Aug 26 (Japan Today) - A Tokyo high school student is in critical condition after suffering heatstroke during a basketball club practice, the metropolitan education board said Friday.
The 15-year-old pupil at Eifuku Gakuen, a public high school for mentally-disabled students, collapsed on Wednesday after a 31-year-old teacher ordered him earlier this week to carry out extra runs around the school buildings because he could not finish a running course within the instructed time.
The first-year student remains unconscious and the Tokyo education board said, "Long-hour running constitutes corporal punishment and it was an inappropriate instruction to put an excessive burden (on the pupil) during high temperatures."
According to the education board, seven members of the basketball club were asked to run a 450-meter course around the school buildings within 1 minute and 25 seconds on Monday afternoon.
The student finished in 2 minutes and 8 seconds, and was asked to run the course 43 times. After he had done 21 rounds, he became ill and left the school.