |
| Aug 16 | Panel urges firms to stop shunning graduates (Yomiuri) |
| A Science Council of Japan panel has compiled a set of urgent proposals to help young people find jobs, calling on companies not to discriminate against applicants who have already graduated and asking the government to provide financial support to students from outside major urban centers. The proposals include a system that would subsidize the transportation and hotel expenses of university students from outside major urban centers while they look for jobs in large cities. The panel will submit the proposals to the Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology Ministry on Tuesday. |
| Aug 15 | Japanese princess returns home (CNET) |
| The granddaughter of Japan's reigning emperor flies back to Tokyo today after spending part of the summer learning English in Dublin. Princess Mako (18), a student of liberal arts at the International Christian University in Tokyo, came to the capital along with 19 of her classmates in June. She attended a six-week summer programme at the Applied Language Centre at UCD and lived on campus. A spokesman for UCD said that in addition to English language workshops, she studied 20th-century Irish literature, drama and Irish history. |
| Aug 15 | Achieving one's goals with JET (Japan Times) |
| Regarding the Aug. 11 article "Budget cutters target JET (Japan Exchange and Teaching program)": The problem of wastefulness right now in the JET program is not about how many people are being brought into Japan; it's about how the education boards and teachers use JET people. So often JETs are used as nothing more than human tape recorders. The only job we get from teachers who may not even want us in their class is to repeat sentences and words. This is not the goal of the JET program, and these teachers are wasting public money. |
| Aug 15 | Historic geological map discovered in Iwate (Yomiuri) |
| A geological map believed to have been used by poet and children's author Kenji Miyazawa (1896-1933) during his school days was recently found at Iwate University Library. Discovered with related documents and books, the map is one of the oldest of its kind ever produced in this country. The findings will be extremely valuable to understanding the circumstances surrounding the introduction of geology into this country. |
| Aug 14 | Detroiter puts golf on his English, boosts students' lie (Japan Times) |
 Detroit-born Bob White has been in love with golf since he picked up one of his father's clubs at the age of 8. There were no kids' size clubs in the late 1950s, he recalls. You just did the best you could with what you had. So passionate is his enthusiasm for the game that he has developed a course for teaching English to Japanese golfers who want to feel comfortable when communicating with non-Japanese players on courses abroad or in Japan.
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| Aug 14 | 40% of trainee lawyers can't secure work / Crowded field leads to intense competition (Yomiuri) |
| About 40 percent of legal trainees preparing to enter the job market as lawyers later this year have yet to receive offers of employment, according to a survey by the Japan Federation of Bar Associations. One of the main reasons for this is a rapid increase in the number of people in the legal profession, meaning more competition for the few spots available at law firms. If the situation continues, many legal professionals will have little option but to open their own practices and try to establish themselves as lawyers in an unfavorable climate. Another reason for the situation is the limited areas in which lawyers are practicing. |
| Aug 13 | Ministry mulls digital textbook project (Japan Times) |
| Hoping to respond to the growing needs of working with online technology to survive a fast-changing world, the education ministry is considering launching a research project next fiscal year on using digital textbooks in schools. Experts say, however, the ministry should thoroughly examine the influence of electronic devices on children's health and shouldn't rush to introduce the new technology. "Fostering students' abilities to utilize information means bringing up those who can independently collect, judge, express, process, create, emit and convey necessary information," the ministry said in a draft proposal for its "Information-Oriented Vision of Education." |
| Aug 13 | Kids' Festa entertains, teaches (Japan Times) |
 At the halfway mark for summer vacation, scholarly children (or parents) might start to worry about summer homework, such as research projects or picture diaries that have yet to be finished.
Before you write a diary about playing video games every day, check out the Marunouchi Kids' Festa, which will run for three days next week. The event will offer various activities for children, some of which are quite educational while others are just plain fun.
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| Aug 12 | English teachers won't be ready (Japan Times) |
| Beginning in 2013, high school English classes are to be taught in English. New guidelines from the education ministry also state that English grammar should no longer be taught as a whole subject but instead incorporated with expressions and vocabulary of the new textbook "English Communication I-III." I believe this may be an almost impossible task. I teach English at a high school regarded as one of the best schools in terms of academic performance in Nara Prefecture. Most of our students take the university entrance exams, which require a high level of English reading and writing ability. |
| Aug 11 | Elementary school teacher handed pay cut for repeated smoking at school (Mainichi) |
| A 52-year-old teacher at an Osaka elementary school received a 10 percent pay cut for one month after he ignored repeated warnings about smoking on school grounds, the city's board of education announced on Aug. 9. Four times, the teacher reportedly said he would "not smoke again," in writing and submitted documents reflecting on his behavior, but each time he continued to smoke. After judging the teacher's bad behavior to be willful, the board of education decided to enact the punishment. |
| Aug 09 | Teacher served third arrest warrant for rape of primary school girl (Mainichi) |
| The Metropolitan Police Department has served a third arrest warrant on a primary school teacher suspected in a number of sexual assaults on primary and junior high school girls starting in November 2008. The third warrant accuses Yui Otsuka, 29, of trespassing on a home in the Tama District of Tokyo and raping a primary school girl in March 2009. Otsuka has already been indicted on a number of similar charges. |
| Aug 09 | The only Filipino nurse to pass Japan's nursing exam (inquirer.net) |
 Ever Lalin, like others in the first batch of 98 nurses and caregivers who went to Japan May last year for a training stint preparatory to taking the Japanese nursing licensure exam, had no prior lessons in the Niponggo language.
"Halimaw ah (A monster's feat)," cheered nurse bloggers when it was announced last March that Ever, 34, was the only Filipino to pass the difficult licensure exam and the only foreign applicant to get it on the first try. Two Indonesians who had arrived a year earlier also passed. The exam included a proficiency test in "kanji," Chinese characters that are a mindset away from those schooled in the Roman alphabet.
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| Aug 08 | More respect for historic buildings (Japan Times) |
| Regarding Takahiro Fukada's July 31 article, "Historic schools face doom": Why is this not surprising? It's once again out with the old and in with the new, historical or cultural significance be damned, along with the sentiment of local community residents. An example, once again, of Japan's democracy inaction. Never mind the financial waste as well. Has no one in Chuo Ward's planning office ever heard of renovation? The old school buildings could be renovated at a fraction of the cost of tearing them down and putting up new "glass and steel" structures. |
| Aug 08 | English teachers are not overpaid (Japan Times) |
| Regarding Steve Sacks Aug. 1 letter, "ALTs (assistant language teachers) could contribute much more": I was an English teacher in Japan 13 years ago. Straight out of college, I thought the pay was great - until I actually tried living on it in Tokyo. I have long since moved on and moved up in a different career, and looking back, I have to say that ¥300,000 a month is practically minimum wage in the United States. Given the cost of living in Japan, it is barely a living wage. |
| Aug 07 | Simile-ing with you, not at you (Japan Times) |
| "Hey . . . Get that!" A simple husband-to-wife request in what had been the hush of a peaceful morning. "Get what?" she said. "What do you mean, 'Get what!?' " Because at that moment our tea kettle was foaming at its metal mouth and peeping a tune so shrill it could both wake the dead and make them dearly regret the experience. A screech I found I could only illustrate by adding a particular emphasis. Like by stating our about-to-burst kettle was . . . "Screaming like a banshee!" Adjective omitted. |