Japan’s education system played a central
role in enabling the country to meet the
challenges presented by the need to quickly
absorb Western ideas, science, and
technology in the Meiji period (1868–1912),
and it was also a key factor in Japan’s
recovery and rapid economic growth in the
decades following the end of World War II.
In the early years of the 21st century,
however, Japanese society is facing many
challenges as a result of changing cultural
norms, advances in science and technology,
economic globalization, and a difficult
business environment. Nurturing young
people who can meet these challenges is a
critical task for Japanese education. The
direction to be taken in this endeavor is the
subject of much debate in the government,
the education community, and Japanese
society as a whole.
Education in reading and writing has of
course existed in some form since the
introduction of Chinese writing and Buddhism
in the 6th century. In 701, the Taiho Code
established schools for the children of the
nobility, in both the capital and the provinces.
Beginning in the Kamakura period (ca. 1185–
1333), an increasing number of the children of
the samurai received a formal education, but
it was not until the 265 years of peace of the
Edo period (1603–1868) that education
became widespread among both the elite and
the common people.
Education in the Edo period was primarily
based on Confucian concepts that
emphasized rote learning and study of the
Chinese classics. Two main types of schools
developed. The first type was the domainal
EDUCATION
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History
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1 EDUCATION
Komaba campus, the
University of Tokyo
schools (hanko), which totaled around 270 by
the end of the period and provided education
primarily to children of the samurai class. The
second type was the terakoya schools, which
enrolled the children of commoners as well as
samurai and concentrated on moral training
and teaching reading, writing, and arithmetic.
Terakoya were usually run by a single teacher
or a married couple, and there were tens of
thousands of these schools in existence at
the end of the Edo period.
Japan’s literacy rate at the time of the
collapse of the Tokugawa shogunate in 1868
was higher than that of many Western nations
at the time. Without this educational
foundation, the rapid modernization achieved
in the following years would not have been
possible.
Meiji leaders moved quickly to put a new
educational system into place as a key part of
their efforts to catch up with the West and
promote national unity. A three-tier system of
primary school, middle school, and university
was established, with primary school being
compulsory for both boys and girls.
Following the end of World War II, the
Fundamental Law on Education and the
School Education Law were enacted in 1947
under the direction of the Occupation forces.
The latter law defined the system that is still in
use today: six years of elementary school,
three years of junior high school, three years
of high school, and two or four years of
university. Elementary and junior high school
attendance is compulsory. There are also
kindergartens (attended from one to three
years), five-year technical colleges for junior
high school graduates, special training
schools for junior high and high school
graduates, and special schools for
handicapped persons. Universities include
undergraduate colleges, junior colleges, and
graduate schools.
School calendar: For most elementary,
junior high, and high schools, the school year
in Japan begins on April 1 and is divided into
three terms: April to July, September to
2 EDUCATION
Schools and Curricula
Elementary school children
(Photo courtesy of Getty Images)
December, and January to March. Some
schools follow a two-term schedule. The
gradual transition from a six-day school week
to a five-day week was completed in 2002.
Many private schools, however, continued to
hold Saturday classes, and in recent years
some public high schools have obtained
special permission to reintroduce Saturday
classes to give them more time to cover the
necessary subjects.
School course guidelines: The Ministry of
Education, Culture, Sports, Science and
Technology prepares guidelines containing
basic outlines of each subject taught in
Japanese schools and the objectives and
content of teaching in each grade. Revised
every 10 years or so, these guidelines are
followed by schools nationwide.
School textbooks: All elementary, junior
high, and high schools are obliged to use text
books that have been evaluated and
approved by the Ministry of Education,
Culture, Sports, Science and Technology.
The purpose of the official authorization
system, which has been in effect since 1886,
is the standardization of education and the
maintenance of objectivity and neutrality on
political and religious issues. A system of free
distribution of textbooks for compulsory
education was established in 1963. The
textbooks used in each public school district
are chosen from among governmentauthorized
candidates by the local board of
education based on a review by the
prefectural board of education. At private
schools, the school principal is responsible for
the choice.
Pre-school education: Education prior to
elementary school is provided at
kindergartens (yochien) and day-care centers
(hoikuen). Public and private day-care centers
accept children from under age one up to age
five; their programs for children age three to
five resemble those at kindergartens.
Approximately 60% of all kindergartens are
privately operated. The combined attendance
of five-year-olds at kindergartens and daycare
centers exceeds 95%. The educational
approach at kindergartens varies
considerably, from unstructured
environments that emphasize play and
provide little formal instruction to highly
structured environments that are focused on
mental training.
Elementary schools: Attendance for the six
years of elementary education is compulsory.
Ninety-nine percent of elementary schools are
public coeducational institutions. A single
teacher is assigned to each class and
responsible for instruction in most subjects,
with the exceptions generally being subjects
such as music and art. In 2011, the maximum
class size at a public elementary school was
35 for 1st-grade classes and 40 for other
grades. In principle, classes are not
segregated based on student ability, but for
instruction in certain subjects students might
be divided up into groups taking proficiency
level into account. The curriculum includes
the following subjects: Japanese language,
social studies, arithmetic, science, life
environmental studies, music, arts and crafts,
physical education, and homemaking.
Requirements also include extracurricular
activities, a moral education course, and
integrated study, which can cover a wide
range of topics (international understanding,
the environment, volunteer activities, etc.).
Reading and writing are perhaps the most
important parts of the elementary school
curriculum; in addition to the two Japanese
syllabaries, students are expected to learn at
least 1006 Chinese characters by the end of
the sixth grade.
