Regarding the Nov. 23 article "Japan's schools flunking at global level": Calls for reform by politicians and university administrators uniformly cite lack of competitiveness and the failure to meet international standards in support of often untested reforms. Throughout my university career that included senior positions in New Zealand, the Netherlands and at Waseda University (my last position), the voice of teachers in the classroom was seldom taken seriously or, if sought at all, usually ignored.
Starving universities of government funds is conducted in the name of "making universities more responsive to society," a process that commenced worldwide around the mid-1980s, and has continued ever since. It has seemingly been forgotten that the education system is an essential part of "public goods" that are best NOT subjected to the marketplace, the race for student enrollments and the largest number of high-level diplomas in the shortest possible period.
Worst of all, universities in non-English speaking countries seem bent on competing for students with institutions in English-speaking countries, introducing reforms that easily lower the quality of teaching -- especially for students of the home country. Why not begin with simple reforms such as the large-scale reduction in the number of useless meetings, administrators, managers and expensive consultant reports whose main purpose is another round of "reforms"?