Junior high schools: Attendance for the
three years of junior high school education is
compulsory. More than 90 percent of junior
high schools are public coeducational
institutions. Each year students are assigned
to a homeroom with a maximum of 40
students (the average class size in 2010 was
29.4), with whom they take their classes. For
the most part, classes are not segregated
based on ability, but some schools have
implemented streaming systems for math and
English classes. The standard curriculum
includes the following required subjects:
3 EDUCATION
High school girls at their studies
(Photo courtesy of Getty Images)
Japanese language, social studies,
mathematics, science, a foreign language
elective (almost always English), music, fine
arts, health and physical education, and
industrial arts or homemaking. Requirements
also include extracurricular activities, a moral
education course, and integrated study.
High schools: High school attendance is
optional. In 2010, 98% of all junior high school
graduates entered high school, and about
74% of all high schools were public. High
school entrance is based on exam
performance and the competition is intense
for favored schools. Students attending
unified junior high and high schools avoid the
high school entrance exam pressure, but
there are still relatively few such unified
schools in the public school system. The high
school core curriculum includes the following
required subjects: Japanese language,
geography and history, civics, mathematics,
science, health and physical education, art,
foreign language, home economics, and
information. Extracurricular activities and
integrated study are also required. Students
in special vocational programs also take
courses in their area of study (business,
industrial arts, agriculture, etc.) while
spending less time on the core curriculum
than regular students.
With almost all junior high school students
now going on to high school regardless of
their desire and willingness to learn, high
schools are looking for ways to reduce
student apathy and the number of dropouts.
As part of this effort, new and more diverse
models of high school education are being
introduced to better respond to the different
abilities and interests of individual students.
Examples of such new models include creditbased
high schools, where graduation is
based on accumulated credits rather than
completion of a set number of full academic
years, and integrated-program schools, where
students have more flexibility to take electives
based on their individual interests and abilities.
Universities: The percentage of Japanese
high school graduates going to either a two
year junior college or four-year university
passed 41% in 1993 and stood at 53.6% in
2012.The figure for four-year colleges and
universities alone was about 47.7% in 2012.
The figure for four-year colleges and
universities alone was about 47%. The great
majority of junior college students are women.
77.0% of all universities and 93.1% of all
junior colleges are private. In 2012, 13.8% of
four-year university graduates went on to
graduate school.
An extensive series of reforms was
recently implemented in the Japanese
university system, with the changes to the
national university system being particularly
drastic. In 2004, the 99 national universities
were reorganized into 87 institutions. In
addition, the national universities—which had
been internal organs of the Ministry of
Education, Culture, Sports, Science and
Technology—were transformed into
independent administrative institutions with
the objective of creating a more competitive
and independent environment in which the
universities can introduce private sector
management techniques and develop their
own special strengths with respect to both
education and research. In order to nurture
people with the wide range of expertise
needed by society, many universities have
also established new specialized graduate
school programs in both business and law.
The number of foreign students at
Japanese universities continues to increase,
with the total studying at junior colleges,
universities, and graduate schools reaching
137,756 in May 2012. Approximately 92.3%
of these students are from Asia.
Tutoring schools and cram schools:
Although they are not part of the core
educational system, academic tutoring
schools (gakushujuku) and cram schools
(yobiko) also play a significant role in
education in Japan. The cram schools focus
strictly on preparing students for university
entrance examinations. The academic
tutoring schools have a more general goal of
helping students keep up with and go beyond
their regular school work, although exam
preparation is frequently emphasized.
According to estimates in fiscal 2008 by the
Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science
and Technology, academic tutoring schools
4 EDUCATION
are attended by 25.9% of public elementary
school students and 53.5% of public junior
high school students.
The Japanese educational system lays
emphasis on cooperative behavior, group
discipline, and conformity to standards. It
served the country well in producing the
skilled industrial workforce that made Japan a
global economic power in the 20th century.
The success of the system is further reflected
in the fact that the great majority of the
Japanese people consider themselves middle
class and see education as the road to
prosperity for their children.
In 2006 the government passed the firstever
revision to the 1947 Fundamental Law of
Education. This revision included provisions
calling for education to instill public
spiritedness, respect for tradition and culture,
and love of country. The curriculum guidelines
were also revised in 2008 to enhance
fundamental education by fostering basic
knowledge and skills, and to expand class
hours. The new curriculum guidelines were
introduced in the 2011 school year for
elementary schools and in the 2012 school
year for junior high schools.
In 1949, Yukawa Hideki became the first
Japanese Nobel laureate, winning a physics
prize for predicting the existence of
mesotrons. He was followed by Esaki Reona
with a physics prize in 1973, Tonegawa
Susumu a prize for physiology or medicine in
1987, and Oe Kenzaburo a literature prize in
1994. More recently, Japanese have won
Nobel prizes one after another in the natural
science area. In 2002, Koshiba Masatoshi of
the University of Tokyo won a physics prize,
Suzuki Akira of Hokkaido University and
Negishi Eiichi of the University of Tokyo
chemistry prizes in 2010, and Yamanaka
Shinya of Kyoto University a prize for
physiology or medicine in 2012 for the
development of the iPS cell. In 2008 and
2010 alone, a total of six Japanese were
awarded physics and chemistry prizes, the
highest honor for natural scientists,
highlighting Japan aiming at becoming a
world leader in science and technology.
The Challenge of Reform